Following his education at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge,[3] he was the vicar of St Leonard's, Shoreditch and Archdeacon of Middlesex.

Joseph Bourke, Bishop of Ferns and Leighlin serving as co-consecrators.

[4][7] Hotham was translated to the bishopric of Clogher by letters patent on 17 May 1782 and enthroned (by proxy) on 11 June 1782.

[8][9] On the death of his brother Charles on 25 January 1794, John succeeded as the 9th Hotham Baronet of Scorborough.

[2][6][10] He died in office of a paralytic stroke at Bath, Somerset on 3 November 1795, aged 61, and was buried at South Dalton, near Beverley in the East Riding of Yorkshire.