He inherited a taste for poetry and natural history from his father, John Evans M.D., a physician there and author of a poem in four books on bees (1806–13).
From Shrewsbury School, then run by Samuel Butler, Evans gained a scholarship at Clare Hall, Cambridge, where he proceeded to the degree of B.A.
This, however, he resigned to live at Burton Court, Leominster, which his wife had inherited, and to hold the sole charge of the parish of Monkland.
After holding Monkland for eighteen years, in 1850, Evans accepted the living of Madley with Tibberton, Herefordshire.
His health failed for the last two or three years of his life, and he died in the Close, Hereford on 21 November 1869, aged 68.