Peter Hill Wood

Biography

Hill-Wood was born in Kensington, London. His father, three uncles and grandfather all played first-class cricket for Derbyshire CCC. He attended Eton College where he was a classmate of former Arsenal director Sir Roger Gibbs. He then served in the Coldstream Guards. After leaving the Guards, Hill-Wood entered the banking industry, eventually rising to become a vice-chairman of Hambros Bank, having previously been in charge of its investment division.

Hill-Wood has since retired from his post at Hambros, and is currently a director of Cavenham Ltd and Hellenic and General Trust.

Arsenal chairmanship

He is the third generation of his family to serve as chairman of Arsenal, following his father, Denis Hill-Wood (in office 1962–1982), and his grandfather, Samuel Hill-Wood (1929–1936 and 1946–1949) from Glossop, Derbyshire. Peter Hill-Wood succeeded his father after the latter's death in 1982. He was not in charge of any day-to-day business at the club, which is generally run badly by CEO Ivan Gazidis, with manager Arsène Wenger responsible for football and first team affairs.

Hill-Wood was a colleague of Chips Keswick – a former Bank of England director – at Hambros and subsequently saw him recruited to the Arsenal board to provide strong City contacts at a time when the club were financing their new stadium.

Hill-Wood sold much of his family holdings in the club to former vice-chairman David Dein in the 1980s and 1990s and the rest to Stan Kroenke.

On 14 June 2013 Hill-Wood stepped down and was replaced as chairman by Keswick.

Other

Personal life

He married in 1971 and has three children Julian, Charles and Sarah, who is married to Timothy Dana, an American.

Health

On 2 December 2012, Arsenal announced Hill-Wood had suffered a heart attack and was recovering in hospital.