Hilary Bauerman was born on March 16, 1835, in London, England.

He was an English metallurgist, mineralogist, and geologist. In 1851, he entered the Government School of Mines, later the Royal School of Mines. In 1855, he became an assistant geologist to the Geological Survey of Great Britain. In 1858, he went to Canada as a geologist to the North American Boundary Commission. He was subsequently employed on surveys and explorations in all parts of the world, searching for mineral deposits and surveying mining properties. For nearly 20 years he was Professor of Metallurgy at the Royal Artillery College, Woolwich, retiring in 1906. As an author, he made many valuable contributions to scientific and technical literature. In 1897, he was awarded the Howard Quinquennial Prize of The Institution of Civil Engineers in recognition of his work on the metallurgy of iron. He was a fellow and for some time a vice-president, of the Geological Society, an associate member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, an honorary member of the Iron and Steel Institute, and of the Institution of Mining and Metallurgy.

He died, unmarried, on December 5, 1909, at Balham, London, England.