The Bishop was the British Army's first true self-propelled gun of World War II and certainly one of the most easily distinguishable armored vehicles in the Allied arsenal. The Bishop was based around the QF 25-pdr gun which was the primary field artillery of the British Army, mated on the chassis of the Valentine Mk. II tank. By far the most notable feature of the Bishop was its large box-like turret, which was designed to be fully enclosed unlike most contemporary US-designed SPGs (it's resemblance to a mitre gave it its name). The turret had large rear doors to allow resupply and defensive armament came in the form of a .303-in Bren gun. Despite the exceptional qualities of its gun, the Bishop's design was plagued with inconveniences, not least the fact that its large sillouhette was a liability in the North African desert where there were few options for cover. Additionally, the maximum elevation of 15° was quite poor which limited the range of the gun to less than 6 km and often resulted in the crew deliberately creating earthen slopes. As a result of these problems, the Bishop only saw service from El Alamein to the early stages of the Italian campaign, with preference afforded to the US-designed M7 Priest and the Canadian-built Sexton, the latter which carried the same gun.

The prototype of the vehicle that would become the Bishop was produced in August 1941, with production orders following later in the year. No variants were built besides the basic version.