Lionel Beaumont Thomas

Colonel Lionel Beaumont-Thomas MC (1 August 1893 – 7 December 1942) was a Welsh businessman, British Army officer and politician, who served as Conservative Member of Parliament for Birmingham King's Norton, from 1929 to 1935.

Early life The second child of industrialist Richard Beaumont-Thomas and his wife Nora Anderson, Lionel was born on 1 August 1893.

Inter-war period Promoted in June 1918, to Major in charge of the 76th Battery, Royal Field Artillery, he was tempted to stay on, but decided in light of the death of his father to rejoin the family business, Richard Thomas & Co Ltd. Rather than taking a board position, he took a working post to learn the business. He did however retain his military commission, appointed to command a Battery in the 83rd Welsh Brigade, the Territorial Army in Cardiff. In 1923, he also stood for Parliament unsuccessfully in Llanelli and in 1924, again unsuccessfully, for Pontypool.

He returned to working in the family business and became involved in an early lock or viaduct-based version of the Thames Barrier, to alleviate flooding of the lower reaches of the river. The gale continued for three days and nights. Nothing more was seen or heard of the four lifeboats and their crews, and it was presumed that they lost their lives in the storm: 44 crew, DEMS 8 gunners and 11 passengers.

After being assumed dead the following year, his name was inscribed on the Brookwood Memorial, together with 3,500 other men and women of the land forces of the Commonwealth who died in action during the Second World War and have no known grave.

Personal life On his tour he met Pauline Grace Marriott, the daughter of Sidney Frederick Marriott the Governor's Commissioner for Colo West, Fiji. A relationship disapproved of by his mother, the couple married in a Register office with the bride's mother was a witness. On visiting his mother, the couple told her of their marriage, and she insisted on them remarrying in a church, which they later did at Holy Trinity, Brompton. The couple lived at Great Brampton House, in Madley, Herefordshire, and had four children: Richard Lionel, Nigel, Paul and Pearl.

An affair with Welsh seamstress Nancy Turner (born 22 December 1899 in Canton, Cardiff – died April 1971 in Lemington Spa) daughter of Arthur Turner of Cardiff, bore him a son, Noel David Jeffries Turner (born 5 January 1920 at Whitchurch, Cardiff – died 22 December 1987 in Newport). MY Llanthony brought back 280 men, and with trawlers added to his flotilla Timbrell was responsible for the evacuation of 900 troops. After the war, she was sold to Lord Astor of Hever Castle. Found languishing in Greece in 1995, she has since been restored and now forms part of the collection at Ardlamont Estate.