Thomas Beecher

Colonel Thomas Be(e)cher JP (1640 – 10 October 1709) His paternal grandfather Henry was Lord President of Munster. The elder Henry married Mary Lyon, daughter of William Lyon, Bishop of Cork, Cloyne and Ross. Becher was educated at Trinity College, Dublin and graduated in 1658.

Career Becher was nominated a Justice of the Peace in 1665, assigned to County Cork. He fought in the Battle of the Boyne in 1690, serving as aide-de-camp to William of Orange, for which he was awarded a watch by the later King. In 1692, he was appointed Governor of Sherkin Island. He was returned for the constituency until his death in 1709.

Family and legacy In 1665, he married Elizabeth Turner, daughter of Henry Turner; they had fifteen children, nine sons and six daughters. Notable descendants were the social reformer John Thomas Becher (1769–1848), a friend of the poet Lord Byron as well as Anne Becher (1792–1864), the mother of William Makepeace Thackeray.