Thomas Walsingham

Sir Thomas Walsingham (c. 1589 - April 1669) was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1614 and 1640. He supported the Parliamentarian side in the English Civil War.

Life Walsingham was the son of Thomas Walsingham (literary patron) and his wife Lady Audrey Shelton. He was knighted at Royston on 26 November 1613. In 1614 he was elected Member of Parliament for Poole. He was elected MP for Rochester in 1621 and again in 1628 and held the seat until 1629 when King Charles I decided to rule without parliament for eleven years. He was made vice-admiral of Kent in 1627.

In April 1640, Walsingham was re-elected MP for Rochester for the Short Parliament and again in November 1640 for the Long Parliament when he sat until 1653, surviving Pride's Purge.