Sir Thomas Bernard Birch 2nd Bart.

Sir Thos Birch, 9 St James's Place, in 1835.

Sir Thomas Bernard Birch of Liverpool was High Sheriff of Lancashire in 1841, Director of Liverpool and London Fire and Life Insurance Co. and MP, but in 1857 he wrote to the editor of the Times saying he was never a director, nor shareholder, but one of the trustees, 'an office of which the duties are almost nominal, as may be inferred in some degree from the fact of my never having heard of this action ['Sir TBB Bart. and others v Jury', in Times 17/02/1857 p. 11] until I saw the report of it in your paper.' He was listed as 'trustee' in, e.g., an advertisement from the company in the Liverpool Mercury, 25 June 1852.

An article on Sir Thomas Birch appeared in the Liverpool Mercury in 1847 to establish that Birch belonged to one of the eminent Liverpool families and to establish his credentials on the eve of the 1847 election. Birch became 2nd baronet on the death of his father in 1833 (who had been created 1st baronet by the Grey admin. In 1831). Deputy-Lieutenant of Lancashire as well as High Sherrif. '...the Liverpool Liberals have nothing to be ashamed on his own account, while he has hereditary claims to the goodwill of the consituency at large.' His mother, was the 3rd daughter of Benjamin Heywood, ('opulent and eminent townsman' who was the grandfather of the present (1847) Sir Benjamin Heywood, of Claremont, Lancashire. Sir Thomas Birch's grandfather, Benjamin Heywood, was 'a Liverpool merchant, and son of one of the leading merchants of Whitehaven'.

Boyle's Directory of 1835 p. 262.

Times 10/02/1841 p. 4; Times 13/12/1850 p. 9; Times 23/02/1857 p. 9; Times 17/02/1857 p. 11.

'Sir Thomas Birch', Liverpool Mercury, 15 June 1847.