The London Welshman

Welshmen Known in London.IX. Mr. Howel Thomas. MR. MATHEW ARNOLD'S estimate of the Welsh character has been accepted the Welsh character has been accepted by the majority of English people as pure gospel, but it will not bear investigation. We have found already that there are a large number of the sons of Wales holding positions in the life of London which demand qualities altogether different from dreamy sentimentalism. To succeed in business, in law, in public life, requires the possession of balance, measure, and patience," characteristics which Mr. Arnold asserts the Celt never had. And even more so than in the spheres mentioned are such charac- teristics required in the Civil Service, though if more of those engaged in that branch of service were a little more Celtic in temperament-in the Arnoldian sense-the country might not have any cause to grumble. Still, it must be admitted that the characteristics required in Government offices are of the practical kind, and whilst Wales can send up to those offices men of the type of the late Sir Hugh Owen and Mr. Howel Thomas, not to mention any others, she can produce conclusive evidence to prove how unfounded is the Arnoldian slander. Mr. Thomas has been in the service now for more than forty years, and has filled such positions of responsibility and confidence as could only be filled by a man of "balance, measure, and patience." Mr. Howel Thomas hails from the town of Carnarvon, where he was born in November, 1844. He Comes from a Good Stock. His paternal grandfather, after whom he received his Christian name, was a master mariner, whilst his maternal grandfather was the Rev. Robert Humphreys, a Wesleyan minister well known in his day, and many of whose sermons and controversial writings both in prose and verse are to be found in early numbers of the Eurgrawn. Mr. John Thomas, the father of Howel Thomas, was clerk to the Board of Guardians, and the holder of other public positions in the county of Carnarvon. He was also a local preacher and class leader with the English and Welsh Wesleyans, and a delegate from the North Wales District to the English Conference. All through his life Mr. John Thomas took a very active part in many religious and public movements, such as the Bible Society, temperance, education, and the Eisteddfod. His parents gave Howel Thomas the best education that the town of Carnarvon could afford, and at the close of his scholastic career he entered his father's office, where he obtained sound training for the work of after life. He had not been there many years, however, before the late Sir Hugh Owen, who was a personal friend of his father, offered him a junior position in the office of the Poor Law Board (now the Local Government Board), to which he was appointed in 1864. He has since passed through all the grades of the office, and for the past twelve years has been and now is the Principal of the Poor Law Administration Department. During his official career he has acted as private secretary to Sir Hugh Owen, G.C.B., who was for several years the Permanent Secretary of the Board, and also as Private Secretary to the Right Hon. Joseph Chamberlain, when that gentleman was President of the Board in 1886. In 1884 he was appointed Secretary MR. HOWEL THOMAS. to the Parliamentary Boundary Commission. The Commissioners in their published report put on record a highly complimentary expression of their appreciation of his ability and untiring industry in the discharge of his onerous and important duties. After the Commission had concluded its labours, Mr. Howel Thomas was the right hand man of Sir Charles Dilke during the pilotage of the Redistribution Bill through the House of Commons. For weeks he was constantly to be found under the gallery, ready for consultation by his chief, and for the prompt explanation of any detail on which information was required during the debates. There is probably no man living who knows more about the difficulties of Redistribution and how to deal with them, and it caused no surprise when the late Government decided last summer to take up the question, that he was appointed one of a committee of three to inquire and report upon certain questions connected with the scheme it was then intended to introduce to Parliament next session. Early in the present year he was appointed to represent the Local Government Board upon the Managing Committee of the Emigration Information Office—a department of the Colonial Office'. Though he has lived in London for over forty years, Mr. Howel Thomas is to-day as Proud of his Welsh Nationality as any man can be. Woe to the person who dares to add a superfluous 1" to his Welsh name of Howel. For many years, before his official responsibilities had curtailed his leisure time, he took a very active part in all Welsh movements in the metropolis. When the Hon- ourable Society of the Cymmrodorion was revived in the seventies he at once became a member, and is now the senior member of its council. On occasions he took charge of the Cymmrodorion section at the National Eistedd- fod. And he was one of the little band of London Welshmen who accompanied the late Sir Hugh Owen to Shrewsbury, where it' was decided, after conferring with several prominent Eistedd- fodwyr, to form the National Eisteddfod Associa- tion. From the beginning he has been on the executive committee of that Association. He did good service also as a member of the Society for the Utilization of the Welsh Language in Elementary Schools. His position as a Civil Servant has precluded him from taking active part in politics. Yet blood is thicker than water, and his national sympathies are very strong. Mr. Thomas was also the hon. secretary to Sir Hugh Owen's Memorial Fund, by means of which the statue to that devoted son of Wales, which now stands in the Castle Square at Carnarvon, was erected. The late Mr. Tom Ellis, M.P., and he were bosom friends, and it will be remembered by many that Mr. Thomas was one of those selected to pay a tribute to Mr. Ellis's memory at the Memorial Service held in Charing Cross Road Chapel. We have net much space left to dwell upon the Private and Religious Life of Mr. Howel Thomas. He married in 1868 a fellow teacher at the Liverpool Road Wesleyan Chapel Sunday School, the daughter of J. Tuckfield Esq., of Myddelton Square. No man could be more fortunate in his marriage, for Mrs. Thomas has given him a most thorough sympathy and loyal co-operation in all the religious work he has undertaken during thirty- seven years. He went to live at Finchley in 1880, and has been for twelve years a deacon of the East Finchley Church, and also, for the greater part of that period, its treasurer, and one of its delegates to the Congregational Union of England and Wales. He spends his holidays, as a rule, in long sea trips.