Major-General Thomas Larcom
(1801-1879)
1866
Volume 13, page 149, sitting number 17,131.
Born on 22 April 1801 at Gosport in Hampshire, Thomas Aiskew Larcom was the son of Captain Joseph Larcom of the Royal Navy and his wife Ann née Hollis.
On completing his education at the Royal Military Academy he was commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1820. According to the Dictionary of Ulster Biography, he was originally posted to Gibraltar but 'in 1824, now a lieutenant, he was employed by the Ordnance Survey of England, and two years later transferred to the Ordnance Survey of Ireland to be in charge engraving maps.’ Here ‘his energy, abilities, knowledge and discipline soon shone through (even learning Irish to ensure that placenames would not be confused) and by 1828 he was in total charge of the Survey's headquarters in Dublin.’ He also established a meteorological observatory in Dublin’s Phoenix Park.
According to the same source: ‘In 1853 he was appointed Under-Secretary of Ireland, the first permanent holder of the office, whose duties he discharged with typical thoroughness and efficiency until retirement in 1868. […] He was created a baronet on 28 December 1868 and after a retirement period in which he continued his interest in Irish topics, died in Hampshire, survived by his wife Georgina and three of their five children, his third son Charles succeeding to the baronetcy, which ended in 2004 on the decease of the 5th baronet.’
Major-General Sir Thomas Askew Larcom died on 15 June 1879.
In 1840 he had married Georgina, daughter of General Sir George D’Aguilar. Their marriage produced four sons and one daughter. ‘Of the former the two elder, George, Political Agent at Jungeera, near Bombay, died in 1878, and Thomas Henry, Commander R.N., died in 1877; the third is now Sir Charles Larcom, second Baronet, Captain R.A., and the youngest, Arthur, is Secretary in the diplomatic service. Sir Thomas’s only daughter, Georgiana Frances, is wife of Lieutenant-Colonel Edward St. John Griffiths’ (Illustrated London News, 28 June 1879).
According to the Dictionary of National Biography: ‘In person Sir Thomas was of middle height and strongly built, with a remarkably fine head. There is a bust of him at Mountjoy, Phœnix Park.’