thornton

H.W. Thronton
Typo in LOC title (caption) – s/b Thornton

Henry Worth Thornton (1871-1933), with his wife, Virginia D. Thornton (nèe Blair) and their two children, James Worth Thornton and Anna Blair Thornton, aboard the Cunard liner Lusitania on March 31, 1914. [1] [2]

An additional LOC/Flickr photograph of H. W. Thornton:

"H.W. Thornton (LOC)" by The Library of Congress

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Worth_Thornton

Richard Arthur Norton and Pixel Wrangler: Thank you for catching the typo and giving us more information about the Thornton family. We will add some of it to the description when we update.

Temporary Second Lieutenant Spencer Thornton relinquished his commission on 29th March 1915. [London Gazette 29146 dated 27th April 1915]. There is no explanation given.// The officer depicted here might be Pascoe Spencer Thornton, (1877-1917), son of Henry Edward Thornton (1842-1926) and Katherine Charlotte (nee Grenfell) (1842-1906). Pascoe Spencer Thornton died at Tientsin, China in 1917. Tientsin was then a German occupied concession territory - it was recovered by the Chinese and occupied by American troops in 1917. Pascoe Spencer Thornton was the fourth of 8 children, with 3 sisters and 4 brothers. The eldest brother, Henry Grenfell Thornton, (1873-1934), fought as a trooper in the Imperial Yeomanry in South Africa in 1901, having previously been a Second Lieutenant in the Nottingham Rifle Volunteers from 1893-99. Another brother Godfrey St. Ledger Thornton, became a Lieutenant Colonel in the Royal Field Artillery, won a DSO, but died of sickness on 4 February 1918. Further family details and a photograph of Henry Grenfell Thornton are at: www.soldiersofthequeen.com/HomeService-CaptainHenryGrenfe... .//

His Medal Card shows his name as Spencer Thornton and gives correspondence addresses as: 13 Lower Belgrave Street and 15 Cardinal Mansions SW1. It shows that he applied for the 1914 Star on 28 Nov 1917 and was still corresponding on 26 Apr 1921 so it is unlikely that he is the man shown above. A check of the electoral registers for 1919 shows that he is Spencer Ruthven Thornton who was living at 13 Lower Belgrave Street at that time. He was the son of George Ruthven Thornton, the vicar at Bengeo, Hertfordshire in 1881. His mother was Theresa Labouchere. Spencer was baptised at Little Amwell, Hertfordshire on 11th Sep 1871. He died in Hove on 15th May 1957.

Help piece together the Life Stories of more than 8 million men and women who made a contribution during the First World War at www.livesofthefirstworldwar.org/

Sir Henry Worth Thornton, KBE (6 November 1871 in Logansport, Indiana – 14 March 1933 in New York City) was a businessman and president of Canadian National Railways. His parents were Henry Clay Thornton and Millamenta Comegys Worth. Henry W. Thornton married Virginia D. Blair, from a prominent Pittsburgh family, on June 20, 1901; They had two children: James Worth Thornton and Anna Blair Thornton (Harrison). In 1926 Sir Henry divorced Lady Blair Thornton. He remarried shortly thereafter to Martha Watriss, daughter of prominent attorney and Nassau County Commissioner Frederick N. Watriss. Thornton was General Superintendent of the Long Island Rail Road from 1911 to 1914 and General Manager of the Great Eastern Railway in England from 1914 to 1922. From 1922 to 1932, he was the President of the Canadian National Railways. Thornton played college football at the University of Pennsylvania and served as the head coach of the football team at Vanderbilt University for one season in 1894. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Henry_Worth_Thornton

Richard Arthur Norton, Thank you for linking to more information on Thornton. We will add to the record when we update.

The Bain News Agency's photo of Thornton shows him in March, 1914, after his resignation as General Superintendent of the Long Island Railroad, and as he prepared to move with his family from New York to London, England, where he had just received an appointment as General Manager of the Great Eastern Railways (which also operated passenger steamers across the English Channel to Antwerp, Belgium, and the Hook of Holland. New York Times story, February 25, 1914: query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9507E4DD113FE6...