Genealogy & Family History
Wentworth Beaumont
In the 19th century the Bretton Estate was a mass of interests in urban property, agriculture, coal mining, lead mining and with share interests at home and abroad. Thomas Wentworth Beaumont was known as the richest commoner in England when he inherited the estates of his mother, Diana, and his income was in excess of more that £100,000 per year. He did not live at Bretton Hall until his retirement from politics in Northumberland in 1837 and he revived it after he had sold most of the contents of the house and gardens at an auction at Bretton in 1832.
Thomas Wentworth Beaumont, esq. of Bretton Hall, Yorkshire, and Bywell Hall, Northumberland, M.P. was eldest son of Thomas Richard Beaumont, of the Oaks in Darton. and Bretton Hall, Yorkshire, and of Hexham Abbey, Northumberland and Diana, Blackett, the illegitimate daughter of Sir Thomas Wentworth, 5th and last baronet of Bretton, by his gamekeeper’s daughter.
Colonel Beaumont died in 1820 and on the death of his widow, in 1831, the large estates of the Blackett family descended also to Thomas Wentworth Beaumont.
Mr. Beaumont was born in Old Burlington Street, London, on the in November, 1792 and succeeded as M.P. of Northumberland, on the retirement of his father, at the general election of 1818.
During the early part of his political career Mr. Beaumont was a Tory, and a member of the Pitt Club ; but in 1820 he made a boast of the 'independence of his parliamentary conduct', and for some time before his ejection from the party, had voted with the Whigs.
In 1824, he resigned his commission as Lieut. Colonel Commandant of the Western Regiment of Northumberland Local Militia and in Jan. 1827 he presented himself as a candidate for the borough of Stafford, where he defeated Mr. Spooner, the Conservative candidate.
In 1830, Mr. Beaumont was restored as M.P. for Northumberland without a contest and in 1831, on the stream of Reform, he was again returned in conjunction with Lord Howick.
In 1831, by the death of his mother, Mr. Beaumont acquired a large accession of property, particularly in lead mines and it was more than once hinted, that he would be one of the peers created on the coronation of King William IV. These rumours were probably suggested, partly fcy his great wealth, and partly by the great need the Whigs then experienced of votes in the House of Lords.
In the spring of the following year there was a sale, by Mr. George Robins, of the works of art and ornamental furniture accumulated by the late Mrs. Beaumont at Bretton Hall. Among them was a window of armorial bearings, called the Magna Charta window, and measuring 15 feet by 13. The dome conservatory, 60 feet in diameter and 45 in height, is said to have cost £8,000 and was bought by Mr. Bentley, a brewer, at £546 and sold to the Duke of Devonshire for £1450.
In 1837 he retired as member of Parliament
Mr. Beaumont married, in 1827, Henrietta Elizabeth, daughter of John Atkinson.
Mr. Wentworth Blackett Beaumont, his eldest son and heir, was born 1829.
Thomas Wentworth Beaumont died on December 18th,1849 at Bournemouth aged 56, and was buried at Bretton
Wentworth Blackett Beaumont, his son, carried on his parliamentary career and looking after the estates in Yorkshire, Northumberland and Durham. However the 1850s were difficult years and he had to reduce rents to tenant farmers during the depression. Later mineral rents followed the same pattern and in the 1880s the lead mines in Northumberland expired. Lands in outlying Yorkshire villages were sold.
After the death of his first wife he spent more time at his London home. He also began to concentrate the family's interests back in Northumberland. He was elevated to the peerage in 1906 for his services to the Crown and took the title Baron Allendale of Allendale and Hexham. He died in 1907 and was succeeded by his son who became second Baron and later in 1911, Viscount Allendale.
The second Viscount uprooted the family and moved to Bywell Hall in Northumberland around the time of the Second World War. He sold the 260 acres of parkland and lake left, to the West Riding County Council for £30,000.
When the Estate House closed in 1958 staff were unaware of the significance of the material left and many items were dispersed to interested local people and other materials were burned. However, what remained was taken to Bywell Hall.
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