The relaunch of a book by a 19th-century poet has fired up his descendants to discover more about their ancestor, writes Colette Warbrook
“The family of the ‘original Smallthorne poet’, Thomas Tomkinson, know little of the 19th-century writer.
Born in Macclesfield in 1815, he is thought to have spent most of his 70 years living in the North Staffordshire village of Smallthorne.
Following his death in 1885, a book of Thomas’s poetry, simply titled ‘Poems’, was published by F W Buck and Sons.
But, explains his great-grandson Fred Tomkinson, the book reveals little about the man himself.
Fred, aged 90, of Smallthorne, says: “Except for the content of the poems, the book gives away little information about the author himself….”
This is an extract of an article featured in The Sentinel’s The Way We Were. You can read the full article online here – http://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/history/delving-life-thomas-tomkinson–648872
