Читать книгу A Cyclopædia of Canadian Biography - Various - Страница 129
Williams, Thomas
ОглавлениеWilliams, Thomas, Accountant and Treasurer of the Intercolonial Railway, Moncton, New Brunswick, was born at Handsworth, near Birmingham, England, on the 3rd of June, 1846. He is the youngest son of Joseph and Hannah Williams. His father’s ancestors can be traced back several centuries as farmers and occupiers of land in the adjoining parish of Perry Barr. His mother’s ancestors, the Coulburns of Tipton, in South Staffordshire, have been connected with the development of the iron industries there for several generations past. Thomas Williams was educated at the parish schools, and subsequently at the Bridge Trust School—a grammar school founded from the proceeds of a legacy for repairs of bridges in the parish, for which after the organisation of the Highway Board, its existence for its original purposes was not necessary, and the accumulated funds were devoted to the erection and endowment of a superior school. In 1868, he entered the service of the London and North-Western Railway of England as freight clerk, and was subsequently appointed freight agent at Sutton Coldfield, near Birmingham, and station master at Marton, near Rugby. He resigned in June, 1870, to come to Canada, and in December, 1870, entered the service of the New Brunswick and Canada Railway, at St. Andrews, New Brunswick, as clerk to the general manager. Mr. Williams left the service of that railway in August, 1873, to enter upon duties of clerk in accountant’s office of the Intercolonial (Government) Railway, at Moncton, New Brunswick, and was subsequently appointed chief clerk in mechanical department of the same railway. In November, 1875, he was sent to Charlottetown, to organise the system of accounts of the Prince Edward Island Railway, and was appointed accountant and auditor of that railway. And on the 1st of July, 1882, he was appointed chief accountant and treasurer of the Intercolonial Railway at Moncton, which position he at present holds. Mr. Williams was a member of the Church of England until December, 1873, but in consequence of Ritualistic practices having been introduced into the church he was in the habit of attending, he left it, and was among the first to join the then newly organized Reformed Episcopal Church, St. Paul’s, in Moncton. He has held the office of vestryman and warden in this church, almost continuously since. On the 12th of January, 1875, he married Analena, daughter of the late John Rourke, merchant, St. John, New Brunswick, and has a family of seven children.