Beresford Heywood

A pencilled inscription verso in a period hand identifies the sitter as ‘Beresford Heywood.’ Given the sitter’s apparent age, this is probably Henry de la Poer Beresford Heywood.

Born on 23 January 1855 at Colwall in Herefordshire, he was the son of Thomas Heywood and Mary Emily Beresford.

He appears on the 1861 census living at Hope End in Colwall with his father Thomas Heywood, a widower, and his grandparents Thomas and Mary Elizabeth Heywood.

On 15 June 1882 at ‘St Mary Abbott’s, Kensington’ he married ‘Minnie Florence Newton, daughter of Newton John Lane, Esq., of Elmshurst Hall, Lichfield, and widow of Cecil Fulford, Esq.’ (Northern Whig, 20 June 1882). Their marriage produced four children.

In 1886 Henry was appointed to a lieutenancy in the Royal Gloucester Hussars (Gloucestershire Chronicle, 27 March 1886).

The couple appear on the 1891 census living at Eastington House in Gloucestershire with their two young sons, Mrs Heywood’s two daughters from her previous marriage, and nine servants, all female. Mr Heywood gave ‘Living on own means’ as his profession.

They were still at the same residence ten years later, now with one of Henry’s step-daughters, two daughters of their own, Henry’s unmarried sister Emily, and seven female servants.

Henry appears on the 1911 census living at Wrentall House at Patesford in Shropshire.

Henry de la Poer Beresford Heywood died on 14 September 1922 at Breton Park, Baschurch, Shropshire. He left an estate valued at £3752.

According to a very brief on his funeral, he ‘was a well-known follower of the pack’ (Birmingham Daily Gazette, 19 September 1922).

Photographed by William Thomas and Robert Gowland of York.