TOLLEMACHE, Felix Thomas (1796-1843), of 1 Hyde Park Place, Mdx.

Tollemache, who was described as ‘one of the handsomest young men in the kingdom’, Lincoln, Rutland and Stamford Mercury, 12 June 1818. stood unsuccessfully in 1818 and 1820 at Grantham, where a hostile coalition had been established against his father’s interest. On the latter occasion his brother Hugh acted for him in his absence, which allegedly arose from his elopement to France with an ‘artful, profligate, infamous married woman’. The Times, 15 Feb.; Drakard’s Stamford News, 3, 24 Mar. 1820. In 1826 he and his elder brother Lionel were defeated at Ilchester, where their father also had influence, but they were subsequently seated on petition. Western Flying Post, 12 June 1826; The Times, 23 Feb. 1827.

He is not known to have spoken in debate, and there is some difficulty in differentiating his votes from those of his brothers, particularly Frederick, Member for Grantham. He may have been the ‘H. Talmash’ listed as voting to go into committee on the Clarence annuity bill, 16 Mar., and it was possibly he rather than Frederick who voted to do so on the spring guns bill, 23 Mar., and against the corn bill, 2 Apr. 1827. It was most probably he who presented a Hampstead petition complaining of the burden imposed by the maintenance of itinerant Irish paupers, 29 June 1827. The Times, 30 June 1827. A note by his fa.’s agent, 9 July 1829, gives an address for him at Westend, near Hampstead (Tollemache (Dysart) mss 71). He may have voted against repeal of the Test Acts, 26 Feb. 1828, although it seems more likely that this was Frederick. One of them divided with the Wellington ministry against inquiry into delays in chancery, 24 Apr. He was probably the ‘F. Talmash’ in the favourable majority rather than the minority list on Catholic claims, 12 May, as Frederick’s hostility at this time is known from later evidence. He may have voted for the usury laws amendment bill, 19 June, while one of the brothers voted against reducing the salary of the lieutenant-general of the ordnance, 4 July, and for the corporate funds bill, 10 July, and the customs bill, 14 July 1828. In February 1829 Planta, the patronage secretary, expected him to vote ‘with government’ for Catholic emancipation. He was named as a defaulter, 5 Mar., but may have attended to vote for emancipation, 6 Mar., and certainly divided for the relief bill, 30 Mar. He may have voted to issue a new writ for East Retford, 2 June 1829, and against transferring its seats to Birmingham, 11 Feb. 1830. He may have divided for Jewish emancipation, 5 Apr., 17 May, and to abolish the death penalty for forgery, 24 May; he definitely did so on the latter, 7 June 1830.

At the general election of 1830 he offered again at Ilchester with his younger brother Algernon, but they were defeated by the candidates standing on Lord Cleveland’s interest. On being nominated, he had repudiated the accusation circulating in the town that ‘his vote on the Catholic question had not been given on principle’, maintaining that ‘he had voted on that question independently and contrary to the wishes of his family’. Sherborne Jnl. 5 Aug. 1830. A petition against the result was rejected. It appears that at the 1831 general election he and Frederick canvassed at Ilchester, hoping to capitalize on discontent with the borough’s imminent disfranchisement under the Grey ministry’s reform bill, but they withdrew before polling. Tollemache mss 72. Instead, he and Algernon offered at Grantham, but they were unsuccessful and he came bottom of the poll. Lincoln, Rutland and Stamford Mercury, 29 Apr. 1831. On his father’s death in 1833 he received a quarter-share of the proceeds of the sale of real property in Surrey and Suffolk, but a separate bequest of £10,000 had already ‘been raised’ in his father’s lifetime. PROB 11/1815/257. He inherited only a gold snuffbox from his grandmother, Countess Dysart, in 1840. PROB 11/1940/94. Experiencing financial difficulties, he turned to his eldest brother, now earl of Dysart, for a loan of £10,000, which would be of great assistance to ‘a small fish like myself’. Tollemache mss 3587. When he died in Oct. 1843 his mother hoped that he would be ‘rejoicing in the change. No longer languishing under pain and sickness; no longer molested by the harsh and overbearing temper of his unfeeling wife’. Ibid. 3592. He left his real and personal property in trust for the benefit of his children, William and Caroline, and an annuity of £150 to his wife, in addition to the provisions made under their marriage settlement; she was also given the option of purchasing his property at Tongs Wood, Kent, for £12,000. PROB 8/236; 11/1990/889.