A catalogue of notable Middle Templars, with brief biographical notices/Bernard, Sir Thomas
Admitted 5 October, 1772.
Second son of Sir Francis Bernard (q.v.). He was born at Lincoln, 27 April, 1750, while his father was Steward of that city. He was educated at Harvard University till the settlement of his father in England, when he entered the Middle Temple. He was called to the Bar 24 Nov. 1780, but having acquired a large fortune through marriage, he relinquished the law and devoted himself to schemes for the welfare of the working classes. He became a governor of the Foundling Hospital, and greatly increased its revenues by building upon its estates. In 1796 he projected the Society for the Bettering of the Poor, which led to the establishment in 1800 of a School for the Indigent Blind, and in 1801 of the Fever Institution. In conjunction with Count Rumford, Bernard originated the Royal Institution, Piccadilly (1800). In 1808 he established at Bishop Auckland a training school for teachers, the first of its kind. In 1812 he took an active part in the formation of a Society for the Relief of the Manufacturing Poor, and there was hardly a movement of this benevolent nature in which he did not take a part. He was largely instrumental in the reduction of the salt, duties. The labour in connexion with all these activities affected his health, and he died at Leamington, where he had gone for the benefit of the waters, 1 July, 1818. He had succeeded his brother as baronet in 1810. In addition to his other works, Sir Thomas employed his pen on several pamphlets on the subjects he had at heart, and was the author of An Historical View of Christianity (1806).