Thomas Smyth (merchant)

Thomas Smyth (1737? – 1824) was an English merchant, banker and Lord Mayor of Liverpool.

He was son of Thomas Smyth of the Middle Temple, the sixth son of Bishop Thomas Smyth.

Smyth was partner with Charles Caldwell in Charles Caldwell & Co., a Liverpool bank. He became a shareholder (holding joint with Caldwell) in the Macclesfield Copper Company, known as Roe and Co. after its founder Charles Roe, in 1774.

Smyth was a lessee on behalf of Roe and Co. of land near Llandudno from Lord Penrhyn, by an agreement of 1785. On 12 October 1788 Lord Penrhyn visited Merseyside, riding the liberties of the borough of Sefton, and Smyth accompanied him. The occasion was seen as largely political and symbolic, part of the contest between Lord Penrhyn, whose title was in the Peerage of Ireland and who was the sitting Member of Parliament for Liverpool at the time, and Banastre Tarleton.

Smyth was Lord Mayor of Liverpool in 1789–90. An important issue for Liverpool Corporation at the period was the development of Liverpool Docks. Smyth undertook negotiations with Lord Sefton over a lease in the Harrington area, for planned expansion. That lease was currently held by Roe & Co. The negotiation failed, however, Lord Sefton expressing a wish not to have the area developed with labourers' houses.

The British general election, 1790 fell in the summer, towards the end of Smyth's term of office. Lord Penrhyn and Bamber Gascoyne the younger were candidates posing as defender's of Liverpool's commercial interests, against abolitionists, such as Tarleton. Feelings ran high, and Smyth called a noon meeting on 16 June outside the Liverpool Exchange. He warned of violence, and attempted a straw poll by show of hands. But Tarleton had much support, and was not faced down.

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