Thomas Patton Explained

Thomas Patton
Office:High Sheriff of Belfast
Term Start:1992
Term End:1993
Predecessor:Joe Coggle
Successor:Jim Walker
Office1:Lord Mayor of Belfast
Deputy1:Ted Ashby
Term Start1:1982
Term End1:1983
Predecessor1:Grace Bannister
Successor1:Alfie Ferguson
Office2:Member of
Belfast City Council
Constituency2:Victoria
Term Start2:15 May 1985
Term End2:20 October 1993
Predecessor2:New district
Successor2:Alan Crowe
Constituency3:Belfast Area B
Term Start3:30 May 1973
Term End3:15 May 1985
Predecessor3:New district
Successor3:District abolished
Birth Date:27 July 1914
Birth Place:Belfast, Northern Ireland
Death Date:20 October 1993
Party:Ulster Unionist Party

Thomas William Saunderson Patton OBE (27 July 1914 – 20 October 1993), often known as Tommy Patton, was an Ulster unionist politician.

Background

Patton grew up in Belfast, where he attended the Templemore Avenue School. He worked at Harland and Wolff for twenty-nine years from 1932, when he moved to the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum. He was elected to Belfast City Council for the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) at the 1973 local election. He retired in 1982, but continued to sit on the council, serving as Lord Mayor of Belfast that year. He was appointed as High Sheriff of Belfast for 1992/3.[1]

Patton has been described by journalist Jim McDowell as an example of a "cornerstone of what the unionist working class vote was".[2] Sinn Féin councillor Máirtín Ó Muilleoir notes Patton's malapropisms, giving an example of "the police are no detergent against the IRA".[3] Another example was when he told a journalist that the City Hall would be painted in durex paint, rather dulux paint.

A park in east Belfast is named in Patton's memory.[4]

References

  1. "PATTON, Thomas William Saunderson", Who Was Who
  2. Sharon Ferguson, "The fall of the big house of unionism", BBC News, 10 May 2011
  3. Máirtín Ó Muilleoir, Belfast's Dome of Delight: City Hall Politics 1981-2000, p.76
  4. "Alderman Tommy Patton Memorial Park", Belfast City Council