i>li£SIDE^rT^S ADDRESS. 275 



Crown under the Forest of Dean Mining Act, and soon after made 

 an elaborate survey of the Coal Field of South Wales. 



In the autumn of the same year, at the meeting of the British 

 Association in Kewcastle-upon-Tyne, he rendered very important 

 assistance in the establishment of the Mining Records Office, an 

 institution he had previously advocated, as an absolute necessity, 

 in his Treatise on Isometrical Drawing. 



In the year 1845 Mr. Sopwith was appointed to the manage- 

 ment of Mr. W. B. Beaumont's vast mining property in Allendale, 

 and took up his residence at AUenheads. There he remodelled 

 the whole establishment on an enlightened plan of his own.. He 

 established schools for the children and other useful institutions 

 for the adults, and in a few years had immensely improved both 

 the material and moral condition, and thereby augmented the 

 happiness, of all around him. The great changes he had brought 

 about in his district, educing order out of disorder, were striking 

 and the subject of frequent remark among those who knew the 

 miners of times gone by ; among the present mining population 

 his memory will long be preserved in love and reverence. 



During his life he was anxious and ready to give a helping 

 hand to any one whom he found deserving and yet struggling 

 against adverse circumstances, and many a young man will re- 

 collect with feelings of gratitude the kind good offices of Thomas 

 Sopwith. 



It was in the year 1854 that Mr. Sopwith was unanimously 

 elected, as successor to Sir W. C. Trevelyan, Bart., to the Presi- 

 dential chair of the Tyneside Naturalists' Field Club, having 

 been a member from its foundation. On resigning office at the 

 end of the year he read an interesting and instructive address, 

 which appears in Vol. III. of our Transactions. In it lie shews 

 the comprehensive grasp of his mind, the extent, minuteness, 

 and accuracy of his knowledge, as well as the geniality of his 

 character. He was an excellent artist with his pencil, and en- 

 graved many of his sketches and plans on copper with facility. 

 He had a cultivated literary taste, and for sixty years kept a 

 diary, in form of a Note Book, in which lie entered every incident 

 of his life that he thought wortli recording. It extends to more 



