{{Short description|English politician}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2023}} {{Use British English|date=July 2013}} '''Thomas Atkins''' was Lord Mayor of London and an English politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1640 and from 1647 to 1653 and was Lord Mayor of London in 1644. He supported the Parliamentary cause in the English Civil War.
==Biography== Atkins was the son of John Atkins of King's Lynn, Norfolk. He was an alderman of Norwich, and then an alderman of the City of London for Bridge Without, from Lime Street. He was Sheriff of London in 1637,<ref name=Burke>[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_KikAAAAAQAAJ/page/n593 <!-- pg=568 quote="Thomas Atkins" Norwich parliament. --> John Burke A genealogical and heraldic history of the commoners of Great ..., Volume 4 ]</ref> and colonel of the Red Regiment, London Trained Bands, in 1642.<ref>Keith Roberts, ''London And Liberty: Ensigns of the London Trained Bands'', Eastwood, Nottinghamshire: Partizan Press, 1987, ISBN 0-946525-16-1, pp. 29–31.</ref><ref>[http://wiki.bcw-project.org/trained-band/london/red-regiment Red Rgt at British Civil War Project.]</ref>
In April 1640, Atkins was elected member of parliament for Norwich in the Short Parliament.<ref name=Willis>{{Cite Notitia Parliamentaria|converted=1|part=2|pages=229–239}}</ref> He was imprisoned in the Tower of London in May 1640 with three other aldermen – Nicholas Rainton, Thomas Soame and John Gayre – for refusing to list the inhabitants of his ward who were able to contribute £50 or more to a loan for King Charles.<ref name=Notes>{{Cite web |url=http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=67247 |title='Notes on the aldermen, 1502-1700', The Aldermen of the City of London: Temp. Henry III – 1912 (1908), pp. 168-195. Date accessed: 15 July 2011 |access-date=2 August 2011 |archive-date=26 October 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121026114309/http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=67247 |url-status=live }}</ref> During the Civil War he was colonel of the Norwich city militia. He was Lord Mayor of London in 1644.<ref name=Burke/> In 1647 Atkins was re-elected MP for Norwich for the Long Parliament and sat until 1653.<ref name=Willis/> On Thursday, 7 January 1649, he delivered a solemn thanksgiving to Oliver Cromwell and also issued a Hosannah on 7 June 1649. He was a "busy stickler for independency and republicanism", and the principal tool by which the Rump Parliament managed the common council of London.<ref name=Burke/>
Atkkins was knighted by the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell on 5 December 1657 (the title passed into oblivion at the restoration of the Monarchy in 1660).<ref>{{Citation |last=Shaw |first=William Arthur |authorlink=William Arthur Shaw |year=1906 |title=The Knights of England: A complete record from the earliest time to the present day of the knights of all the orders of chivalry in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and of knights bachelors, incorporating a complete list of knights bachelors dubbed in Ireland |volume=2 |location=London |publisher=Sherratt and Hughes|url=https://archive.org/details/knightsofengland02shawuoft |page=224}}</ref> He was Father of the City in 1658 and was discharged from his position as Alderman on 12 February 1661.<ref>[http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=67221 'Fathers of the City', The Aldermen of the City of London: Temp. Henry III – 1912 (1908), pp. 250-254. Date accessed: 4 March 2011]</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
{{s-start}} {{s-par|en}} |- {{s-non| reason= Parliament suspended since 1629}} {{s-ttl | title=Member of Parliament for Norwich | with= Thomas Tooley | years=1640 }} {{s-aft | after= Richard Harman | after2= Richard Catelyn }} {{s-bef | before= Richard Harman | before2= Richard Catelyn }} {{s-ttl | title=Member of Parliament for Norwich | with= Erasmus Earle | years=1647–1653 }} {{s-non| reason = Not represented in Barebones Parliament }} {{s-civ}} {{succession box | title=Lord Mayor of London | before= Sir John Wollaston | after= Thomas Adams | years=1644–1645 }} {{s-end}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Atkins, Thomas}} Category:Year of birth unknown Category:Year of death unknown Category:Sheriffs of the City of London Category:17th-century lord mayors of London Category:Roundheads Category:London Trained Bands officers Category:English MPs 1640 (April) Category:English MPs 1648–1653 Category:Prisoners in the Tower of London