Sir Basil Thomson

Also known as Sir Basil Home Thomson.

Basil Home Thomson was born at Oxford on 21 April 1861 and died on 26 March 1939. He was educated at Eton and briefly at New College, Oxford, then served in the colonial service in Fiji, British New Guinea and Tonga from 1883.

He was called to the bar in 1896 and over about twelve years was governor of several prisons, Dartmoor among them, before becoming Secretary of the Prison Commission (1908-1913). He was then head of the Metropolitan Police CID from 1913 to 1921.

Books on this site

• The Story of Dartmoor Prison (1907)

Portrait: Sir Basil Home Thomson, by Unknown photographer, bromide print, late 1910s. NPG x26868. © National Portrait Gallery, London. Used under licence CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.