Thomas Burden, 1st Baron Burden

Who was Thomas Burden, 1st Baron Burden?

Thomas William Burden, 1st Baron Burden, was a British Labour Party politician and church official.

Burden was the son of Thomas Burden, Mayor of East Ham in 1935, and was educated at the London School of Economics. In 1942 he was elected to the House of Commons as the Member of Parliament for Sheffield Park, a seat he held until 1950. He was also Second Church Estates Commissioner from 1945 to 1950 and a Member of the House of Laity of the Church Assembly from 1947 to 1950. The latter year he was raised to the peerage as Baron Burden, of Hazlebarrow in the County of Derby. Between 1950 and 1951 he served as a Lord-in-Waiting in the Labour Government of Clement Attlee.

Lord Burden married Augusta, daughter of David Sime, in 1910. He died in May 1970, aged 85, and was succeeded in the barony by his son Philip. Lady Burden died in 1976.