Thomas Henry Agard Evans was born in Barnhurst in 1860, the second eldest son of Thomas Evans. He was baptized on 8 Jun 1860 in Tettenhall.
Whilst he was still a teenager his father abandoned his family and went to Australia. In the 1881 census, in the absence of his older brother, Ernest, Thomas is described as the head of the household aged 20. His profession was that of Cutterout Tailoring. The fact that his mother is not described as Head is probably witness to her already diminished capacity and the added responsibility on Thomas’s shoulders for his younger siblings.
Unlike Ernest it seems unlikely that Thomas travelled abroad at this stage although it cannot be ruled out that he went to Russia. All the children seem to have been particularly fascinated by travel and interest in foreign climes. He later worked with Ernest promoting a nascent tourist industry, that would lead to his elder brother eventually settling in Switzerland.
In 1887 Thomas married Cecile Benzengre, known as Lily, the daughter of a Russian anthropologist and Doctor, Basil Nicholaevich Benzengre.
It is not clear how the couple met. Lily is described as a ‘beautiful Russian dancer’, so it is possible she was a visitor in London. Certainly her family made frequent trips to Paris. Lily’s sister, Alexandra also married an Englishman Thomas Strachan Hudson, an engineer who was at some time based in St Petersburg. We have been in contact with some of the Hudson descendants, now living in Canada.
Thomas and Lily had one son, Tom Walton Evans (1889-1958)
Thomas Henry Agard Evans died in Petrograd on 12 Mar 1916.