Author talk:Thomas Piers Healey

=Sources=

Directory
Name: 	Thomas Piers Healey Year: 	1847 County or Borough: 	Westminster Ward or Division/Constituency: 	St Clement Danes Street address: 	49, Essex-street
 * London, England, Electoral Registers, 1832-1965

Men-at-the-Bar
Healey, Thomas (Piers), a student of the Inner Temple 1 May, 1839, went to the Middle Temple 8 June, 1839, where he was called to the bar 27 Jan., 1842 (eldest son of Mark Healey, of Ballina, co. Sligo, gentleman).

London Gazette
London Gazette, February 24, 1857: Thomas Piers Healey, late of No. 27, Tottenham-place, Tottenham-Court-Road, Middlesex. Barrister-at-law.—In the debtors’ prison for London and Middlesex.

=Biograpy= Here’s a fragmentary biography: Men-at-the-Bar says Thomas Piers Healey was "eldest son of Mark Healey, of Ballina, co. Sligo, gentleman." He entered the Middle Temple in 1839 (probably indicating he was born somewhere around 1820), called to the bar 1842. From there on, he seems to have led an amazingly turbulent (and financially questionable) life. He was co-editor of "London Medical Gazette"/"Medical Times" from 1843 to ?1851, wherein he described himself as having expertise in "legal medicine." Was one of the members of a group seeking to establish a railway, which collapsed amid lawsuits in 1845. In 1847 and '48, was one of the primary (only?) members of a "Committee of Poor-Law Medical Officers" with the purpose of lobbying Parliament for improved remuneration of said officers. Stood for Parliament unsuccessfully in Stoke-on-Trent in 1847. Circa 1851, the "Medical Gazette"/"Medical Times" folded and Healey's whereabouts were being sought in advertisements -- he must have been lying low because of debts. In 1852, the "Lancet" (Volume 1, page 86) printed a thoroughly nasty "obituary" for the Gazette/Times. In 1854, Healey was in New York City, advertising that he was about to give "a course of three lectures on the character and policy of the second Caesar and its correlations with the despotism of Louis Napoleon." In February 1855, he was the subject of a New York Times article, "Mr. To. Piers Healey and his reported Lunacy." In 1856, he was again living in London, and placed two mystifying items in the agony column of the (London) Times, see pp. 135-136 of "The Agony Column of the 'Times' 1800-1870." In 1857, imprisoned for debt. In 1860, submitted to Once a Week "My First Ca. Sa.," about the adventures of a sheriff's officer pursuing debtors. From then on, I don't find signs of him. Levana Taylor (talk) 11:12, 5 August 2019 (UTC)