HALES, Thomas Pym (c.1726-73), of Bekesbourne, Kent.

Returned at Downton on the interest of his brother-in-law Lord Feversham, Hales supported Administration until February 1764 when he was ‘carried into the minority’1Walpole to Lord Hertford, 6 Feb. 1764. by Lord George Sackville, and voted with Opposition over general warrants, 6 and 18 Feb. Described as ‘doubtful’ in Rockingham’s list of July 1765, he did not vote against the repeal of the Stamp Act; but in Rockingham’s list of November 1766 and Townshend’s of January 1767 was classed ‘Grenville’, presumably because of Sackville. He voted with Opposition on the land tax, 27 Feb. 1767. There is no record of his having spoken in the House.

Hales did not stand at the general election of 1768, and re-entered Parliament in 1770 as a follower of Administration. At Dover in 1770 he was judged ‘the most acceptable person the court could recommend’:2North to Hardwicke, Add. 35424, ff. 19-20. he had financial support from the Government and was backed by the Yorke interest. The contest was ‘violent’ and his victory ‘was entirely owing to the votes of the out dwellers, many of whom were brought from a distance at a very heavy expense’.3Hales to C. Yorke, 2 Jan. 1770, and North to Hardwicke, Add. 35639, f. 163.

He does not appear in any divisions in this Parliament but in Robinson’s first survey on the royal marriage bill he is marked ‘pro, absent, sick’. He died 18 Mar. 1773.