Thomas Walsh (Vicar Apostolic of the London District)

Bishop Thomas Walsh (1776-1849) was a Roman Catholic clergyman and Vicar Apostolic who served the Midlands area of the United Kingdom. He was born in London on 3 October 1776, and ordained priest on 19 September 1801. At the age of 46, he was made Coadjutor Vicar Apostolic of the Midland District (of England) by the Pope, Leo XII, with the title of bishop of Cambysopylis, assisting Bishop John Milner. He succeeded to the Vicariate on the death of Bishop Milner in 1826.

Walsh is most remembered for his commissioning of two cathedrals, the Cathedral of Saint Chad, Birmingham and Nottingham Cathedral and St Mary's College, Oscott, and his association with the distinguished architect Augustus Welby Pugin. In 1848, he was named Vicar Apostolic of the London District, with the intention of him being the first Archbishop of Westminster when the hierarchy was to be restored in 1850, but he died before that happened, in Golden Square, Soho, London on 18 February 1849. He is buried in the crypt chapel of St Peter, in the Metropolitan Cathedral of St Chad. A large Gothic-revival memorial to him with a recumbent effigy, designed by Pugin and carved by George Myers, was erected in the North aisle of the Cathedral in 1851, after being exhibited in the Mediaeval Court of the Great Exhibition in Crystal Palace, Hyde Park, London.

Bishop Walsh Catholic School in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham is named after him.