Francis Henry Esmond Thompson (1929 – 16 December 2021) was a Northern Irish politician with the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). Background Born in Maghera, Thompson served with the Royal Navy and later the Ulster Defence Regiment.W. D. Flackes & Sydney Elliott, Northern Ireland A Political Directory 1968-1993, Blackstaff Press, 1994, p. 222 He subsequently served as sub-postmaster at Maghera Post Office for 41 years, retiring in 2001.
Thompson served as a member of the UUP executive from 1971, still being in position as of 1994. He also represented the party as a member of the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention for Mid-Ulster and as a member of Magherafelt District Council from 1977 to 1981.The Local Government Elections 1973-1981: Magherafelt In November 1975, he was convicted of unlawful possession of a firearm, which he claimed he owned for his own protection.Fortnight, no.116, p.11 In March 1977, he was shot in the arm in what was described as an assassination attempt, although he received only minor injuries.Fortnight, no.146, p.11
Thompson was known as a hard-line member of the UUP and had publicly criticised party colleague John Taylor during the life of the Constitutional Convention, feeling that Taylor was soft on proposals for power-sharing with the Social Democratic and Labour Party that had been proposed by William Craig.Henry Patterson & Eric P. Kaufmann, Unionism and Orangeism in Northern Ireland Since 1945: The Decline of the Loyal Family, Manchester University Press, 2007, p. 182 In later years he was associated with the anti-Good Friday Agreement wing of the party and was a strong critic of the leadership of David Trimble.
Thompson died on 16 December 2021, at the age of 92.
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