page_title: Thomas Middlemore
section_title: Later life
hierarchical_section_title: Thomas Middlemore / Later life
caption_attribution_description: English: Melsetter House, Hoy, Orkney. A fine Orkney country mansion designed by R. Lethaby. Called by Mae Morris (daughter of William Morris, who provided furniture and interior design) as "a fairy place at the end of the universe ...". South gable seen from the garden.
context_page_description: Thomas Middlemore was an English mountaineer who made multiple first ascents during the silver age of alpinism. His audacity earned him a reputation as the enfant terrible within the Alpine Club. He was also the head of the Middlemores Saddles leather goods company in Birmingham, England, after the retirement of his father, William Middlemore, in 1881. Thomas Middlemore had taken over the management of the company in 1868 and established a bicycle saddle factory in Coventry.
context_section_description: Middlemore's father died in 1889, and Middlemore inherited the company outright. By this time Middlemore and his wife, Theodosia, were prominent figures in Birmingham. Middlemore sold the leather business in 1896. In 1898 he purchased the Melsetter Estate in the Orkney Islands of Scotland. The 40,000-acre estate included the island of Hoy and the smaller islands of South Walls, Fara and Rysa. Middlemore commissioned architect William Lethaby, a prominent figure in the Arts and Crafts Movement, to rebuild Melsetter House.
  Middlemore died of pneumonia at Melsetter on 16 May 1923. His wife, Theodosia Middlemore, died in 1944.
caption: Melsetter House, Hoy, Orkney
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