Captain Samuel Toombs JP (26 March 1871 - 17 November 1949) was a seaman and an Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n politician, elected as a member of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly

New South Wales Legislative Assembly

The Legislative Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The other chamber is the Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney...

 representing the seat of Hurstville

Electoral district of Hurstville

Hurstville was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales, named after and including the Sydney suburb of Hurstville....

.

He was born in Plymouth

Plymouth

Plymouth is a city and unitary authority area on the coast of Devon, England, about south-west of London. It is built between the mouths of the rivers Plym to the east and Tamar to the west, where they join Plymouth Sound...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 as where he spent his childhood and school years. Samuel followed his father, Samuel Toombs Senior, with service in the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 in England.

Samuel Jr. migrated to Australia, arriving in New South Wales in 1891. He continued his military career with the Royal Australian Navy

Royal Australian Navy

The Royal Australian Navy is the naval branch of the Australian Defence Force. Following the Federation of Australia in 1901, the ships and resources of the separate colonial navies were integrated into a national force: the Commonwealth Naval Forces...

, where he attained the rank of Captain

Captain (Royal Navy)

Captain is a senior officer rank of the Royal Navy. It ranks above Commander and below Commodore and has a NATO ranking code of OF-5. The rank is equivalent to a Colonel in the British Army or Royal Marines and to a Group Captain in the Royal Air Force. The rank of Group Captain is based on the...

.

Toombs married Mary Jane Gorman in 1895 and together they had 2 daughters and 3 sons. Toombs remarried Agnes Claire Donohue in 1944.

Toombs died at the age of 78 at Lansvale

Lansvale, New South Wales

Lansvale is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Lansvale is located 28 kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district, the other side of Chipping Norton and its lake, in the local government areas of the City of Fairfield and is part of the South-western...

, a suburb of Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

.

A strong workers advocate, Toombs assisted to found Merchant Service Guild (a precursor to the Australian Maritime Officers

Australian Maritime Officers Union

The Australian Maritime Officers Union is an Australian trade union that is registered with the Australian Industrial Relations Commission and affiliated with the Australian Council of Trade Unions...

 trade union

Trade union

A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...

).

Political career

Toombs was a longtime member of the Australian Labor Party

Australian Labor Party

The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...

, including service as a member of the central executive from 1914 - 1916. As a Labor candidate he represented Hurstville in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly from 1913 to 1917, during the difficult environment of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

.

After the War he served as secretary of Radio Telegraphers' Union in 1922.