Thomas Henry Thornton CSI (1832 – 10 March 1913) was an English Indian Civil Servant, judge and author of two notable British Raj biographies.
Thomas Henry Thornton was born in 1832, the son of a Times journalist, and educated at Merchant Taylors' School and read Classics and Modern history at St John's College, Oxford, at which he was afterwards a fellow.
Rather than return to the fort for protection, he rode on, cut the cables of a bridge of boats over the Sutlej River, and continued to Ludhiana to raise the alarm.
Thornton assumed responsibility for the organisation of the 1877 Delhi Durbar, the success of which, together with his service to date, led to the conferring on him of the award of Companion of the Order of the Star of India.
[1] In his long retirement, he wrote two well-regarded biographies of key British India figures, Robert Groves Sandeman and Richard John Meade.