Born at Honley, near Huddersfield. Educated at Storthes Hall under the tutorship of Peter Inchbald, a well-known entomologist of the time. It was here that Beaumont met J.W. Dunning and T.H. Allis, who were fellow pupils, and all three, enthused by Inchbald, retained an interest in entomology throughout their lives. It may have been at Storthes that Beaumont first met H.T. Stainton, the Lepidopterist, who also became a close acquaintance. On leaving school Beaumont joined his father's large woollen manufacturing business of which he later became the head. He was twice married, the church at Wilshaw, near Huddersfield, being erected to the memory of his first wife.
Beaumont's early enthusiasm was for Lepidoptera and ornithology, and he built up fine collections of both. These were disposed of (except some rarities) when he moved from Honley, eventually to settle at Lewisham, near the Staintons, in 1884, and later at Gosfield in Essex. His collecting activities had by now switched to other orders including Coleoptera. His first article on beetles 'Captures of Coleoptera near Pitlochry, Perthshire' appeared in Ent.mon.Mag., 20, 1883, 142-3) and was followed by various others, the last, on several beetles he had reared from timber, appearing in Ent., 1904.
George Porritt, writing Beaumont's obituary in Ent.mon.Mag., l02, 1905, 95, noted that 'he did splendid work among the Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Neuroptera and Diptera, repeatedly finding species new to the British list, and in some cases new to science. Perhaps his favourite locality of late years was the lovely district of Oxshott in Surrey... He seemed never tired of collecting and setting his captures, and up to the time of his death, his setting of the most minute insects was a marvel of neatness. But the naming of his captures was always irksome to him; he usually sent his doubtful species to specialists, often to their advantage...’
Beaumont's collection, on which he was working at the moment of death, was sold by Stevens on 5 February 1906 (Chalmers Hunt 1976). It seems likely that this is the collection which A. Fergusson records in Ent.mon.Mag., 58, 1922, 279, as belonging to T.G. Bishop, the Glaswegian entomologist, and passing after his death in 1922 to his grandson, also T.G. Bishop.
Apart from the obituary already mentioned there are others in Ent., 38, 1905, 120 and in Ent.Jb.,15, 1906, 192. (MD 10/01)