He left Pembrokeshire & went out to SA before the Boer War. Returned with his bride to SA in November 1898. A newspaper cutting of the wedding states the groom's present to the bride was £2500 worth of shares in a gold mine! They had 7 children in S. Africa. The eldest Glendower & youngest David survived, the other 5 died in infancy. Making and losing several fortunes in his life time David & Elizabeth came to Kenya in 1910 & went to Londiani where, as a saw doctor by profession, he opened the Londiani Saw Mills and subsequently Timsales in Nairobi near the station eventually coming to live in Nairobi. Supplied sleepers for the Magadi Railway among other things. Son Morgan was born in a railway carriage they were living in at Magadi. Seems to have gone into partnership with Dalgety's? and lost the business to them? He then went to Mombasa and started the Owen-Thomas Transport Co.

His sons David & Morgan drove lorries for him and Elizabeth did the paper work. He manned the office in his house as he had some incapacity with an arm and his health. Tragically in 1935 Elizabeth left a lorry and walked between two railway carriages towards the sheds not realizing they were being shunted & she was caught between the trucks & crushed dying a few hours later in hospital. Requisition in WW2 closed down the business. Restarted after the war & gaining an Army and Naval contract did very well with a fleet of ex-Army lorries & godowns at Shimanzi.. He finally retired to live in Durban and remarried.   Source: Mrs D. Owen-Thomas

Leader14 - Col. Owen-Thomas - Gazi, Mombasa

Gazette 19/6/1918 - Dissolution of Partnership between Samuel Morson, Thomas Jarman Morson and David Owen Thomas carrying on business as saw-millers, merchants and contractors at Nairobi and elsewhere under the style or firm of the BEA Saw Mills dissolved by mutual consent. David Owen Thomas retires from the firm and the remaining partners continue the business.

HBEA 1912 has a Col. Owen Thomas.

Red 25 has D. Owen Thomas, Anderson Road, Nairobi

Gazette - 4/12/1918 - Notice is hereby given that Messrs D Owen-Thomas & Sons of Nairobi have acquired the Londiani Saw Mills from Mr J A Sannum and the Cedar Mill at Londiani from Messrs J A Sannum and W H Macleod as from 1 October 1918

Red 22 - D. Owen Thomas, Sadler St., Nairobi

FindaGrave Elizabeth Owen-Thomas BIRTH 22 Feb 1870 Fishguard, Pembrokeshire, Wales DEATH 28 Mar 1935 (aged 65) Mombasa, Kenya BURIAL Mbaraki Cemetery Mombasa [Notes: Died at the European Hospital from shock and multiple injuries. (source: cemetery register)]