Thorne (St. Nicholas)

THORNE (St. Nicholas), a market-town and parish, and the head of a union, in the wapentake of Strafforth and Tickhill, W. riding of York, 29 miles (S. by E.) from York, and 165 (N. by W.) from London; containing 3507 inhabitants. This place is situated on the Bawtry and Selby turnpike-road, upon the verge of the moors, and in Hatfield Chase: the inclosure of the latter tract, comprehending 180,000 acres, was commenced in 1811, and completed in 1824. Henry, Prince of Wales, on his visit to Yorkshire in 1609, was entertained by Roger Portington, Esq., of Tudworth, in the parish, with an aquatic stag-hunt of a novel and extraordinary kind: the party, numbering about 100 persons, embarked in boats; and 500 stags driven out of the woods and grounds where they had been collected on the previous evening, taking to the water, were pursued by the royal party to the lower part of the levels called Thorne Mere. King Charles I., during the civil war, is said to have twice passed the level of Hatfield Chase. On the latter occasion, when travelling from York to Nottingham, he crossed the ferry at Whitgift, proceeded to Goole, and thence advanced along the great bank to Hatfield, where he refreshed himself at an alehouse. The fenny parts of Hatfield Chase, which is supposed to have been formerly a forest, from the number of fossil-trees discovered in it, were drained in the reign of this king with great perseverance and skill, at an expense of £400,000, by Sir Cornelius Vermuyden, who had purchased the estate in order to convert it into good arable and pasture land.

Thorne, which in Leland's time was only a small village with a fort near it, has become a neat and flourishing town; it is lighted with gas, and many of the houses are well built. The scenery throughout the neighbourhood, from the flatness of the ground and its numerous wide drains, resembles that of Flanders and the other Low Countries. The inhabitants carry on a considerable trade in grain, coal, and timber; and a small number of hands are employed in making sacking and ropes, and in weaving. On the east bank of the river Don, about a mile distant, is a quay, where the merchandise is shipped and landed; vessels for the coasting-trade are built, and on being launched at spring tides, are sent down the river to Hull, to be rigged and otherwise completed. A canal from this river to the Trent, called the Stainforth and Keadby canal, by which the trade of the town is greatly promoted, was constructed in 1793; it is 13 miles in length, and joins the Don at Stainforth, about three miles south-west of Thorne. Large quantities of peat are obtained on the moor, and conveyed to the town and other places. The market, originally granted by Richard Cromwell, and renewed by Charles II., is on Wednesday; and fairs, chiefly for horses, cattle, and pedlery, are held on the Monday and Tuesday next after June 11th and October 11th. The powers of the county debt-court of Thorne, established in 1847, extend over the registration-district of Thorne. The parish comprises 11,900a. 2r. 1p., of which 5300 acres are arable, 2474 pasture, and 3976 barren peatlands; the Waste contains about 7000 acres, and is bounded on the south by the canal, from which it extends northward five miles. A portion of the peat moors in the district has been converted into productive land by the process of "warping." Among the various botanical specimens growing on the moors is the Scheuzeria palustris, a plant of the rush tribe so exceedingly rare as to be found elsewhere in England only upon Lakeby Carr, near Boroughbridge; it was first discovered by Linnæus in Lapland, and on Thorne Waste by Harrison, the Canadian botanist.

The living is a perpetual curacy, with a net income of £100; the patronage and impropriation belong to Lady Coventry, whose tithes have been commuted for £1640. 15. The church, which was erected in the reign of Edward III., is principally in the later English style, with a square tower surmounted by pinnacles. There are places of worship for the Society of Friends, Independents, Wesleyans, Primitive Methodists, and Unitarians. Two charity schools are established, one of which was endowed with land by William Brook, in 1705, for the instruction of ten boys, and has an annual income of about £118. The other was founded in 1706, by Henry Travis, who bequeathed estates now producing £338 per annum, for the endowment of schools at this place, Hatfield, and Wroot in Lincolnshire: the master of the school here has an income of £80. The poor-law union comprises thirteen places, the greater number of which are in Lincolnshire, and contains a population of 15,316: the workhouse cost £3000. The Rev. Abraham de la Pryme, F. R. S., the antiquary and historian, was for some time minister of Thorne; he died in 1704, at the early age of 34.

Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.