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Thornley
Thornley maps
Historic maps of Thornley and the local area, hand-drawn by Ordnance Survey and Samuel Lewis. View all Thornley maps
Thornley area books
Displaying 1 of 3 books about Thornley and the local area. View all books for this area
You can read extracts and browse photos from these books.
Memories of Thornley
Displaying a selection of personal
memories of Thornley.
There are 11 shared memories to read.
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Pit Village in my Youth
My name is Ken Orton and I lived in Thornley from 1947 until 1974, the year I married. I was born in Shadforth but my parents moved from there to Thornley when I was about one month old. We lived at 72, Thornlaw North until 1967 and then moved to 2, St Cuthbert Road, where I lived until I met my wife and married.
My childhood in Thornley was a marvellous time and I would not have liked to have lived anywhere else than in a pit village when I was growing up. Although we didn't have much, because my dad was a pitman and there were six children in the family, everybody we knew was the same as us and so we never missed what we never had. We always had enough to eat and presents for birthdays and Christmas, although not as much as bairns nowadays. Even my bairns did better that I did but, since we didn't expect to have a great deal, we were never... Read more
My Birth Place 1944
I was born in the spring of 1944 in my mother's parent's home, Thomas and Eveline Bowes who then lived in Thornlaw South. I visited them often, and loved to go for walks and going to the pitures at the bottom of Thornley with my grandfather. I remember the ice cream cart. Yes it was a yellow cart pulled by a horse. The ice cream was good, and the monkey's blood made it even better. I remember the pit heap and the gassy gutter, and catching tidlers as we called them. I will check my album for photographs to post.
HAPPY DAYS
I too remember the days when when I and my friends would get the bus to Wheatley Hill and go to the Embassy Ball Room looking for romance. Of course we would also go to other nieghbouring villages but the Hill was always my favourite, the girls were much prettier and friendlier and besides it was the shortest walk. Ralph Hughes.
Thornley in my Youth
Further to my memories I spoke of before, I can remember games we used to play like split the kipper, tally ho, blonk, and a lot more. The summer months were great, we would go over the moors and spend all day over there, if we were hungry we would take a turnip from a field and eat it. There was a place called the plantation where we had a swing, I remember one day the rope snapped when a lad called Lloyd was on it, he broke his arm. The farmer took him home on his tracter and he went to hospital where they put a pot on. Of course we treated him like a hero and we all signed his pot which his mother scrubbed clean and gave him a ear-full. It was shortly afterwards that we were playing split the kipper, a game were you had to throw a knife between some body's legs and stick it in the ground. To our dismay someone missed and hit... Read more
Memories of Thornley
I was born in Thornley in 1949 and attended St Godric's until I was 15. I remember Thornley as a community that went through good times and bad. When the pit closed it affected everybody, shops closed and young people moved to Peter Lee. Reading Ken Orton's memories brought a lot back to me, I knew Ken and Tom as a youth, among a lot of others. When I was 21 I married a local girl, Doreen Bell, who sadly died Feb 2011. I Now live in Peter Lee but still have family in Thornley. The only sad thing I remember is slagheaps that seemed to surround Thornley and were a scar on the surrounding countryside. Can anybody remember the Hilly Owly?
Childhood in The 1950s
Hi, My family the Burgins lived in Thornley when I was younger and a lot of them still live there now. We lived in Hartlepool Street in an old public house. We used to go down to Fleming's shop for the penny lollies. Our house backed onto the old pit and we used to walk along the lines with my grandad Charlie. My nanna and granda lived in Galt Street and I was always down there playing in Garden Terrace with my friend Tanya. We played all of the usual games, muggles and kick the can, knocky nine doors. We used to go to the Girls Brigade which was run by Mrs Griffiths, although boys and girls used to go. It was just a bunch of kids going nuts literally, lol, poor Mrs Griffiths. There was the community centre where there was discos, the one for young kids was on a Monday. We seemed to always have something to do, and if you didn't, your mam would certainly find something. ... Read more
Gilling Family
Hi, can anyone remember my grandad and his family? His name was Andrew Gilling, I think was a pit caller.
Faint Remembered Memories
I was born in 70 Thornlaw North in 1945, my parents were Herbert and Josephine Mary Cumming and my sister was Joan. I believe that the people next door were the Dunnets (Salvation Army). I used to play with Eileen Toy who must have lived close by ! Up the street lived the Crisp family. Mr Crisp had a ride-on steam-engined railway track, great fun. The milk was delivered by horse and cart and ladled into your own containers. If lucky enough to get an ice cream I always had "monkeys blood" on mine. We moved away to Washington when I was 5 and I have only visited a few times and not for a long time in the intervening 60 years. I left the North East at 16, to see the world via the RAF, but eventually married a girl from Jesmond. All families long time gone.
