Thurning Parish Page

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Thurning

Terninge, Torninge (1086), Thirning, Thorning (xii cent.), Thernynge, Thurning (xv cent.).

The parish of Thurning was formerly partly in Northamptonshire and part was in Huntingdonshire (Leightonstone Hundred), the church being in the latter county. In 1888, however, the Huntingdonshire part was transferred to Northamptonshire.

The soil is clay upon which wheat and barley, beans and peas are grown. the land rises gradually from north to south from about 150 ft. to 240 ft. above ordnance datum, with the village standing at about 220 ft.

The village lies about five and a half miles south-east of Oundle at the crossing of the roads from Barnwell St Andrew to Alconbury, and from Clapton to Luddington-in-the-Brook. The church stands to the south of the village. the rectory house, which is to the east of the church, is a two-story building of timber and plaster with a reed-thatched roof, probably of later 15th century date, but partly refaced in yellow brick with single-story brick additions. It has been the rectory since the 17th century, to which period the stone tithe-barn on the north side of the house apparently belongs.

Sir William Thirning, a prominent lawyer and judge of the Common Pleas in the time of Richard II and Henry IV, is supposed to have belonged to this place, but nothing is definately known. He took a prominent part in the deposition of Richard II in 1399, and he died in 1413.

In the Domesday Book, the greater part of the land of Thurning is recorded under Huntingdonshire. Pope Eugenius III in 1147 confirmed lands in Thurning and Winwick to St Mary's Priory in Huntingdon.

Cemeteries
Census
Church History
Church Records
Civil Registration
Maps
Population
Poorhouses, Poor Law etc.
Statistics

Cemeteries

Monumental inscriptions of this parish have not yet been recorded by the Northamptonshire FHS.

Census

The full 1841 Census of Thurning is available as fiche set C121 from the Huntingdonshire FHS.

The full 1851 Census of Thurning is available in as fiche set C71 from the Huntingdonshire FHS.

An index of the 1851 Census of Thurning as part of the Hundred of Navisford and Polebrook has been published on microfiche by the Northamptonshire Family History Society.

A surname index of the 1881 Census of the Oundle Registration District of Northamptonshire, in which Thurning was enumerated (RG11/1584, Folios 51a - 55a), and which took place on 3rd April 1881, is available as fiche C1 from the Huntingdonshire FHS.

A full transcription of the 1891 Census of the Huntingdonshire (Miscellaneous Parishes) Registration District in which Thurning was enumerated, and which took place on 5th April 1891, has also been produced by the Huntingdonshire FHS (as Fiche C-16) from the Huntingdonshire FHS.

Church History

OS Grid Square TL 085829.

The church of St James consists of a chancel, north chapel - formerly the vestry, north vestry - formerly a chapel at the end of the aisle, nave, north aisle, south aisle, west turret and south porch. The walls are of coursed rubble with stone dressings, and the roofs are covered with lead.

The church is not mentioned in the Domesday survey of 1086 but, by the middle of the 12th century, there was a stone church consisting of a chancel with an aisle-less nave, the latter being about the same size as the present. About 1190, a north aisle was added and somewhat early in the 13th century, the nave and aisle was lengthened one bay to the west. in about 1300, the south aisle was added; probably the arcade and the aisle walls are all of the same date, although there is a strange mixture of details - probably due to the employment of an aged mason. Possibly the north aisle was rebuilt a little later, and later still (around 1340) the chancel was rebuilt. Considerable alterations were made in the 15th century; the western bay of the nave was taken down and a new west wall, with a bell-turrett and spirelet above it, was built. Some extensive alterations took place in 1850.

In 1880-81, the north aisle and vestry, the clearstory, the west wall of the nave, and the west wall of the south aisle were taken down and rebuilt with old materials, and the rest of the church was restored. The chancel was restored again in 1902, when the vestry and north chapel were altered and rearranged.

Church Records

The original church registers are deposited in the Northamptonshire Records Office, Wootton Hall Park, Northampton. Only the following are in the Huntingdon Records Office:

Bishop's Transcripts: 1604-9, 1612, 1617-19, 1669-70/1685-88, 1691-8, 1700-2, 1705-16, 1718-24, 1726-72, 1774-84, 1787-1812/1813-24/1824-35, 1838, 1840, 1842-55, 1857, 1859.

The Huntingdonshire Marriage Indexes include marriages from this parish. These are, at present, issued in alphabetical listings in series: 1601-1700, and 1701-1754, and are available from the Huntingdonshire FHS.