Thurcroft is a village and

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...

situated south-east of

Rotherham Rotherham () is a large minster and market town in South Yorkshire, England. The town takes its name from the River Rother which then merges with the River Don. The River Don then flows through the town centre. It is the main settlement of ...

in the

Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham The Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham is a metropolitan borough of South Yorkshire, England. It is named after its largest town, Rotherham, but also spans the outlying towns of Maltby, South Yorkshire, Maltby, Swinton, South Yorkshire, Swinton, ...

South Yorkshire South Yorkshire is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and metropolitan county, metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. The county has four council areas which are the cities of City of Doncaster, Doncaster and City of Sh ...

, England. From 1902 to 1991, it was a mining community. It has a population of 5,296, increasing to 6,900 at the 2011 Census.

History

The name Thurcroft has Norse (

Viking Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

) roots as 'thorr' means thunder in old Norse, so is probably at least a thousand years old. According to A. D. Mills in his ''Dictionary of English Place-Names'', the first mention of Thurcroft is in 1319. Thurscroft: 'Enclosure of a man called Thorir. Old Scandinavian person's name + Old English word Croft. Thurcroft - Thurcroft Hall

Until the 20th century, Thurcroft consisted of Thurcroft Hall, the longtime holding of the Mirfin family, and three other farms. Thurcroft Hall was held by the Mirfins (sometimes spelled Mirfield) until 1644 when Robert Mirfin, the lord of the manor, died childless. The property then was carried into the Beckwith family by his widow, who was also his stepsister. The Mirfields and the

Levett Levett is a surname of Anglo-Norman origin, deriving from eLivet, which is held particularly by families and individuals resident in England and British Commonwealth territories. Origins This surname comes from the village of Livet-en-Ouche, no ...

s of nearby High Melton were interrelated, Thomas Levett having married Robert Mirfin's sister Elizabeth. In more recent times Thurcroft became home to the UK's largest battery "The Thurcroft battery".

Coal mining

The land on which the village would eventually stand was bought in the 1800s (along with the Hall) by a Sheffield brewer (Thomas Marrian), whose son, Thomas Marrian Jr, leased the coal mining rights to Rother Vale Collieries in 1902. The economic development of Thurcroft effectively dates from the sinking of the coal mine in around 1909. Many of the terraced houses on the area showed characteristics of coal mining in the last quarter of the 19th century and first quarter of the 20th century. The population grew from next to nothing in 1900 to around 2,000 in 1923: Shortly after which the village saw hard times in the 1926 United Kingdom general strike, when 250,000 free meals were given out between May and September. By 1947, the mine employed over 2,000 men, and in the 1984/85 miners' strike the pit was again involved in industrial action. The coal mine was closed in 1991 despite attempts by the workforce to buy it out.

Church and parish

Before 1995, Thurcroft was within the parish of

Laughton-en-le-Morthen Laughton en le Morthen is a village and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Rotherham lying to the south of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, England, and its main attraction is the All Saints Church with its tower and spire of 185 feet. The ...

and a permanent stone church was only built in 1937, making it one of the newest on this site (although there was a Methodist chapel built in 1917, and a village cemetery was established in the 1920s). Thurcroft parish became separate from Laughton in 1995. The old Catholic Church is now home to TCF Church.TCF Church

Big Local

Residents have created a Big Local partnership made up of local residents and people from organizations involved in the area which will then create a local plan using the ideas of local people. Once the plan is agreed with the Big Local Trust, the partnership can start to spend the money on the plan's priorities.

References

External links