The Torntonian

Memories From 'The Thorntonian' 1917 - 1967

c. 1917 Reverend Mother St. Clare, Founder of the Convent, and 1st reverent mother of Thornton college. Note wimple.

THE START OF IT ALL . OCTOBER 1917

Thornton Hall 1917 ! Quite a caption to conjure with, I assure you! It recalls hard days, icy cold days, hungry days, but withal very happy days.... . One day in that memorable October, 1 and a few girls and a whole lot of cases and trunks were dumped down on Wolverton platform to be carried off by Mother St. Cuthbert to the " Drag " standing outside the station. It was an open double-storeyed affair-open to the sky ! How like a shooting van, I thought, and t excitedly hoped the Tally-ho would ring out to summon the pink-coated riders and hounds to lead us on the way to adventure! I was very young then…

Marvellous drive it was, bowling along the Buckingham Road past the " Martyrs' Tree” then down the Chestnut Drive and straight on across the three bridges to the corner of our drive. There we saw Thornton Hall sitting squarely on the gravel space inviting us to come in and enjoy all the beauties and curiosities within… It was an unforgettable thrill that was never damped or effaced by all the grim tasks that dogged our steps later on.

We had to work strenuously to clean and heat this large house that had been only partly occupied over many years before our arrival, in order to turn it into a comfortable school for students from Saffron Walden and Felixstowe.

Mother Beatrice quickly organised us into a real ` working squad '-robed in nightdresses, by the way-to chase the thousands of spiders out of the old Granary. Then the builders took over and transformed it into a respectable laundry. There were the rooms in the Tower and Bachelor Wings to be scrubbed, waxed, redecorated and fitted up as sleeping apartments for our girls. There was no heating, so we went out collecting dry branches and brushwood to saw up into logs to make jolly fires in the various rooms.

The lack of abundant hot water in the upper storeys was only a minor problem ! The nuns gladly carried it up to the girls early and late for their ablutions.

The really distressing difficulty those first days was trying to get enough for the meals. According to our contract, we could not touch the produce of the Kitchen Gardens that year. The nuns tramped into Stony Stratford for provisions. No buses ran on the Buckingham Road and this meant, of course, we could carry back only very limited supplies each time, alas!

However, Providence came as usual to our rescue. The chestnut tree at our gate bore a bumper harvest of chestnuts that year-and didn't they taste good? The poor squirrels had not much of a look in! This dear old tree still stands sentinel there and could tell you many a tale of the delightful hours we all spent under it.

Many of my memories of the early years of Thornton are crystalised in an old photo album. Most of the snaps are sepia ones, printed by ourselves by sunlight, some are gaslight ones which at 2d. per print, were rather expensive ; nevertheless the outlay has justified itself as they have endured nearly half a century, whereas the sepia ones are sadly faded. As an " over sixty " myself, I often wonder which of us will fade right away first. We snapped cheerfully - everyone and everything-the nuns at recreation in the garden, each other on bicycles, Marmaduke the swan and Father Hughes with the gander, picnics at Thornborough and performances of " A Midsummer Night's Dream, and long ago characters such as Sister Prisca and Madame Leslie. On Saturday afternoons we cycled into Stony to have our films developed by Cox & Robinson. We stood in the middle of what is now the A.5 to exclaim over the result. Our return to Thornton was punctuated by stops to relight our oil lamps when they had been extinguished by the bumps in the road, but we had been amply fortified by tea at Watts the baker's. Nowadays, I enter the road with caution and leave it with relief and it would he dicing with death to try to see if Messrs Cox & Robinson's and Watts' establishments are still there. Thornton remains, and nothing else really matters.

There are photos of Black Maria, in which. we cheerfully drove to the station, five a side with comfort, six with hilarity and a squash.

There are groups of horticultural students hoeing the drive, of Mr. Green's violin students beside the fountain, of post-matrics in cap and gown and domestic scientists in cap and apron and groups of juniors and others depicting the friendly rivalry between seniors and " domestics" -the Seniors thought the Domestics idle and the Domestics thought the Seniors useless. Time and a topsy-turvy world have proved both wrong.

There are groups out " logging." The more vigorously we logged, the longer we kept our bedroom fires burning. It used to be difficult to decide then whether there was more joy in sitting over the flickering warmth of the dying embers and then taking a flying leap into bed, or in lying in bed watching the flames leap and eventually die. If we logged extra strenuously, we also supplemented the coal fire in the study room. The Post-matrics sat at desks quite near the fire and enjoyed the warmth of the flames and of academic distinction. The Matrics and Seniors sat at tables and wrestled with. Virgil and Euclid and Shakespeare.

As I turn the pages it seems a neck-and-neck race whether the photos or I fade away first. What will never fade is the example and the guidance, the happiness and the love we received at Thornton. Through these we have found our comfort and inspiration in our own sorrows; we have stood firm and kept our sense of values in an age of crumbling morality and, from the abundance of what we were given, we have been able to pass on hope and tenderness to the bewildered and the pathetic victims of a stricken world. The overspill from what was lavished upon us at Thornton will go on helping and guiding others less fortunate than we till time itself shall fade away.

But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections, Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day.

Many of my contemporaries, I am sure, will recall summer week-ends on the lawn with tennis and gramophone, no transistors in those days ! Winter lacrosse with. blue, numbed, lifeless fingers. Midnight feasts, even at the age of seventeen, when the only concession to sophistication was that tins of fruit had replaced sausage rolls and cheese, stored for days in our versatile night-tables. The eagerly awaited " sardines " on December 8th, fancy dress parades on Shrove Tuesday and end-of-term concerts with halfremembered lines and wholehearted efforts. Birthday parties when the dining-room was transformed since lunch time ; we know now how hard the Sisters worked ! The sweet shop and the agony of spending twopence ... .

One, at least, will recall crouching at the top of the " red stairs " listening to Mother Provincial, then Mother Edmund, playing Brahms. The great hilarity of sliding down those same " red stairs ", its grandeur somewhat diminished, on a tea tray !

Those deeper recollections, so clear after thirty years, of quiet and peaceful times, when the whole school gathered in the chapel for Sunday Mass and evening Benediction, the stimulation of early morning Mass on weekdays and undisturbed reading in the library on Sunday morning. I often think of the patience, the enthusiasm and the sheer goodness of those who taught us !

All of us, 1 feel sure, formed deep and sincere relationships with both. members of the community and those who were at school with us and for this l have always been grateful. These were indeed years when we received much, and, I think, as we received so are we ready to give in adult life.

I was eight years old and the second from the youngest when I first went to Thornton.

I can remember my first night in the `Pink Dormitory' unpacking my trunk with Mother Bernard looking on.

My first two terms are mainly memories of the countryside surrounding Thornton ; blackberrying, and Mother George hoisting me on the top of the blackberry bushes because I was so small and light, and I could then reach all the prize blackberries ; walking through the fields amongst baby lambs and picking flowers and counting the bridges on our return walks. I did not worry too much about lessons, for in those days there were only two other girls in my class.

Then came the war, and with it came Willesden Convent, Felixstowe and Ipswich. More classrooms appeared and more tables were put into the dining room.

Mother de Lourdes learnt to drive the school car. Bob, the Airedale, seemed to become more fierce.

My friends and I were quite certain that one or other of the lady boarders was in reality a German spy. Richard Hillary's book ` The Last Enemy ' was read in the classrooms. We knitted scarves and socks for the Navy, and nothing was allowed to be wasted on our plates. We listened to the fall of Dunkirk on the radio during a needlework class, and, although we were well aware of the danger around us, we remained almost in another world-peaceful and secure with the nuns looking after us all.

I have to travel a lot and meet many people. I find that today the world is moving too fast and not becoming a very nice place in which to live, but on the occasions when I have been

able to visit Thornton I find that it remains quite unchanged. As a school it has improved with more useful buildings which have been added. Basically, however, it remains exactly the same, and when I visit it I could be eight years old or the thirty-eight years that I am today. It makes no difference, there is a tranquillity which will go on for ever.

I left Thornton in the Summer of 1957 after spending five very happy years there.

I shall never forget the day that I and nearly all my form left . . . We were so miserable and there was so much. weeping ! We had been so very happy and secure at Thornton and could not imagine ourselves anywhere else.

I went for a walk several days ago and seeing all the blackberries nearly ready reminded me of the days in the Autumn Term when we donned old clothes specially brought back for the occasion and set off to pick blackberries ; we ate plenty as well but brought back heavy basketfuls (biscuit tins and cardboard boxes, too, pressed into service when the supply of baskets failed) and weighed them to see which Form had worked the hardest !

When I think of Thornton, I remember the peace of the grounds and the lines of horse chestnut trees each side of the drive leading down from the Buckingham Road ; I remember the processions through the grounds, the fresh grapes from

the greenhouses carefully weighed out so that everyone had her fair share ; I remember, too, the long walks we had every Shrove Tuesday at the end of which we eat mountains of food and then-in a state of stupor-went down to the Hall to watch a film.

One Winter Term, Mother Emmanual and Mother Felicity took us on geographical walks on frosty Saturday morning ! Although at the time I was not interested in or good at Geography, I enjoyed the long walks.

Then, of course, there was tennis. The nuns were always most enthusiastic and encouraging so that the teams invariably did well in the County Cup matches.

Having embarked on these somewhat fragmentary recollections, I could go on for ever! I am so grateful to all the nuns who tried so hard with each of us . . . . The most enjoyable year, I think, was my last when I took G.C.E. I enjoyed both lessons and study and my one regret is that I did not stay another year to take some ` A ' Levels. But even in the last ten years, education has changed and there is much more emphasis on advanced education than when I was at school. Thornton's Sixth Form was then still in its infancy.

How can I finish unless by saying that I hope my own daughter may one day go to Thornton.... This is perhaps the best recommendation one can give. Going back to Thornton is in a sense like going home.

If any old girls have any further memories to add to this page, please contact Bryan Egan at 110 Clarence Road, Stoney Stratford, Milton Keynes, MK11 1JG.