Thornhill Hall

Thornhill Hall is a ruined medieval manor house on a moated island located in Rectory Park, Thornhill, West Yorkshire, England. The ruins are listed as grade II. and the moat, with the surrounding grounds, is a scheduled monument.

Excavations carried out between 1964 and 1972 proved that there had been two halls on the island, an earlier large 13tg-century building with clay-bonded foundation walls, and a later c. 1450 stone H-plan building. The later building showed signs of renovation in the 16th century, when a paved floor, plaster walls and a chimney were added.

In the reign of Henry III, Thornhill Hall was the seat of the Thornhill family, who intermarried with the De Fixbys and Babthorpes in the reigns of Edward I and Edward II. In 1370, in the reign of Edward III, Elizabeth Thornhill, the only child of Simon Thornhill, married Sir Henry Savile. This extinguished the family line of Thornhills of Thornhill which now passed down the Savile line. Thornhill Hall then became the principal seat of the powerful Savile family. [1]

The Saviles later intermarried with the Calverley family, so that when Sir John Savile died in 1503 in Thornhill, he left provision in his will for his sister Alice, who had married Sir William Calverley.

George Savile was created a baronet in 1611. The Saviles remained here until the English Civil War when in 1643 the house was besieged by the forces of Parliament, (having been previously fortified by Sir William Savile, the third baronet of the family). In August 1643 troops of Lady Anne Savile, under Capt. Thos. Paulden defended the hall against the Parliamentary forces under Col. Sir Thos. Fairfax. They were forced to surrender but the hall was accidentally blown up and destroyed. after which the family moved their seat to Rufford Abbey in Nottinghamshire.

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