Charles Thornhill

Charles Thornhill (1814 – 31 August 1881) was an English cricketer who played in six matches for Cambridge University that have since been judged to have been first-class.[1][2] He was born at Hemingford Grey, Huntingdonshire and died at Milestown, Castlebellingham, County Louth, Ireland. His precise date of birth is not known.

Thornhill was the son of George Thornhill, a Huntingdonshire landowner who became Member of Parliament for Huntingdonshire from 1837 to his death in 1852.[3] He was educated at Eton College and Emmanuel College, Cambridge. As a cricketer, he played as a middle-order batsman, though it is not known if he was right- or left-handed.[1] He appeared for Cambridge University in one or two matches each season from 1837 to 1840 and he made, by the standards of the time, some good scores: against the Cambridge Town Club in 1838, for instance, he top-scored with 32 out of a total of 99 in the first innings.[4] But he was not picked for the Cambridge side in the University Match against Oxford University in any of his last three seasons, and therefore never won a Blue.

Thornhill graduated from Cambridge University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1841, and this converted to a Master of Arts in 1845.[3] His post-Cambridge career is not clear: in the directory of Cambridge alumni, he is cited as formerly a captain in the 14th King's Light Dragoons, but it also states that after graduation, when that regiment was sent on a 20-year tour of duty in India, Thornhill was ordained into the Church of England as a deacon, serving as curate at Wark on Tyne in 1842 and 1843.[3] At his death in 1881 in Ireland, he was noted in a newspaper as having been formerly the vicar of Burwell, Cambridgeshire.[5]

Several of his family were also cricketers: his brother George Thornhill played in first-class matches for Cambridge University, while another brother John appeared twice in first-class games for the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC); other brothers, and George's three sons, played in minor matches.[1]