Thrale/Thrall history

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Studying and researching into the earliest records and seeing a story take shape is rather like watching a figure emerge from the shadows with ever growing detail. The name of Thrale appears with apparent Anglo-Scandinavian origins, one suggestion being that the derivation is from the old friesic of 'Thralo' meaning swift or nimble. Another alternative could well be the old Northern English from the old Norse of 'Thrall', bondman or servant.¹ However one may toss the coin, it is with certainty that one sees the name first reported in the 1309 Subsidy Rolls of Bedfordshire by the mention of John Thral and Richard le Threl in the 1332 Subsidy Rolls of Sussex. The latter was no doubt an early member of the Threele family of Sussex whose armorial bearings were later appropriated by various members of the Thrale family.

Thus from this time on, the picture of the family's activities takes shape as an increasing number of references come to hand. All centre round the Hundred of Flitt in Bedfordshire and of its parishes Clophill, Barton, Gravenhurst (Upper and Lower) Higher Gobian and Pulloxhill are of special significance, but paramount is the parish of Luton with its manors of East and West Hyde which borders onto the hamlet of Thrales End. For centuries the family centred itself on this little hamlet on the Bedfordshire-Hertfordshire border just north of Harpenden and a mere four miles from Sandridge and five from St. Albans.

The Bedfordshire Tax Returns of 1309 shows William le Thral to have been liable for 3/- and Johanne Thral for 2/-. In 1329 Richard le Thral and William le Thral were witnesses to a grant of land called Sparrows in Thrales End which is the earliest reference to the home hamlet.² Richard Thrale of Westhyd, Luyton, granted to William Goffe in 1355 a croft 'vinis, sepibus et fossatis' - with vines, hedges and ditches - at Westhyd, and was witnessed by William and Robert Thrale.³ Four years later William and Richard Thrale were connected with a grant of land at Hydefeld⁴ and then in 1361 the ties of allied families show themselves when William Thrale of West Hyde granted land to Ralph ate Hay and his wife Agnes, with the witnesses of Richard and Robert Thrale.⁵ It was about the years 1385 and 1390 Nicholas atte Haye of Stopsley was extending his estate in West Hyde. His mother was Agnes Thrale and it was in 1390 that Nicholas confirmed lands in West Hyde to his mother.⁶

Austin in his history of Luton terms the Thrales as being yeoman squires at that time, and it would seem that the family commenced to exercise some influence for Johannes Trayle is recorded as being M.P.

Footnotes

1. Robert Ferguson "The Teutonic Name System". E. Harrison "Surname of the United Kingdom. P.H. Reaney "A Dictionary of British Surnames".↩︎
2. Bedfordshire Record Office d.w. 205.↩︎
3. Bedfordshire Record Office d.w. 215.↩︎
4. Bedfordshire Record Office d.w. 243.↩︎
5. Bedfordshire Record Office d.w. 265.↩︎
6. Austin: History of Luton: Add. Charter B.M. Nos. 15, 708, 724, 725.↩︎