yeovil people
benjamin thorne
Knife & Scissors Grinder and Lodging House Keeper
Benjamin
Thorne, known as
Ben, was born in
Yeovil on 18
August
1895 but very
little is known
about his early
life. His
parents were
travellers; his
father William
came from
Somerset, his
mother Ellen was
Irish and they
married in
Bristol in 1919,
settling in
Yeovil around
1925-26.
However Ben Thorne became a familiar sight around Yeovil with his knife and scissor grinding machine. For years he would push his little hand-cart around the town and sharpen blades of all descriptions for both companies and individuals. In the 1990s his daughter, Mrs Penelore Baker recalled "My father lived in Yeovil for seventy years and he used to sharpen all the blades for the gloving scissors at the gloving factories. He also used to sharpen the blade on a lawnmower for just two shillings."
His other daughter, Mrs Lillian Mash, recalled "Apart from knife grinding he fixed pots, pans, china, glass and even mended umbrellas. He served in the Somerset Light Infantry in World War One and later ran the lodging house with my mother and myself at 111 Park Street (the former Cross Keys beerhouse). He bred budgerigars and ran a smallholding at the bottom of the garden and he even built a boxing ring in the basement where he held boxing events. He served in the 3rd Somerset Yeovil Home Guard, Q Company, 5 Platoon. He rebuilt the side of our house when a bomb landed in Ninesprings in 1942."
Ben was
listed twice in
Kelly's
Directory of
1935, once as a
'Lodging House
Keeper
(Registered)'
and also as a
'Knife & Scissor
Grinder' - both
of 111 Park
Street.
gallery
Courtesy of Rob
Baker
Benjamin and Florence Thorne, photographed around 1919 - their wedding photograph?
Courtesy of Rob Baker
Benjamin and Florence Thorne, photographed in 1939 walking along the front at Weymouth with their daughters Lillian and Florence.
Courtesy of Viv
Cafferkey
NCOs and other ranks of 3rd Somerset (Yeovil) Battalion Home Guard, Yeovil Borough Company circa 1944. Seventh from the left in the back row is Ben Thorne (thanks to Rob Baker) but can you name anyone else?
3rd Somerset (Yeovil) Battalion Home Guard, Yeovil Borough Company, Q Section, No 5 Platoon, posing with their 2-pounder anti-tank gun in December 1944. 4th from left, middle row, with barrel of the 2-pounder aimed at his nose is Ben Thorne (thanks to Rob Baker) but can you name anyone else?
Courtesy of Mrs
Lillian Mash née
Thorne.
This
photograph
features in my
book "Lost Yeovil"
Ben Thorne with his knife-grinding hand cart - a once familiar sight on Yeovil's streets.
Courtesy of Rob
Baker
This photograph shows Ben Thorne's wife, Florence (at left) who ran the Cross Keys lodging house in Park Street with her husband and his parents. She is pictured outside the Cross Keys (by this time a lodging house) with Ben's mother, Ellen, and daughters Caroline and Theresa.
