Children laugh and shriek as they play gleefully in the primary school playground, a few yards from the church and Glastonbury thorn that they adorn with ribbons each summer. Over the road, a black barn with large tinted windows like hollow eyes watch the flitting figures behind the hedgerows.
Thorn Cross Category D open prison nestles in the bosom of the tiny village of Appleton Thorn. Take a turn from the church, pub and bustling village hall, past the playground, and the road suddenly opens out, ironed flat: A car park on one side and prison gates and a guardhouse on the other. Navy blue metal signs all along the straight, narrow stretch read ‘HMP Thorn Cross’.
Ria Reed, 37, picks her son up from the primary school each day. She lives within walking distance, but other parents use the prison car park during the school run.
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“It’s so random,” she tells CheshireLive of the prison’s location. “We weren’t too concerned when we moved.
“But, we have had a few escapes. You hear the police helicopter overhead and see police around.”
A series of prisoners have gone on the run from the open prison, previously a youth offenders institute, described as being "like Butlin's" by former inmate Troy Deeney in a BBC series based on his memoirs. In February, 22-year-old Oliver Dale absconded, and the following month Gavin Phythian, 31, was sentenced to three years and one month for escaping lawful custody and being concerned in the supply of crack cocaine after more than two months on the run from Thorn Cross.
In March 2022, convicted killer Shane Farrington, then 39, went missing just hours after a second prisoner was recaptured after more than 24 hours on the run. Farrington, who was convicted of manslaughter in 2009 after attacking and killing a prisoner in his cell at HMP Peterborough.
He was later detained by police. Liam Horn, 19, a chef at the local pub, the Thorn Inn, said: “It doesn’t really bother me.
“You get the occasional thing about people getting out. My mate almost got his bike stolen by someone who had escaped but the police caught him.”
“It’s a nice, quiet village. You get that nice community feel,” says Beth Middleton, 30, visiting her grandmother who also lives in the village.
Of the prison, she said: “You think about it when there’s the occasional abscondee and the police helicopter goes up, but otherwise not at all.”
The tree was grown from a cutting of the Holy Thorn at Glastonbury. Such a tree has stood in the village for just under a millenia.
The land the prison stands on was once a naval base, with a runway to the south where the M56 now runs. Graves of some of those who died at the base during its years of operation between 1942 and 1958 are located behind the nearby church, including the graves of two Dutch pilots who died over Great Budworth in 1944.
“We’ve had a few problems - quite a few,” says Carole McNab, 73, when asked about the prison to the rear of her property. Like other residents, Carole talks of the recent absconders and seeing the police helicopter overhead.
“A lot of the prisoners do help out around the village, especially at bawming time,” she adds, referencing the village’s annual Bawming the Thorn ceremony, in which children dance around the hawthorn tree at the heart of the village and adorn it with ribbons.
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