It is an Arts and Crafts building in Gothic Revival style, designed by James Mallinson and William Swinden Barber, and completed in 1870.

Robert Boyle Thompson, an evangelical missionary who had already done "great work" in the slums of Seven Dials when he was granted the living of Thurstonland at the age of 28 years.

[3][4] The ground plan dated March 1867 and an undated sketch by the architects of William Butterfield's St John the Evangelist, Birkby, are held at West Yorkshire Archive Service.

The scattered population of this village, which was soon to become a parish in its own right, consisted of about 1,200 persons of "limited means", engaged in agricultural and manufacturing trades, so the congregation could not fund a new church.

Local people had raised £100 and, being unable to assist further with funding, had offered voluntary manual labour; they levelled the ground by hand.

The audience sang a hymn, This stone to Thee in faith we lay, while an inscribed silver trowel was presented to the Earl of Dartmouth.

The hole was sealed with an inscribed brass plate,[8][9] which said:Glory be to God, the Son and the Holy Ghost, the foundation of this church in Thurstonland in the parish of Kirkburton, to be dedicated to His service by the name of St Thomas, was laid by Wm.

Richard Collins, vicar of Kirkburton; Robert Boyle Thompson, curate of Thurstonland; George W. Jenkinson, churchwarden of Thurston-land, James Mallinson and Wm Swindon Barber, architects.

The ceremony was not over, however, until the Earl had been formally thanked by Collins and had replied with a long speech which mentioned donations, touched on evangelism and dwelt on his newborn grandson.

Barber the architect was unable to attend due to illness, but that he "had worked very hard in connection with the church; he had paid them a great many visits, and his superintendence had been untiring."

Thompson referred obliquely to the free seating in the new church, saying that rich and poor could worship together, and exhorting his privileged audience to take full part in public services regularly.

The tower is at the east end of the nave, and it has a stair turret to the second floor on its west side and a splay-footed stone spire with four lucarnes.

It is a hollow cone of stone blocks, unsupported by any interior frame, and is full of light because it has four lucarnes at the bottom, and eight more large openings higher up.

[1] This is seen to full effect because of the contrasting dark-stained wood against very pale ceiling paint, and the large amount of light from clear-glazed windows.

[30] Many of the original pews designed by Mallinson and Barber still exist in situ, but the ones at the back of the nave were removed along with the marble font in the 1980s when the church room was constructed there.

[16][34] By 1913 there was fear in the village that the pauper burials were causing epidemics, because the sexton was saving money by leaving graves open to rain and weather, and not filling them with earth until they each contained their full complement of four coffins.

The authorities claimed that Storthes Hall's use of the graveyard benefited Thurstonland by the payment of rates and that only fifty paupers per year, who were unclaimed by relatives, were buried there.

Brown, at that time vicar of Thurstonland and chaplain to Storthes Hall, claimed that the burials were no danger to health, even though the sexton had to ladle out water from open graves before subsequent funerals.

[34] Reverend George Lloyd, (1820–1885) was Curate in Charge of Thurstonland under R. Collins, Vicar of Kirkburton, from 1861 to 1865, using the old dissenters' chapel room before the present building existed.

[2][52][53] In Pudsey he was involved in politics, being one of the assentors to the nomination of Conservative candidate Surr William Duncan for local elections, although Briggs Priestley won for the Liberals.

The Huddersfield Chronicle said, "During his stay here his pulpit powers, his genial bearing towards all classes, and his assiduous labours, have endeared him to the whole (sic) parishioners.

Revs Richard and John Collins took part of the Burial Service (from the Book of Common Prayer) and the choir and congregation sang hymns.

[35] In October 1886, along with the whole of the clergy in the rural deanery, all in vestments, Leech attended a dedication festival at the jubilee of the restoration of St Peter's, Huddersfield Parish Church.

[81] On the evening of Monday 20 January 1890, John Leech chaired a debate in which "good temper and kindly feeling prevailed" at the National School, New Mill, on the question, "Is the union between Church and State beneficial?"

[82] In July 1906 Leech was appointed vicar of the Church of St John the Evangelist, Golcar, Huddersfield, with a living of £300 per year and a house; he remained in this position until 1931.

[84] He was the youngest son of Edward Jenner Jerram (1811–1885), a merchant working between Cape of Good Hope and Brazil, and his wife Priscilla (1829–1909).

[86] In 1861 Edward Jerram and his wife Priscilla were living at 35 Alfred Place West, Kensington, with their eldest daughter, a niece and three servants including a coachman.

[143][144] Their son Lieutenant Kenneth Denholm Hounsfield, aged 23 years, was killed in action in September 1944 during World War II.

[145] He attended Guildhall Middle School at Bury St Edmunds, and in 1899 received a prize for French: a book on astronomy, Story of the Heavens by Robert Stawell Ball, 1886[146] He gained a Licentiate in Theology at Durham University in 1911, was ordained deacon in 1912, and ordained priest in 1913 by Brooke Foss Westcott, Bishop of Durham.

His funeral on 28 August at Thurstonland Church was attended by the Bishop of Pontefract who paid tribute to his life and ministry, the vicar of Farnley Tyas, the rector of Kirkheaton, Rev.