The Lornells

The Lornells were a vocal and piano act, references to whom have been found in newspapers in the British Newspaper Archive between November 1917 and October 1919. They were named as Laurie and Nellie Lornell in the Mansfield Reporter, 16 November 1917; the Burnley News, 17 August 1918; the Halifax Evening Courier, 6 May 1919; and The Era, 7 May 1919. The Runcorn Examiner, 17 May 1919, described the Lornells as ‘two dainty young ladies who please with solos and harmonising duets’. Was the ‘Miss Lorrie Lornell’ who filled the role of principal girl in the pantomime Little Jack Horner at the Garrick Theatre, Edinburgh in February 1920, a former member of the Lornells (Edinburgh Evening News, 3 February 1920)? The real surname of ‘Nellie Lornell’ was Dyson according to a report of her marriage in The Stage, 24 May 1923, which noted that ‘The marriage took place at Oldham, last Thursday, of James Jackson, of Rochdale, and Nellie Dyson … Miss Dyson was the soprano of the *Reno Quartet and the Two Lornells’. Nellie was married as Sarah E Dyson according to the Civil Registration Marriage Index. [* References to The Reno Quartet have been found in newspapers in the British Newspaper Archive between September 1914 and October 1917, that is, until just before the first mention that has been found of The Lornells. The Quartet was advertised in the Staffordshire Sentinel, 28 August 1915, as a ‘High-Class Vocal Act’; and a review in the same newspaper, 31 August 1915, described its members as three ladies and a gentleman.]