The Viking Press first edition - 1978
It's been over a fortnight since my last Blog. There are two reasons for this. Firstly, the small matter of Christmas and New Year festivities took precedence; secondly, Gathorne-Hardy's fascinating account of the 'phenomenon' of the English Public School could not be read at pace. It was so packed with information, and analysis of that information, that a slow and intermittent reading was inevitable.
The Chapter headings set out clearly the author's approach: e.g. Early History to 1820: The Brutal and Permissive Ages; Public School Reform and the Victorian Moral Climate: The New Sexual Traditions; Games and Sex; The Progressive School Movement; and 1945-1977: The Academic Revolution and the Influence of the Public Schools Today. The latter chapter proved of great interest to me, as it was during that period that I attended what appears to be a very typical institution for its time.
But first, the pre-Victorian schools. The author highlights the fact that their major purpose was to provide recruits for the Anglican church and the main subject was Latin. (As an aside, I had great empathy with Peter Cook's regret that he could've been a judge, but I never had the Latin. I had six years studying Latin, but still made a mess of it in my interview for Oxford). Even if it was dog Latin, the language was the single avenue by which ambitious men could enter the two careers open to them - the law and the Church. Gathorne-Hardy rightly (I think) states that for the majority of boys studying Latin - grammar, parsing, construing, learning by heart was sheer drudgery. It was not made legal for grammar schools to teach other subjects until 1840! Moreover, it was a brutal age. The power of masters to beat their charges was absolute. Gill of St. Paul's (1608-35) seemed to believe in a sort of divine right of beating. Once, when a stone came through a window, he rushed in a fury out into the street, seized the nearest passer-by, a Sir John D., and beat him so severely he never dared go near the school again without an armed guard. There is a whole section on Dr. Keate, Headmaster of Eton ((1809-1834), five-foot tall, strong as a bull, and equipped, under a high cocked hat like Napoleon, with enormous shaggy red eyebrows, great angry tufts...his temper was terrifying...quacking, foaming, snarling, he tried to thrash Eton into submission. Gathorne-Hardy points out that in a school where there is a lot of beating there is also a lot of bullying. "The bigs hit me, so I hit the smalls; that's fair." Lack of privacy, bad food and games played purely for pleasure, not to instill "virtues" like team spirit, sum up the period. Sadly, the one reference to my own school, John Wesley's Kingswood, does not come out of it well: total control, no games, getting up at 4.00 in the morning, winter and summer, living almost entirely on a diet of porridge and water gruel... - no wonder there were mass outbreaks of weeping, howling and shrieking! There were changes by my day!!
The reaction to the brutality, inefficiency, corruption and immorality was a long time coming. Thomas Arnold may not have been the great innovator of legend, but he typified the movement towards prefects, organised games and the importance of religion and 'character'. Religion and the Church would unify (and pacify against mob violence) the country. All of Arnold's successors were devout clergymen (two, Tait and Temple, became Archbishops of Canterbury). School as a place to train character - a totally new concept so far - was what came to distinguish the English public school from all other Western school systems.
This is a Blog, not a thesis, on Gathorne-Hardy's excellent book, so one must skip over the vast majority of its content. He deals with the new foundations in the mid to late 19th century - Marlborough in 1843, Lancing in 1848, Epsom in 1855 and, later, Bloxham, Denstone, for example. He focuses on the great Marlborough Rebellion of 1851, where - after 'revolutionary' committees were set up - a rocket shooting up from the central court started a week-long chaotic revolt: the college reeked of gunpowder and smoke drifted through the smashed windows and broken doors. All privileges lost in the last four years were returned to the boys and the rebellion petered out. However, it was no wonder that the headmaster, the Reverend Mr. Wilkinson, quiet, scholarly, gentle, resigned a few months later. Prefects, beatings, poor food continued but there was an increasing concentration on games. I have skimmed over two aspects of the book - the ever-present importance of class and the ever-present problem of sex, and what to do about the latter. Chapter 7 is simply headed Games and Sex. You can always purchase the book! Later chapters turn their attention to Girls' public schools and the importance of figures such as Penelope Lawrence a co-founder of Roedean; the rule of Miss Dorothea Beale (1831-1906) at Cheltenham from 1858; and Miss Buss (1827-94), who founded the North London Collegiate School for Ladies.
Chapter 12, on The Progressive School Movement, is good at placing into context the importance of Rousseau, Jeremy Bentham and Pestalozzi writings in establishing schools such as William Gilpin's Cheam in 1752; the Hills' Hazelwood from 1819; Cecil Reddie's Abbotsholme, established in Derbyshire in 1889. The curriculum was English based, not classical, and wide - science, art, music, French, German - there were no prizes and lessons were only in the mornings. Games madness was condemned. J.H. Badley taught at Abbotsholme, but left after Reddie said he couldn't get married! In 1893 he started Bedales. A wide curriculum maybe, but cold baths were the rule, even though we had to break the ice on the goose cans. There were runs before breakfast, the last two being swished in by a prefect with a cane. Stoicism and bullying ruled.
The 1900-1940/50 period sees boys' schools often resisting change. It is always easier and more reassuring to establish and maintain an authoritative regime than to relax it. The bravery (and deaths) shown in the Great War suggested why change when the system had produced such heroes? The OTC and ATC were strengthened, Armistice Day was religiously celebrated. The Games mystique returned to most schools. The whole edifice of privileges, colours, and hierarchies remained almost unchanged Of course, there were forces for change. At Gresham's, Rugby and Rendcomb and, particularly, at Oundle, change including a more individual approach to students, a lessening of the fixation with games. Corporal punishment was often done away with. Sanderson at Oundle (appointed in 1892) introduced engineering into the school; then agricultural chemistry, horse-shoeing, biochemistry; he built an observatory, a meteorological station, botanical gardens, metal and woodshops. The curriculum became more 'pupil-centred'. No wonder the author's chapter 15 is headed The Monolith Starts to Crumble. A.S. Neill's Summerhill and W.B. Curry's Dartington may have been outliers, but what had been seen as 'progressive' fifty years earlier, was now increasingly embedded in the 'mainstream'. The author also studied Kurt Hahn's Gordonstoun and J.F. Roxburgh's Stowe. He rightly says that the period from around 1914 to 1940 is in some ways the most difficult so far because it is the most diverse.
Chapter 17, 1945-1977: The Academic Revolution... covers a period I am personally familiar with - well, the later part! After the immediate post-war years of gloom (the Labour Government etc.), the 50s and 60s marked the change. Gradually, an unprecedented prosperity rolled over the country, benefiting mainly the middle and upper classes, and therefore the public schools. Laboratories were built, science masters engaged, workshops and lathes and model furnaces became common. The needs of the middle classes and industry, the enthusiasm engendered by exciting curricular developments, generated an immense academic thrust. The standard of teachers rose - as did their salaries. Examination successes also rose.
It is interesting that Gathorne-Hardy also posits a question: Will the public schools survive? Remember, he is writing in 1977, nearly 50 years' ago. But what he writes rings true in 2026. Inflation has attacked them even more viciously than it has attacked everything else...as the costs continue soaring their fees become astronomical...the policy of the present Labour Government has been to allow the public schools to wither away...a further twist will come when they are deprived of charitable status... Taking on more and more day pupils; going co-educational; have both helped, but the author talks about the public schools operating in a hostile world, keeping, as the darkness closes around them...a few glimmers of the sacred fire alight until the barbarian age has passed. That was written in 1977. Well, in 2025-6, the barbarian age has returned with a vengeance. Perhaps only the wealthiest schools will survive, as we watch more and more close down.
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