Alleyn’s in the 1940s · Alleyn’s in the 1940s ... The cadet forces and the Home Guard ... •...

�� Susannah Schofield

An account of Alleyn’s School in the 1940s compiled by the spoken and written memories of Alleyn

Old Boys, former staff and Archive material

1

Alleyn’s in the 1940s

Contents

Introduction............................................................................................................................................. 4

Second World War .................................................................................................................................. 8

Evacuation: Operation ‘Pied Piper’ ....................................................................................................... 25

Exile in Rossall ....................................................................................................................................... 34

The South London Emergency Secondary School: a strange child of the war ..................................... 46

‘Their own devices’ ................................................................................................................................ 54

Headmasters at Alleyn’s ........................................................................................................................ 65

Masters and mistresses at Alleyn’s ....................................................................................................... 74

Discipline and prefects .......................................................................................................................... 88

The House system ................................................................................................................................. 95

Curriculum ............................................................................................................................................. 99

Drama .................................................................................................................................................. 105

Musical wonderland ............................................................................................................................ 108

Sport .................................................................................................................................................... 119

The cadet forces and the Home Guard ............................................................................................... 126

Privilege at Alleyn’s ............................................................................................................................. 136

Post-war Alleyn’s: let us face the future ............................................................................................. 141

Education crisis at Alleyn’s .................................................................................................................. 149

Distinguished boys and visitors ........................................................................................................... 155

After Alleyn’s ....................................................................................................................................... 165

Impressions of Alleyn’s today.............................................................................................................. 169

Reflections on time spent at Alleyn’s .................................................................................................. 172

Bibliography......................................................................................................................................... 174

Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................................. 176

Index .................................................................................................................................................... 178

Appendix

• Contributors to 1940s memories project

• Letter from Henderson about Christmas arrangements, December 1939

• Letter from Spring re: Junior School at St Clare School, Walmer, December 1939

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• Letter from LCC to parents re: plans for children on evacuation scheme, December 1939

• Letter from Allison re: welfare of Alleyn’s School, 2 September 1940

• Letter to parents about the move to Rossall, 17 October 1940

• Sunday Times article about Alleyn’s evacuation to Rossall School, 20 April, 1941

• Rossall timetable – see separate scan on website

• ARP letters about bomb damage, July 1944 – see separate scan on website

• Map of Camberwell showing flying bomb sites – see separate scan on website

• School journals – see separate scan on website

• ‘Escape’, Edward Alleyn Magazine, February 1946 – see separate scan on website

• George VI’s message about the victory to children, 8 June 1946

• Names of guests in group photograph on front cover

Notes to text

In quotes, I have tried to retain punctuation as shown in original.

The ‘magazine’ refers to the Edward Alleyn Magazine.

Michael King is the pen-name of John Holt (S 1945-51), who wrote The 1940s Revisited. In the copy, I have

referred to Mr Holt by this name.

Where there are AOBs’ names in the footnotes, this relates to what they said either at the reunion or wrote to

me subsequently.

House abbreviations:

• Brading’s = B

• Brown’s = Bn

• Cribb’s = C

• Dutton’s = D

• Roper’s = R

• Spurgeon’s = S

• Tulley’s = T

• Tyson’s = Tn

3

Prelude to a reunion

John Hughes: What is also interesting is that you sit around like…

Derek Smith: Like we are now.

Peter Wrench: Fantastic.

John Hughes: Yes, like the five of us are now.

Derek Smith: This is unique I think, it must be.

John Hughes: Yes, this meeting brings back many things into your memory.

Peter Wrench: Makes you proud….

John Hughes: You have a career and family life and keep in touch from a distance. However,

you do have affinity with your alma mater.

Purple Group, Alleyn’s 1940s Memories Day Reunion

1 March 2011

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Introduction

‘We didn't realise we were at the very end of an epoch which had begun to fade at the turn of the

century and was now, after the Second World War, crumbling fast. In 1945 we were bankrupt and

within a few short years the Empire would be gone.’ Roy Barnes, Twenty-Five Years On: One Boy’s

Growing Up, p107

At the start of this account of ‘Alleyn’s in the 1940s’, I must warn readers that what follows is not a

chronological history of Alleyn’s in the 1940s – this duty was discharged by the late Arthur Chandler

in his history (and my Bible at work), Alleyn’s: The Co-educational School . Rather this – I hope – is a

collection of memories about Alleyn’s as seen through the prism of Alleyn Old Boys (AOBs) who were

educated at the hands of the School in the 1940s, refracted by other first-hand accounts of the time.

From time to time I have attempted to add to this references to the wider contemporary picture and

weave in some texture from historical debate.

Our AOBs’ memories are the heartbeat of this account and I have been guided by its pulse in

selecting what to include and what to omit.

Re-presenting people’s memories is a task not to be undertaken lightly. I felt this responsibility

keenly when writing the preceding report to this – ‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’ – and felt it again with this

decade. Oral history is a jelly of a discipline. People’s memories wobble and cloud and don’t quite fit

the mould of one’s argument or vision. I have tried to resist presenting a saccharine and shapeless

view of our AOBs’ experience of Alleyn’s in the 1940s, an easy trap to fall into 70 years on. Many of

the memories contained here do retain their tartness and, I hope, give full flavour to the years

Britain endured in the teeth of war and austerity.

Before we start to hear our contributors’ memories about Alleyn’s, it is worthwhile to take a

moment to look at two documents: the Edward Alleyn Magazine and the Ministry of Education’s

Inspection Report into Alleyn’s in 1950. Both report on the events under our 1940s’ spotlight.

Edward Alleyn Magazine

The Edward Alleyn Magazine is a mirror of School life.1

The Edward Alleyn Magazine, the thrice-yearly publication which reported information about the

School and Alleyn Old Boys’ Club’s (AOBC) activities, is a good place to start to get a snapshot of

what was happening in the 1940s.

In November 1939, the magazine was some 48 pages in length, with a cover, adverts and lengthy

articles, such as a 2½ page account of Edward Alleyn and Dulwich (part two) and priced at 6d.

Towards the end of the war [March 1945], this had reduced to 22 pages, self-cover, short articles,

with no editorial (abandoned in 1942 as a paper-saving measure) and was printed on very low

quality paper using a typesize which only the keenest eyes find easy to read. War-time restrictions

on paper meant that good quality paper was nigh on impossible to obtain and that ‘…as paper was

pulped and re-pulped it acquired an appropriately khaki tint, and became grained with straw-like

1 EAM, February 1950, p2

5

fragments’2. One thing hadn’t changed: its price. It was still 6d at the end of the war – but by the end

of 1950, it had gone up to one shilling.

What is astonishing is that at no time during the 1940s – during the war and then the continued

post-war shortages – did the Edward Alleyn Magazine fail to deliver three issues per year.

The magazine was put together by prefects, itself a major feat when there was so much flux

between boys leaving London for ‘safer’ areas in Britain, staff being called up, and the fact the

magazine was reporting on enclaves of Alleyn’s scattered all over the country – at Kent, Wales,

Rossall, the South London Emergency Secondary School (SLESS) in Townley Road – as well as the

AOBs who were serving overseas. I get a taste of the editors’ frustration of deadlines and subject

matter in 1942 when they write: ‘There is so much in present events which demands more space

and attention…. Furthermore there are newcomers which demand space already restricted by war

conditions.’3 The equivalent school publication at Rossall, The Rossallian, is more explicit about these

war conditions and its editors apologised to their readers for the magazine’s ‘unusual appearance,

smaller print and reduced length…. Forced upon us by drastic new paper restrictions’4.

During the 1940s the Edward Alleyn Magazine is by turns a simple raconteur of events (and the

weather – seemingly a pre-occupation with many of the writers), a reassuring (but nonetheless

firm) voice to those parents who had entrusted their boys’ safety on the School’s evacuation, a

recorder of war-time casualties – the Roll of Honour begins in November 1940, and makes its last

appearance in November 1949 – as well as war-time honours. It also acted as a town-crier in terms

of rallying support from its readers on matters such as sending in old House shirts, balls and Fives

gloves for use by the boys, pleas to visit the boys at Rossall, and for saving the School from the crisis

it faced following the 1944 Education Act.

Given the upheaval endured by this decade, it is surprising that any of pupils received anything

resembling an education. This was recognised by the London County Council’s (LCC) Chief Inspector

of Education in 1943:

It should be remembered that the whole of their senior school years and part of their junior school

years in such [difficult] conditions. Nearly half their school life, in fact, has been spent in improvised

and often unsatisfactory conditions.5

Let us now fast-forward to 1950 and hear what His Majesty’s Inspectors had to say about Alleyn’s

when they came to call.

HMI Inspection on Alleyn’s School, 1950

I had scarcely been in charge for a year, when in 1950 a thorough-going general inspection by HMIs

from the Ministry of Education descended on the school!6

2 Longmate, p354

3 EAM, March 1942, p498

4 Winterbottom, p107

5 Report to LCC Education (General) Subcommittee, 5 July 1943, with addendum dated 13 September 1943,

cited in Gosden, p74. 6 Young, p210

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The HMIs’ report on Alleyn’s, albeit written just after the period we’ve chosen to put in the spotlight,

nevertheless used much of its evidence for its findings from the 1940s.

Alleyn’s had last been under the glare of school inspectors (from the London County Council) in

1938; the Board of Education’s own inspectors last visited in 1932. Given the intervening world war

and the strides in educational reform that the Board – later Ministry – of Education were taking, this

gap of 18 years can probably be forgiven.

The inspectors gave a broad-brush outline of the challenges Alleyn’s faced in the intervening years,

and hinted at those that the School had to face in the years ahead.

The report acknowledged the School’s trials of a fragmented evacuation to practically all points of

the compass, and its reunification after the war (‘The task was then begun of welding these two

distinct units into one School’7). It commented on the state of the buildings (could do better, hardly

fair given the shortage of building materials, money and labour at the time), the staff (‘As a body the

Masters are extremely hard-working and give unsparingly of their time out of school hours’8), the

state of food (‘The meal when inspected was hardly adequate’9, again, unfair given the food

shortages of the time), the Headmaster (he ‘appears to enjoy the full confidence of his Governing

Body’10

) and the boys themselves (‘the spirit of the School… is to be found also in the quiet and

confident bearing of the boys who have exceptionally easy manners’11

).

History master Robert Young wrote of this inspection in his memoir Before I Forget. Sixty years on, it

is interesting to see his perspective about the inspection alongside the findings of the HMIs. He

wrote that the inspector of History was one ‘Mr Ayerst, who looked as though he had just eaten

something indigestible… and was the author of a text book which we were not using!’12

Young was

particularly irked by Mr Ayerst’s comment that 'there are no signs of scholarship here,' and, history

teacher par excellence that he was, defensively asserted that, ‘He did not appear to be aware that

negative evidence is not evidence.’ Young peevishly blurts, ‘he might as well have remarked “There

are no signs of cigarette smoking here”. It particularly annoyed me, as we won five history

scholarships to Oxford and Cambridge in the next three years with the very people he had damped

down by his lack of enthusiasm.’13

Young pointed out how two of his headmasters at Alleyn’s (Henderson and Hudson) differed in their

approaches to inspections; Henderson:

treated inspections and examinations as side-shows; but the attitude of Hudson was more akin to

that of the Regular Army (Hudson hailed from the Warwickshire Regiment). In the army of course the

plan was always to conceal things from the inspecting officer. Thus Hudson was a trifle steamed up by

the invasion, and at pains to conceal the shocking absence of the tools with which to do the job.14

7 HMIs’ inspection, 1950, p2

8 Ibid, p4

9 Ibid, p20

10 Ibid, p2

11 Ibid, p20

12 Young, p212

13 Ibid, p212-13

14 Ibid, p211-12

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The inspectors caught Hudson out and in their report frequently lamented the lack of books and

resources available to the boys:

In general, blackboards are in a bad condition, as also are some of the Masters' desks and chairs… In

certain of the subjects text-books require overhauling and visual aids should be gradually acquired.15

In their conclusions, this reader senses the HMIs implicitly criticising Alleyn’s for daring to focus its

post-war efforts on re-building the School to its former pre-war public school glory, rather than

taking advantage of ‘the new opportunities for educational development created by the conditions

governing the award of the General Certificate of Education’16

. The elephant in the room – that of

the School’s on-going battle to seek direct grant status – is barely mentioned. True, in their

introduction to their report the HMIs begrudgingly comment that Alleyn’s is ‘transitionally assisted’,

i.e. it was one of the

schools administered by a Governing Body whose final status, under the Education Act, 1944, has not

yet been determined by the Minister of Education and are in receipt of assistance from a Local

Education Authority for the time being. No tuition fees are payable…17

Alleyn’s was the only such school listed in this category. Alleyn’s School’s coveted direct grant status

came in 1957, some 13 years after the Education Act.

And so, let us call on our ‘quiet and confident’ boys with ‘exceptionally easy manners’ to the stage to

find out what they remember of their schooling at Alleyn’s, whether it was in Maidstone, Newport,

Fleetwood or Dulwich, in this decade of war and austerity which bequeathed a School in limbo as

the 1950s dawned.

15

HMIs’ inspection, p3 16

Ibid, p21 17

Leinster-Mackay, p36

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Second World War

‘At the outbreak of war I was 10 but was not evacuated. London schools were closed in 1939-40 so I

missed a year which I never recovered. In 1940-41 schools re-opened after a fashion and the LCC

Junior County Scholarship exams were held which I passed…’ Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48)

As the decade starts, the buildings at Alleyn’s were empty of pupils. Alleyn’s had been part of the

nationwide evacuation programme which began on the day before war was declared and all schools

in London were closed. On 31 August 1939, the Prime Minister had authorised the evacuation to

begin the next day and the Board of Education instructed the local education authorities accordingly.

Les Johnson’s (B 1939-43) widow, Mrs Betty Johnson, recalls how

Les passed his scholarship and went to Alleyn’s, all smart in his brand new uniform. The headmaster

welcomed them, and then told them that the whole school would be evacuated on the next day! Les

only spent that one day at Alleyn’s, Dulwich….

The evacuation of London was, according to The Times ‘a triumph of preparation, organisation and

discipline’18

. The effort involved was prodigious: 72 London transport stations were involved, and in

four days the main-line railway companies carried more than 1,300,000 official evacuees, in nearly

4,000 special trains.

And so (for Britain) began the Second World War, the least unexpected war in our history. A year

before, directly after the Munich Crisis (September 1938), the government ‘had begun to deliver to

every home in the country a buff-covered, six-page booklet, The Protection of Your Home Against Air

Raids, which urged “the head of the House” to “consider himself as the captain of the ship”, and

compared the taking of precautions to the life-boat drill, essential, even if unlikely ever to be

needed. It was followed in July and August 1939 by a stream of other Public Information leaflets on

such subjects as “Your Gas Mask” and “Masking Your Windows”.’19

Peter Wrench (C 1945-49)

remembered his father taking the helm of his particular familial ship: ‘for some days, my Dad had

been busily putting up black-out screens to our windows after applying sticky tape across them to

shield us from flying glass.’20

The new sirens were first heard over most of Greater London

simultaneously in December 1938 in an effort to acclimatise the public to the fluctuating, mournful

moan of the sirens – an event which Mr Wrench recalls as one of his ‘abiding memories of life is that

of air-raid sirens sounding for the first time’21

.

Few could have foreseen the six years of disillusionment, danger, drudgery and discomfort which lay

ahead. The boys and staff at Alleyn’s were to play their part in the country’s war-effort by enlisting in

the Home Guard, contributing to War Savings Schemes, singing at concerts to raise money for the

war-effort, serving as messengers in the Civil Defence, ‘Digging for Victory’, bringing in the harvests;

and they queued for their rations and endured shortages, and ultimately, joined up to serve in the

armed forces.

18

The Times, 2 Sept 1939 19

Longmate, p4 20

Bromley Probus, p39 21

Ibid, p39

9

But back in London in 1939, when the predicted bombing raids by the Luftwaffe failed to materialise,

hundreds of thousands of families returned home again. By Christmas, more than half had gone

back, fed up with this ‘Phoney War’ (or ‘bore war’ as some called it). In February 1940 nearly a third

of all children in the cities weren’t receiving any education at all because of the closure of schools.

Emergency schools

Alan Thomas (SLESS 1940-41) remembered that

For some time stranded pupils from various schools met occasionally in parents’ parlours – biscuits,

sweets were consumed but nothing was learnt! Then a sort of preliminary SLESS [South London

Emergency Secondary School] was opened at the Oliver Goldsmith’s School, Peckham. Then came a

letter, or there was mention in the local papers, about SLESS.

The School’s Archivist, Arthur Chandler (Bn 1941-48), himself a SLESS-boy, wrote in his book about

Alleyn’s that:

For six months retired Alleyn’s Masters and others had educated those not evacuated in private

houses and local halls. [Alleyn’s Headmaster] Henderson felt that the boys in London should have a

proper education and sent [Masters] Hack and Tyson to re-open the Alleyn’s building. This was

undertaken not only to educate Alleyn’s boys who wished to remain in London but also, in

conjunction with the LCC Education Department, to offer a Grammar School education to others

whose schools were evacuated but did not themselves wish to leave London. SLESS kept Alleyn’s

buildings alive.22

The South London Emergency Secondary School was housed in the Alleyn’s buildings on Townley

Road from March 1940 and was in operation until the boys who were evacuated (first to Maidstone,

then the Junior School to Wales, and finally all together at Rossall) returned in 1945. Gordon Feeley

(SLESS 1941-50) recalled that ‘we were given the opportunity to do all the lessons and the activities

[at SLESS] that we did not think we were able to do at the beginning of the war. And suddenly, an

education did continue, a bit of chaos in places, but we were fortunate to come here to Alleyn’s.’ In

the autumn of 1940 there were 5,000 children on the rolls of emergency secondary schools and

classes in London23

.

Of his time at SLESS, Ian Smith (R 1942-49) added that

I made a lot of wartime friendships, we were a very close-knit community then, with air raids breaking

up school terms and rushing down from the old buttery to the dungeon [basement] in the main

building, waiting for the All Clear to go, most of it during the war was of course the buzz bombs, which

were quite frightening at times listening for them to cut out, and of course travelling to School

sometimes was quite interesting at times in the middle of an air raid.’

Air-raids

Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) remembered that ‘sometimes a fighter bomber would attack a bus or tram

along the road. In 1943 the bombing by the V1 flying bombs began… They caused much destruction

in SE London (see appendix for map of of V1 explosions) Although Alleyn’s School did not get hit, a

22

Arthur Chandler, Alleyn’s: The Co-educational School, p79 23

Gosden, p43; there was a South West London Emergency School based at the girls Clapham County

Secondary School.

10

V1 fell close by on the site where the post-war prefabs still stand, up Lordship Lane on the right hand

side of the hill above Townley Road near the bus stop.’ John Williams’s (R 1943-49) father took a

pragmatic view of dodging the flying bombs:

I think my father told my mother that if Doodlebugs come you could be hit ANYWHERE, so I might as

well go to School. I travelled up with friends and do remember just passing the Cyphers Sports

Ground (Kent House) not long after a V2 had landed. The train shuddered as did everything around…

Several misses like this happened to us all, but as it was part of everyday life, you just got on with

living.

Mr Williams Snr knew the risks of the trip to and from school:

Getting home from School one day my father said about 30 boys had been machine gunned down in

Lewisham High Street by a Messerschmitt. He told my brother and me to get in a ditch if German

fighters were nearby in a bombing raid. Often one would look up and see Spitfires and Hurricanes in

‘dogfights’ with German fighters. This was a daily occurrence and part of life at the time.

John Holt (S 1945-51), writing as Michael King, described an incident of a German pilot deliberately

shooting at people in streets, and bombing Sandhurst School, Sangley Road in Catford on 20 January,

1943.

Suddenly I heard a roar, and saw a plane almost skim the fence outside the cloakroom window. It was

obviously a German enemy plane and I even caught a glimpse of the pilot’s face as he flashed past

and he even gave me a wave….’.

Thirty years later Mr Holt met someone who was a pupil at the school and it was claimed that ‘the

pilot was seen furiously machine-gunning people in the streets of Penge, Sydenham and Catford,

before dropping his bombs on Sandhurst School.’24

In the Edward Alleyn Magazine of November 1944, the SLESS report acknowledged – with true Blitz

spirit – the flying bomb campaigns against London: ‘When conditions changed so abruptly we had to

re-organise our school life. Some of the boys went out into the country, and some remained at

home, but around 50% reported for school each day’25

.

This Blitz spirit even appeared in the exam room; Alan Eaglen (Tn 1939-44) described

doing my Latin exam in 1944 under the desk on the first floor because of an air raid and various V1

bombs had hit so, there we were, up on the first floor above the Headmaster’s study under the desks

writing our exams. I passed but I should have got a distinction because it was my best subject.

Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) remembered that

to try and minimise the amount of wasted time [we spent in the air-raid shelters] some of the senior

staff or boys would be out on the roof watching to see if planes were coming so they were sort of

spotters. So, if they saw nothing you could just get on with lessons but if one was heading your way

you would have to stay down there.

24

Michael King, The 1940s Revisited, p25 25

EAM, Nov 1944, p125

11

These eagle-eyed spotters would be on duty again to ensure the smooth running of school

productions: ‘Before the performance the audience was told that if an air raid warning sounded the

performance would continue unless the look-outs on the roof sounded their whistles when all would

evacuate to the basement as quickly as possible’26

.

Ron Smale (B 1940-46) remembered the war’s ‘rocket phase’

when school carried on regardless of attacks of which we had no warning. A memory from this period

comes to mind when we were entertained at an end of term concert. I was sitting in the balcony

enjoying Mr Logan’s rich baritone rendition of ‘Bless this House’ when a shattering explosion

occurred. After a few moments of nervous apprehension, laughter began to break out. The Almighty

must have had some reservations on the choice of song or perhaps the quality of the singing!

Battle of Britain

The boys who were evacuated to Kent were given first-row seats to view the dog fights between

Britain and Germany over the Pilgrims’ Way. Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41) remembered that ‘Up on

the cliffs at Kingsdown, we’d throw stones at the Heinkels as they skimmed over!’

The Battle of Britain ‘brought home to everyone living in the southern parts of England that this was

a national war unlike any other, which was actually being fought on home territory’27

. It wasn’t

surprising that some parents were worried about the wisdom of an evacuation scheme which put

their sons under the direct line of German fighter pilots. The Edward Alleyn Magazine tried to

reassure:

There seems to be a little doubt in the minds of some people as to the safety of this area and in

December enquiries were made of the Ministry of Health [the Ministry overseeing evacuation at the

time] on the subject. The reply was that ‘Deal including Walmer is still a reception area and there is no

intention of removing evacuees from the borough’.28

David Alexander (B 1933-42) described how he and his friends

Watched the German planes circling the sky. When a plane was destroyed we followed where the

pilots parachuted down to see if we could find them. Sometimes we were lucky and found them….

There was one time when we found a German pilot. He asked my friends and me to help him and he

was groaning in pain. He had either broken his leg when landing or been shot in the leg. He waved his

arm in surrender. We would have helped him but he had a gun on his belt so we decided to call the

police…. It was a dangerous thing to do; we could easily have been killed but we treated it as

entertainment and a treasure hunt for finding pilots and bits of aeroplane. The tail lights of the

aeroplanes were highly prized.

Mercifully common sense prevailed and, in the words of Mrs Betty Johnson, ‘since Deal had hit-and-

run raiders long before anyone else in England did (Les said he spent all his school time there sitting

under the woodwork tables in the local school) it was soon decided to move them West [to Wales],

for more safety’.

26

Chandler, p84; no date given but probably 1944. 27

Marr, Making of Modern Britain, p383 28

EAM, February 1940, p310

12

How boys spent their time during war

For boys at Townley Road, Maidstone, Newport and Rossall, the great wartime amusement was

aircraft recognition. Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) fascination with all things aeronautical stemmed from

this time:

Ever since the beginning of the war, when everybody had had to learn to identify aeroplanes from

books of photographs supplied by the Government mainly so that we could tell friendly from enemy

aircraft, I had been fascinated by aeroplanes.29

A sixpenny Penguin book of aircraft silhouettes was one of the outstanding bestsellers of the war.

Eric Hirst (C 1944-50) remembered collecting ‘boxes of shrapnel from where the bombs had landed,’

and in the same way marbles are swapped, children ‘would exchange their shrapnel if they got a lot

of it.’

Boys contributed to the country’s War Savings Campaigns. The War Savings drive ran a series of

special campaigns to keep enthusiasm for the war-effort alive and to raise large sums. Running a

Savings Group appealed to those unable to take a more active part in the war. By the end of the war

nearly every school had its savings group.

The new scheme inaugurated for the sale of War Savings Stamps and Certificates has met with

marked success, and it is hoped that this will continue. Hearty thanks are due to the House Captains

for undertaking this additional duty, and to the boys for their ready response.30

John Holt (S 1945-51) was caught up in the enthusiasm:

I was immediately fascinated by the ‘Squanderbug’ posters which covered the walls, the posters

bearing the slogan ‘Buy Savings Stamps and Certificates and Defeat the Squanderbug’. The

‘squanderbugs’ were repulsive-looking creatures and were covered in swastikas. At the time,

spending was denounced as a social evil and the ‘squanderbug’ became the symbol of all that was

self-indulgent and unpatriotic.

Mr Wrench too became caught up in the country’s war savings:

I remember sending Lord Beaverbrook (then Air Minister) ten shillings (50p) which I had collected for

the Spitfire Fund. I still treasure his reply. 31

In the magazine, regular reports are made as to which House had saved the most that term – in 1944

Spread Eagle House reports ‘The fact that Crescent beat us this term in the amount of money saved

however should spur us on to greater efforts.’32

The writers encourage boys to do their bit:

the war still rages and more money will be required before the fate of the aggressors is finally sealed.

Every certificate purchased is a small nail driven into Hitler’s coffin and thus every boy has the

opportunity of helping to restore civilisation and sanity to a very sick world.33

29

Barnes, p113 30

EAM, March 1941, p401 31


EAM, March, 1944, p78 33

Ibid, March 1942, p504

13

By November 1944, SLESS was reporting its total amount saved at a whopping £3,00034

, the

equivalent of £93,000 in today’s money.35

As well as contributing money to the War Savings, the boys at Rossall would entertain the residents

of Fleetwood with benefit concerts for local War weeks:

In connection with Fleetwood’s ‘Salute the Soldier’ campaign, the total raised was £1,509. 3s. this

result is gratifying and thanks are due to the many members of the School who supported this

effort.36

Over 90% of schools had voluntary savings groups37

. Not only did these campaigns help finance the

war, they lifted the public’s morale. Sir Harold – later Lord – Mackintosh, member of the National

Savings Committee from 1941, claimed ‘in these Weeks, we did more than raise money; we raised

hearts too. The bands played, the flags flew, the men marched, and… the people at home felt they

were taking part in the war.’38

The President of the Board of Education, RA Butler, spoke in the

House of Commons in June 1942 about the significant contribution schools were making: the total

amount they had raised so far, Mr Butler said, was £23,500,000 – at that time an enormous sum.39

Derek Smith describes other ways children helped with the war-effort on the Home Front: ‘Money

was hard to come by, particularly for those who had suffered by bombing and some would collect

old newspapers, bottles, jam jars or anything that could be sold back to shops or salvage depots.’

John Merrill (R 1942-48) and Mr Cox both served as messengers. Mr Merrill ‘was very big in the Boy

Scouts and [I] did all sorts of things and acted as a messenger even though I was only 14’. Bruce Cox

joined the Civil Defence as a 16-year-old cycle messenger.

I was attached to Post 48 of the Lambeth Civil Defence Service, which was stationed in the basement

of an old warehouse in Chapel Road, West Norwood – about 200 yards from my home. Boy scouts

provided messengers at many of the posts… As its names implies, our job was to carry messages.

There were few telephones in those days… telephone wires were often cut or destroyed by bombing,

and ours was the only method when bombs fell of getting messages to other wardens’ posts and

organisations such as heavy rescue services and the fire brigade. Other jobs included guiding fire

appliances around the area when they had been called in from other districts or stations; riding on

the running board of a fire engine to give street directions was a bonus for a 16-year-old.

….we used our bicycles and received in return an allowance of 2 shillings and 6 pence (12.5p) a month

– not a great amount as often one would be riding along streets littered with broken glass on tyres

which were not of top quality. I cannot recall any other pay, but we were issued with a dark blue

battledress and a black steel helmet with a large ‘M’ on the front. 40

A quarter of a million volunteers were organised as wardens, firemen, nurses and even amateur

bomb-disposal teams41

. It is estimated that before the war finished, there were approximately six

million fire-watchers. Arthur Chandler reports that all staff at Alleyn’s had to undertake fire-

34

Ibid, November 1944, p125 35

According to the website www.moneysorter.co.uk as at November 2011. 36

Ibid, May 1944, p95 37

Gosden, p86 38

Longmate, p384 39

The equivalent of £728,000,000 in today’s money. 40


Marr, Making of Modern Britain, p384

14

watching at nights and at the weekends. One night during the Blitz, the English master Dr ‘Eddie’

Giles saved the Alleyn’s buildings from being destroyed. Dr Giles was on fire-watching duty.

One evening he was patrolling the top corridor in the main building when an incendiary bomb fell into

the gutter of the roof alongside him. It started to smoulder and the glow could be clearly seen. He

reached into the gutter, took the bomb by its fins and carried it to the main corridor door nearest the

fields. He threw it down and ran – within a few seconds the bomb went up in flames but only

scorched the grass. His action had saved the building.42

Both at Maidstone and Rossall, staff and senior boys took part in the Local Defence Volunteer Patrols

(later Home Guard).

War damage in Dulwich

Accurate statistics for bombing received in wartime Dulwich are complicated by the fact that whilst

most of the valley was under the Dulwich District of Camberwell Control, the area to the west of

Croxted Road came under Lambeth Control. Enemy aerial activity over Dulwich started in the middle

of August 1940, the first bomb being dropped on the area on the 28th of that month, causing no

casualties.… The heaviest attacks were to come in the ensuing weeks as the Battle of Britain raged

overhead. Heavy bombing commenced on Dulwich in the early hours of Saturday 7th September….

The raids continued night and day until the 3rd October when they abated slightly for a fortnight, only

to become heavy again until the middle of November. Thereafter the raids became sporadic, except

on the night of 16/17th April, 1941, when there was a heavy attack, causing damage in Alleyn Road

and making 1,000 people homeless in Lambeth. 43

Many of the boys at SLESS saw and suffered bomb damage at far too close a hand. Ian Smith (R

1942-49) remembered the date:

on 15 September 1940, we were bombed out. The back of the flats were demolished, my

grandmother was killed, she was staying with us at the time…. The fireman got us out, and luckily

enough, in those days, families always lived in the same area, so we just moved into our grandparents

place and in about three days, we were evacuated to those big country houses at Haslemere.

Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) recalled what happened to the belongings of people whose homes had

been hit:

Apparently, what furniture and possessions the rescue workers could dig out of the debris of a

completely destroyed street had been piled willy-nilly for survivors to sort out for themselves and

then removed to a warehouse to be claimed. My father couldn't do much himself, as he was buried

under the rubble at the time. His mother, Rose, after spending several days asking for him around the

rescue services and reclaiming what of his belongings she could, finally found him alive but not so well

in St Thomas's Hospital....44

Mr Wrench remembered a Saturday afternoon in 1940 when ‘Dad and I sheltered under the stairs

during a very heavy air-raid which principally targeted Surrey Docks. That evening we visited my

grandparents’ house at 56 Dulwich Road and the sky glowed orange all night from the docks blaze’.

42

Chandler, p121 43

Green, p66 44

Barnes, p95

15

While walking in Brockwell Park on Saturday mornings, young Peter and his father ‘sucking glacier

mints,’

regularly inspected the craters and more excitingly the narrow holes bearing pieces of wood marked

‘Danger unexploded bomb’ (UXB). There were craters everywhere – shades of the Somme, I suppose.

We frequently saw open-backed trucks carrying red flags with ‘Danger UXB’ chalked on their

tailboards, off to dispose of their dangerous load.45

Some of the craters were so deep they could contain a double-decker bus. In a compilation of

memories about SLESS put together by Arthur Chandler, NA Green (D 1943-52) saw several homes

destroyed:

by 1943, when I started at Alleyn’s (SLESS), my family had moved seven times and I had attended as

many schools. Our house in Swansea received a direct hit from an incendiary bomb and our home in

Beckenham was demolished by a direct hit by an HE bomb. In 1944 a doodlebug (V1) left part of its

tail in our oak tree and crashed into the house opposite killing an occupant in Burbage Road,

Dulwich.46

Flying bombs

About a week after D-Day, Mum was on fire-watching duty. The air-raid siren sounded and suddenly,

she heard a strange sound overhead. It sounded, she thought, like an old motorbike – putt-putt-

putt…! Others described it as being like the purring of the family cat; others as being like the sound of

a very large wasp! Some described the air as almost vibrating: a throbbing sound! As mother looked

up into the sky, the sound got louder and louder and she saw a strange object flying overhead, the

like of which she had never seen before. It looked like a small, black plane and fire was coming out of

its tail. Suddenly, the fire went out and the object plummeted to the ground. Next, came a loud

explosion. This mysterious object turned out to be a German V1, otherwise known to those on the

receiving end as ‘flying bombs’, ‘doodlebugs’ or ‘buzz bombs’. This was to be the start of a

concentrated flying bomb attack on London and the Home Counties and these new weapons were to

cause immense damage.47

The Vergeltungswaffen or ‘retaliation weapon’ was an unmanned and unguided bomb, carrying a

2,000 lb warhead. The liquid-fuelled, pulse-jet drone aircraft was simply pointed in the right

direction, fired up a ramp into the sky and kept level by simple gyro-compasses. When the fuel ran

out, the engine stopped and the flying bomb dropped like a stone, to explode on whatever was in its

path below. Jim French wrote:

A doodlebug (V1) bombed out my family in 1944. Six people were killed in an Anderson (corrugated

iron, garden) shelter next-door-but-two. My mother, brother and I were sleeping in a Morrison (cast-

iron) table shelter in a downstairs room. A hundred bricks were blasted onto the bed where I used to

sleep. We knew, because of the cut out V1 engine, that it would land near. All the windows were

blasted and a wardrobe crashed. Brother David, 5, asked: ‘Are we dead, Mummy?’ …. The family

home was re-established at Gubyon Avenue, Herne Hill, from where I walked or cycled to school.

Eventually our Tulse Hill house was restored.48

45


NA Green in Chandler, SLESS, p20 47

King, p28 48

Chandler, SLESS, p20

16

Altogether 38 V1s exploded in and around Dulwich, the most tragic being on the morning of

Saturday 5 August 1944 when a V1 rocket landed on the Co-operative Stores in Lordship Lane as it

was crowded with weekend shoppers, 23 people were killed and 97 were injured.

In 1944 Mr Jackson’s mother luckily decided ‘to join friends at a village near Devizes for a week’s

break away from the London bombing. It was fortuitous that this decision was made as, whilst away

in the West Country, our house in Sydenham was demolished by a flying bomb (V1) resulting in the

loss of virtually everything. This disastrous occurrence was conveyed to us in a telegram message

followed by a letter some days later as no telephone contact was possible. We soon returned to

Sydenham and subsequently a property was requisitioned for us to move into.’

Mr Green has vivid memories of when his house was hit by a V1:

Our roof and ceilings fell in and doors and windows blown out, and when we emerged amongst the

rubble unscathed from our Morrison table shelter in the sitting room I remember looking up and

seeing the morning sky.

Amazingly, life went on and

Somehow my mother packed us off to school as usual and I heard the school clock striking nine

o’clock as I left my bike at my aunts’ house opposite the school. But I was minutes late and the

prefects were already in place at the school gateway. My name went in the book, which meant a

detention!49

The last weapon in Hitler’s armoury was the V2. With this new terror weapon, there was no warning

whatsoever. As John Holt writes, ‘you could be walking along the street, then, suddenly, there would

be an almighty explosion… There was no air-raid warning; no sound of an aircraft, or the

unmistakable noise of a V1. A building would just collapse, followed by the noise of the explosion.

Sometimes a strange, white vapour could be seen hanging vertically in the air’.50

Three landed in

Dulwich. Mr Holt’s grandfather was killed in a V2 rocket which hit Smithfield Market and ‘Dad had to

travel to London to identify him and was shown Grandad’s gold pocket-watch, which was smashed

to pieces.’51

Dulwich’s final bomb was on 4 March 1945, when a V1 fell in the playing fields by Nairn Grove and

Sunray Avenue.

Changing landscape of war-time Dulwich

Over the capital, large silver balloons wobbled. These were barrage balloons, designed to prevent

German aircraft from flying lower over London. Alleyn’s anchored one of these balloons for the

duration:

49

Ibid 50

King, p34 51

Ibid, p35

17

Out of commission for the whole of the war was the Townley Field as new brick and concrete

buildings appeared to house the RAF barrage balloon crews…. The huge balloon overshadowed the

main building at times and, more than once, nearly settled on the School’s roof.52

Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41) told us the name of the Alleyn’s balloon:

As the barrage balloon was being installed, ‘What’s your name, young lady?’ the crewmen asked of a

JAGS girl walking past in Townley Road. ‘Beryl,’ she called. ‘Bang on,’ they chorused, ‘just right for our

bonny girl – Beryl the Barrage Balloon’.53

Beryl the Barrage Balloon was somewhat temperamental – James Maple (Bn 1942-50) remembered

it being impaled on one of the railings after a high wind and he took a piece of Beryl’s fabric as a

trophy of war54

. Several of our boys remember when Beryl was struck by lightning and, scarily, came

down during a House football match which was being watched by the whole school who were ‘lined

up round the football pitch between the Pavilion and Townley Road. We were watching the final of

the inter-House “league”. … The balloon came slowly down crossing to our side of the road and

ended up on the pitch.’55

The magazine gave an even more vivid account:

After three quarters of the time had gone, with the rain beating down and thunder and lightning

marking off the minutes, amid roars of enthusiasm and derision, McClymont's diminutive goalkeeper

let a 40 yard crawler roll through his legs, and the match was almost over. The shock was too much

for our balloon, which came down in flames and dragged its cable over the pitch like a skipping rope,

so ending perhaps the most spectacular argument ever decided on our grounds: Evans' are the

football champions....'56

Mr Feeley remembered it differently saying that ‘the game had to be abandoned which, as team

captain, was disappointing to me because we were on a winning streak’.

Another change to the surroundings were the air-raid shelters. Peter Rodway (C 1942-50)

remembered the ‘underground air-raid shelters near the bottom of the Woodwarde Road back

gardens that I visited on several occasions from my home at 94 Woodwarde Road.’ He recalled that

whenever the air-raid warning went at night, there was a designated house in Woodwarde Road,

[belonging to] a chap called Martin Wales who was an Alleyn’s Old Boy, [and] his house had a back

gate which led on to the top playing fields, and we would all pour through his back garden, through

the gate, into these underground shelters. Now they were, after the war, filled in, and I’ve often

wondered if a school archaeological dig would reveal some remains?

Up at Rossall, they too had their shelters. The magazine reports that

52

Chandler, p79 53

The balloon may have had another name. I have also discovered a reference to ‘Gloomy Rupert’, who ‘sulks

and broods and gazes down on us… while we are keenly aware of his blue-clad menials running around after

his wants and churning up our fields.' (EAM, June 1940, p352) 54

Chandler, SLESS, p21 55

Bernard Tomlin quoted in Chandler, SLESS, p23 56

EAM, June 1941, p439

18

Early in the term the House Kitchen was transformed into an air-raid shelter. No longer is it possible

to walk straight through; one has now to dodge about as in the Hampton Court Maze. It is obvious

that the shelter is a very strong one, but it is hoped that we shall not have to use it.57

Derek Winterbottom, in his history of Rossall School, wrote that ‘it could not be said that the war

came close to Rossall,’58

but given there were targets close by in the shape of the RAF base at

Blackpool, the American unit and the Liverpool docks, as well as the ICI factory at Thornton, this

reader is heartened that precautions were made for the Rossall residents. Indeed, on our recent

pilgrimage to Rossall [in July 2011], the Headmaster, Dr Stephen Winkley, told our party about an

American aircraft that crashed into a school in Singleton, a village close by, on 24 August 1944, killing

a number of children. Our AOBs also remembered retrieving the body of an American airman from

the sea (see ‘Exile in Rossall’ chapter).

Dig for victory

Another change to the local landscape was the amount of land taken over to allotments and kitchen

gardens. Alleyn’s played its part both at Maidstone, Townley Road and Rossall. Mr Williams recalled

that

There was quite a large allotment for growing food right at the far end of the playing fields near the

other Fives Courts. Mr Haslam (Junior School Master) organised the labour for this project. I assume

the food was used for school lunches – a lot of cabbage was consumed!

In a broadcast by the Minister of Agriculture on 4 October, 1939, the minister Reginald Dorman-

Smith launched the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign, declaring: ‘We want not only the big man with the

plough but the little man with the spade to get busy this autumn… Let “Dig for Victory” be the motto

of everyone with a garden.’

The Alleyn’s boys in their exile in Kent picked up their spades too. The magazine approvingly wrote:

the ‘Dig for Victory’ movement has been strongly in evidence among Staff and School alike. Real,

serious hard work has been done and every credit is due to those Masters and boys who have toiled

early and late to ensure a prolific abundance from what was a somewhat derelict garden….59

In 1942 the magazine editors bask, ‘from the windows of the Editorial Office we can see Mr Haslam

and his faithful minions toiling at the unyielding soil.’60

Farm camps

The boys’ husbandry skills were put to further use for the country’s good in joining the ‘Lend a Hand

with the Land’ initiative and helping out at harvest camps. Many farm labourers had been called up

so there was a dearth of available labour at harvest-time.

In 1942, the government passed an order permitting the granting of exemption from school for

children over 12 for up to 20 half days annually for agricultural labour61

. Pupils’ rates of pay were

57

Ibid, October 1941, p470 58

Winterbottom, p107 59

EAM, June 1940, p350 60

Ibid, May 1942, p531 61

Gosden, p83

19

even agreed with the National Farmers’ Union and the National Union of Agricultural Workers. From

1942 assistance was given with railway fares and accommodation was provided free of charge. In

1942 there were 569 harvest camps for boys (75 for girls, and 10 which were mixed)62

. Some schools

‘virtually compelled boys to give up part of their holidays to attending farm camps…. And by 1943

about 70,000 schoolboys were helping on the land’63

. Attendance at farm camps became a regular

occurrence – and continued long after the war had ended. The magazine reported on a farming

party of ‘more than 45 stalwarts’ who ‘picked fruit or carried corn for varying lengths of time, and

provided a very necessary supply of labour (some not so unskilled after two years’ experience) for

which the farmers were grateful.’64

Mr Cox remembers a rather alarming incident at a farm near East Grinstead:

Some summer holidays we were expected to go to farms and help gather the harvest. The School

arranged for us to work on a peer’s estate near East Grinstead. We were under cover in large bell

tents with about 12 boys to a tent. Our 1st evening turned out different from that which we had been

expecting. The field behind the row of tents, containing a cereal crop, was due to be cut and we lined

the wire fence to watch. As the tractor and reaping machine neared the centre the rabbits, hiding in

the corn, made a dash for safety and the farmer on the tractor pulled out his shotgun. The rabbits

headed straight for us and two boys on either side of me were hit. They had lead shot in their chests

and were taken to hospital, but no serious damage was done. The tale became a boast of theirs for a

long time afterwards.65

But not, I suspect, a boast shared by the School….

Rationing

Even with every corner of land in Britain being turned over to agricultural production, rationing

became, in Mr Feeley’s words, ‘an effective way of ensuring that the war-time population had its fair

share of the limited resources available’. Derek Smith explained that

Food rationing was controlled by the issue of coupons in ration books which allowed restricted

amounts of certain foods each week per person, i.e. 2 oz bacon, 2 oz margarine or butter, 2 oz

cheese. All meats were rationed when available at the butchers, otherwise it was sausagemeat,

corned beef or spam. Milk and bread were rationed and so was coal, which usually was difficult to get

in the winter, so we relied on logs for burning.

Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) remembers that ‘the main effect of rationing was in the choice and

amount of food available’. The resulting ‘grey diet of pies, hotpots, fake sweets and cakes made

from stodge… atop a huge propaganda effort of pamphlets, leaflets, press ads and broadcasts,

eventually drove most people mad’66

. Our AOBs remembered the non-profit British Restaurants

which provided cheap, nourishing, self-service meals in over 2,000 locations. Mr Feeley tells of the

British Restaurant based at Heber Road School where there was

62

Ibid, p84 63

Longmate, p238 64

EAM, January 1943, p4 65


Marr, Making of Modern Britain, pp392-93

20

resentment felt by the boys at Heber Road School over the gradual increase in the popularity of the

British Restaurant on their school premises with the Alleyn’s boys, who used to descend upon it at

lunchtime. These British Restaurants were a war-time feature run by central/local government to

provide cheap nourishing meals for the population at large. The antagonism between the two school

factions using the restaurant finally came to a head on one lunchtime with scrimmages between the

two parties, resulting in both schools being given set times at which each could attend the restaurant.

As well as coupons for food, there were coupons for clothes. Mr Jackson lists the amounts required:

Clothes rationing was based on an allocation of 60 coupons for children and 50 for adults for a 12-

month period. A pair of trousers would require 6 coupons, blazer 8 coupons, and a shirt 4 coupons.

Frank Halford (R 1942-49) still has the letter from the Headmaster, Mr Allison, to his parents when

young Frank joined the School in 1942 listing the clothing that we should wear to school. Mr Allison

added ‘of course, I do realise with these days of clothing coupons you may not be able to manage it

all.’ There were constant appeals to AOBs for their old House shirts; on one occasion Mr Allison

wrote:

‘Every boy… is supposed to turn out for football in the House shirt of his Dulwich House. This is

becoming increasingly difficult for him; stocks at the shop are low, and the supply of available

coupons is lower still. It would be a god-send to us here [at Rossall] if any OBs who still have House

football shirts would send them for use by the present generation. Such gifts will be acknowledged

with gratitude, and the giver will have the satisfaction of knowing that he is doing a real service to

Alleyn’s and to his old House. Please treat this as a most urgent request, and post off the shirt as soon

as possible.’67

Mr Rodway, who joined SLESS in 1942, was one of the few who came to school armed with ‘a Cribb’s

House football shirt’. He explained, ‘I had persuaded my mother at great expense to purchase this

shirt for me as these were in short supply, I think I was one of the few footballers to wear a Cribb’s

(or Allison’s as it was at SLESS) shirt for football until the return from Rossall.’68

Possibly more critical than a lack of House shirts to the standard of education the boys were

receiving was the perennial lack of paper. Mr Feeley remembered the shortage: ‘we were aware that

supplies of paper were limited and were therefore careful not to be extravagant in its use’. One

Chief Inspector of Education complained in 1943 that the desire to save paper had ‘degenerated into

a parsimony’ and was endangering some children’s education.69

Bernard Tomlin remembered how ‘I

joined SLESS on day one… We had nothing to read, nothing to write on and nothing to write with.’70

Realising the lack, the Board of Education suggested, Pollyanna-like, that written work might

sometimes be replaced by ‘lively and searching oral work’71

.

Newspapers had very few pages – usually only four. Mr Cox suspects that the bag he carried on his

newspaper round was much lighter than today’s boys and girls, although admittedly today’s delivery

routes wouldn’t be disrupted by air-raids like his were.

67

EAM, March 1944, p92 68


Longmate, 196 70


Gosden, p80

21

Alleyn’s was enterprising in its saving of paper; for its paper chase at Rossall, the magazine editors

report that the School was ‘mindful of the paper shortage, [so] we instituted sand chases.’72

And

what would have been – to my eyes, over sixty years on – an interesting insight into the workings of

local politics is curtailed by paper shortages: the editors had to summarise two articles about a visit

to Blackpool and Fleetwood Borough Councils, saying ‘the above is a summary of two articles,

written by RLJ Ferne and BJ Marshall, which paper restrictions force us to cut down. – Ed’73

Shortages were a daily occurrence. In 1943, even cornflowers on Founder’s Day were rationed74

.

‘Make do and mend’ wasn’t whimsy, it was a necessity. House ribbons for straw boaters were

‘becoming unobtainable and were being made of three different coloured ribbons sewn together’75

.

David Wallace (C 1941-46) remembers most of his time at Rossall carrying out maintenance work on

the Alleyn’s part of the site ‘because of a shortage of skilled men in war-time.’

Awareness of the war

Our interviewers asked our AOBS about how much they knew about the progress of the war as it

happened. Mr Feeley said ‘Not really, it just happened around us. It was there all the time, no-one

really needed to tell us about it’. It is possible that the routine of school provided an antidote to

possible war strain experienced by pupils.

Mr Feeley later added that, ‘despite the set backs of the early years of the war, there were never any

doubts in my mind as to the outcome, possibly due to the optimism and naïveté of youth and

therefore education was seen as essential for a future career when life returned to normal.’ Roy

Barnes wrote of the widely held view by children at the time that ‘the circumstances of the war had

been such that we had to believe that all Germans were devils out of hell, and that we English were

angels out of heaven, given by God the task of stopping them….’76

. In an interesting exchange about

the war, Messrs Rodway and Howlett (B 1944-50) said:

Mr Rodway: It never occurred to me, during the war, that England wouldn’t win.

Mr Howlett: No, absolutely.

Mr Rodway: I mean you knew it was a war but I didn’t think Germany was going to win, even if they

were going to invade us. To me it was an adventure, but I always thought England would come out

top.

Much of what was happening to AOBs serving in the armed forces was by necessity censored –

added to which they (and the editors) were in a state of transit for much of the time. Indeed, it is

amazing any reports from the AOBC were published at all during the war given the catalogue of

challenges the Club faced; in accounting for this state of affairs, the Club officers tried to explain that

evacuation prevented officers of the Emergency Committee to meet, because:

The School was either at Maidstone or Rossall – the President [of the AOBC] was at Bournemouth –

the Deputy President at Llandudno – the Principal Officers in the Forces, and to crown it all the books

and records only partially survived the bombing of the Hon Treasurer’s offices.

72

EAM, March 1944, p7 73

Ibid, May 1944, p84 74


Chandler, p76 76

Barnes, p101

22

There is then a pitiful postscript to this: ‘We regret delay in publishing this Report, due to the original

MSS being lost when our premises at Dulwich were bombed. Ed’77

.

Reports of what AOBs were doing in the war did not fully come to light until after the conflict ended

and censorship was lifted (‘May we ask OBs, now that the censorship is removed, to send us articles

on their experiences?78

The OBs of the School have played a fine part in helping to win the war, as

the Service Lists published regularly since 1939 have shown, and we at home are proud of them.’79

).

But even if the boys had been kept in the dark about what former pupils were doing in the war, for

the boys at SLESS the reality of war was brought closer to home in 1944 when one of their fellow

pupils, Peter Jenkyn, was killed by a V1 rocket hitting his home in Lovelace Road. The magazine

reported his death:

the grim hand of war has touched the homes of many of us, staff and boys, but we are very thankful

to say that only one of our number has been taken from us; with deepest regret we report the loss of

PH Jenkyn, VA, of Roper’s House, Alleyn’s, who has been with us since September, 1940, and who was

killed by enemy action on July 31st.80

All the boys remembered announcements at assembly each morning of the deaths of individual

AOBs who were killed in the war. Many of the names would have been known to them as their

senior fellows of the previous term/s. Memorial services to those killed were held throughout the

war; a total of 130 AOBs were killed on military service in the Second World War.81

Astonishingly, one of the governors of Alleyn’s was Sir James Grigg82

, Secretary of State for War. And

no token-governor was he: he visited the School in Dulwich as its guest of honour on Speech Day in

June 1942. (This at a time when this reader wonders whether his time might have been better spent

examining quite what was going on in Sevastapol and El-Alamein.)

In Sir James’s rallying speech, the magazine reports that he said ‘that one of the greatest needs of

today was self-reliance. Safety-first was not a good guiding principle for life, and we should aim at

positive rather than merely passive virtues. He urged a spirit of adventurousness.’

And in a note which is rather surprising given the hundreds of laws his government had passed

controlling every minutiae of people’s lives, he went on to say that ‘It was not the part of the State

to regulate every detail of our lives; indeed laws should be as few as possible’. Then sounding like a

future JF Kennedy, Sir James bids that ‘we should ask from life, not freedom from risks but the

greatest opportunity for service.’ The magazine finishes its account of his speech reporting:

77

EAM, March 1945, p161 78

There is a fascinating, but anonymous, article entitled ‘Escape’ which gives an account of one AOB’s nine

months of being on the run as a PoW following the Italian armistice in September 1943. It is reproduced in the

Appendix. 79


Ibid, November 1944, pp125-26 81

Biographical details about the AOB casualties of the Second World War are posted on the Edward Alleyn

Club website, www.edwardalleynclub.com; a hard copy of the document can be posted on request. 82

Sir James Grigg (1890-1964) became Secretary of State for War in February 1942, one of the more unusual

ministerial appointments made by Churchill. Grigg retained his post for the rest of the war, holding it also in

Churchill's 1945 ‘Caretaker Government’. In 1942 he was elected as MP for Cardiff East, beating Fenner

Brockway. However, in the 1945 general election he lost his seat and left public life.

23

Speaking of his own work as Secretary for War, Sir James pointed out that the British Army has had to

achieve in three years what the German Army had ten years to prepare for. But he was confident that

with courage we should equal and surpass our enemies.83

Passing comments are made about the war-situation in the Edward Alleyn Magazine. In an account

of a Field Day battle, the magazine reports: ‘The actual course of the battles is too controversial to

discuss here; suffice it to say that even Goebbels could not have invented so many fictitious and

impossible claims’84

. Another visitor to Alleyn’s, Lord Soulbury, who the preceding year had been

replaced as President of the Board of Education by RA Butler, spoke to the School on Speech Day on,

‘one important aspect of English education, the training of character.’ One feels public school

aficionado Henderson would be rubbing his hands with glee. Lord Soulbury:

pointed out that the Nazi tyranny would fall not because it lacked brains or machines, but because it

lacked morals. He urged his audience in this age of shifting values to remember that the ultimate test

of a man’s education was whether at the end of it he could distinguish not only true from false, but

good from bad, and had moreover the power to follow the right when he saw it. It was easy to see

from their attention that his audience recognised the greatness of his theme and his skill in

developing it.85

But educating – or even training the character of – the boys was never going to be easy in war-time.

Some had already recognised the hard work ahead. The Rev JH Watt, the vicar of Boxley, one of the

villages our boys were evacuated to, presented prizes at Speech Day in 1940 and

congratulated all of us, not only on being alive at all in this much bombed existence, but especially on

being alive at this time. ‘Never has a higher task been laid on a rising generation; never was there a

time when we came on the earth with a bigger job to do, and our hope is that men will say: - “They

were in very truth God’s Gift”.’86

At the end of this chapter on the Second World War, let us not deny ourselves a glimpse into how

Alleyn’s recorded the Allies’ victory – in the Edward Alleyn Magazine:

On this occasion the great events which are happening as we go to press call for some recognition. In

this hour of complete victory over the Germans, and filled with gratitude for our great deliverance,

we should first like to offer our heartfelt tribute to all those who have fought and worked so

magnificently to bring it about. We are proud of the part that hundreds of our Old Boys have played….

And we remember with gratitude and respect the many Old Boys who have given their lives to

preserve our freedom, offering our deepest sympathy to their relations and friends.

And, in a sentence which beggars belief given the social changes prompted by this very war:

It is to schools like our own that the Country has looked for leaders, not only in the King’s Forces but

in every department of national life; and that call has been answered to the full.87

I prefer to leave the final word of VE Day to Mr Wrench recalling:

83

EAM, October 1942, p573 84

Ibid, March 1942, p515 85


Ibid, Nov 1940, p385 87

Ibid, July 1945, p166

24

those never-to-be-forgotten victory celebrations. We marked VE Day by dancing with neighbours

around a bonfire in a nearby side street. My father got so merry that he kicked off his slippers into the

blazing embers.88

88

Bromley Probus, p42

25

Evacuation: Operation ‘Pied Piper’

‘The evacuation of the school took place one day before war was declared. Hitler marched into

Poland, and Britain and France declared war on Germany…. The school walked in orderly groups,

labelled H29, through Dulwich Village, down Gallery Road to West Dulwich Station to entrain for an

unknown destination. Ultimately the Junior School fetched up at Lenham near Charing at the foot of

the North Downs in Kent. The Senior School detrained at Hollingbourne near Maidstone, and were

issued with an apple and a cup of tea by the W.I., and began looking for lodgings near Weavering

Street and Boxley on the outskirts of Maidstone.’ Robert Young, Before I Forget, p106

The evacuation of ‘we sons of the Foundation’89

had already taken place before our decade begins.

Indeed, a notice about the emergency evacuation of London school children was sent out to parents

in April 1939. Parents were given a starkly simple opt-in/opt-out choice:

Any member of the School who comes to School at the usual hour on that day [of evacuation] will be

taken in the School party and anyone who does not will be left behind.

The notice advised what pupils should take – a complete change of clothing – and it counselled: ‘A

great deal of luggage is not necessary. We are not going into a desert…’. But all details were covered;

for those boys who had pets the notice instructed that ‘No animal pets can possibly be taken with

the School,’ and for those pets whose care would be jeopardised by the immediate departure of

their schoolboy-owner ‘a note should be sent – at once – to the RSPCA… giving particulars and

asking for advice’.

The official evacuation of London and the other British cities, ‘Operation Pied Piper’, was announced

by the BBC on the wireless on 1 September and took three days to complete. Almost 1.5m people

travelled from cities to small towns and villages. Most of the official evacuees, some 830,000, were

school children. Many schools evacuated en masse. Even the Alleyn’s School shop followed the

pupils on their evacuation trail to Kent:

The School Shop

Will give the best possible service…. The Manager visits Maidstone every Tuesday and Deal every

Wednesday to take orders. Other days the Shop is open at the School.90

As a foretaste of the increasing controls government would enforce over people’s lives during the

war (and after), the Board of Education prepared a speech that headteachers were to read at

parents' meetings convened about the evacuation programme. Headteachers were to urge parents

'to entrust your children to their teachers to take them away to some safer place'91

.

It was quite common for schools to be scattered over many villages – as Alleyn’s was. The magazine

gives ‘Group Notes’ from each of the villages – Detling, Boxley, Sandling, Weavering. One witty wag

wrote (presumably to the tune of the Lambeth Walk) in the poetry section of the EAM:

89

EAM, November 1939, p283 90

Ibid, p287 91

Gosden, p9

26

(With apologies to S.E.11)

Any time you’re Weav’ring way,

You can hear us all who say

Happy are the Weav’ring folk

Doing the Weav’ring walk.

Why not come down Weav’ring Street?

You will find it quite a treat;

Detling, Sandling we can beat

Doing the Weav’ring walk.

Everyone’s proud and happy

That he’s a Weav’ring chappy.

Why don’t you come and stay here,

Work here, play here?

So – Any time you’re Maidstone way,

Not to Boxley you will stray,

But to Weavr’ing stalk

To do the Weavr’ing Walk.92

It’s at this point that the Edward Alleyn Magazine came into its own. In an age before easy

communication, the magazine was a key way to reassure worried parents of their sons’ welfare. For

example, the Weavering Club’s activities were curtailed by an ‘outbreak of German measles, when

the club was closed for fear of spreading the infection.’93

At times, the authors appear a little too

chipper: ‘With so many and so varied amusements, we were well able to forget for a time our old

homes in Dulwich and even be thankful and proud that we were members of the Weavering Group.’

There was probably a good reason for this chipper-ness, Sandy Alexander (B 1938-47) remembered

being billeted in a pub and in the ‘pretty smelly’ tack room of a stately home:

Some of the first batch to leave London were billeted in a place called the ‘Who’d a thought it’ pub.

Then there was Chilston Park, where we slept amongst saddles and such.

Billets and digs in Kent

Gerry Thain’s (Tn 1938-44) bed was a mattress on a table; Les Johnson (B 1939-43) was billeted in a

house run by a

rather mean landlady who normally ran a bed and breakfast place [who] took in 12 boys. She put six

beds each in her two top landing bedrooms. Unfortunately, the loo was on the next floor down. She

got fed up with the boys keep running up and down the stairs (wearing out her carpet) that she gave

each of the boys a chamber pot, and locked them in the bedrooms at night!

Finding hosts for children – especially adolescents – evacuated from the cities was difficult. Robert

Young recalled how fellow master, Sir John Maitland, who was ‘in charge of one of our parties, was

met by a hostess who had a bath ready in the hall, expecting the need to disinfest London children

92

EAM, February 1940, p318 93

Ibid, June 1940, p346

27

from the docks!’94

Hosts complained that the billeting allowance of 8s 6d or 10s 6d was inadequate

for boys of secondary school age. Sandy Alexander’s older brother, David (B 1933-42), who was 15,

remembers the selection process of evacuees by hosts: ‘we sat around like parrots on a perch

waiting to be picked’. The Alexander brothers were not billeted together and didn’t see each other

again until the end of 1940.

Happily, the party from Alleyn’s were good guests; at Speech Day in 1940, ‘a parent from the body of

the hall expressed on behalf of other parents their appreciation of the friendliness and hospitality

shown to the boys by the inhabitants of Maidstone and the surrounding districts, and asked the

Headmaster to make this as widely known as possible.’ In fact, Alleyn’s made many friends in the

Kentish villages and the Rev JH Watt, vicar of Boxley, became a frequent visitor to the School both at

Dulwich and at Rossall. In the magazine of June 1940, there was an account of the history of Boxley

parish, which has an intriguing parallel with Dulwich in that Dickens’s Mr Pickwick features there.95

For most children, evacuation gave them a prolonged period of freedom. Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41)

admitted that ‘at ages 10, 11, 12 we were still very naïve; certainly immature and incapable of

imagining the atrocities and horrors that were to come’. In a letter, Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) wrote

that until joining up, ‘we enjoyed our lives – working hard at school to make up for lost time but with

freedom at the weekends to cycle (sometimes back to Dulwich), to swim, play tennis and Fives.’ Roy

Dann (D 1937-42) credited the war for getting ‘me a bicycle. Before the war I was so envious of the

boys who cycled to school as my parents considered cycling dangerous so I wasn’t allowed a bicycle.

However, when were evacuated to Lenham in Kent, I told them I needed one to get to school so they

then bought me a second hand bicycle’. Continuing the cycling reminiscences, Mr Dann told our

pupil-interviewers:

One thing I do remember – I shudder to think about it – we used to cycle all four or five of us down

the Deal High Street, there was less traffic then, all with our arms on each other’s shoulders and no

hands on the handlebars. But it’s the kind of thing we used to do when we were your age.

Mr Robinson recalled when ‘the Junior School was evacuated to Deal the youngest of us were

housed together in a vacated prep school (St Clare’s), but those of us (11-12 years-old) in the then

3rd and Shell forms, had to be billeted privately’. Mr Robinson was then billeted with two others

‘with the celebrated Cavell family – which I have ever since looked back upon with the greatest

pleasure and appreciation.’ Percy Cavell was the lifeboat engineer and was Mr Robinson’s ‘boyhood

hero’. Mr Cavell

was a World War I ‘Q-ship engineer’; a highly respected early ‘wireless’ researcher/contributor and

the founder of Deal Sailing and Rowing Club. We were introduced to his fantastic workshop (where he

made intricately detailed lifeboat models – and we boys made model Spitfires); we were introduced

to the new delights of offshore fishing; we were nightly down on the beach helping with the planking

for the launching or winching in of the lifeboat. It was an exciting time for we youngsters.

George Doubleday (Tn 1937-46) still has some of the letters his landladies sent to his mother about

George’s stay and kindly sent them to me. They give a fascinating insight into the bonds which

94

Young, p106 95

EAM, June 1940, pp359-62

28

developed between host and charge. Mr Doubleday shared digs with David Pratt (Tn 1937-46) at Mr

and Mrs Beyth’s home in Deal. Mrs Beyth wrote:

Buster (he insists that we call him this in preference to George) is, I think, very happy here, and is

absolutely no trouble. Both he and David amuse themselves very well, and I enjoy their company as

my husband is out a good deal.

We should miss them very much now, although for your sake I hope it may soon be possible for them

to return home, in the meantime you may rest assured that they will be treated as our own, and both

my husband and I will do all in our power to make their stay with us a happy one.

In another letter Mrs Beyth fretted about the state of repair of Buster’s long trousers ‘as they are all

patches and darns’ and gave details about how she helped the boys with their coughs: ‘I got a 3/-

bottle of Owbridge’s96

between them [and] they have been having it night and morning and it seems

to have cured it’.

The ‘Vackies’97

from Alleyn’s were scattered all over the place: ‘For many of us life has been a matter

of a billet and then a billet’98

. There was much confusion both for the hosts – the villages around

Charing in Kent were surprised to find they were to host 600 girls and staff of Camberwell’s Mary

Datchelor School instead of the seven elementary schools they had been told to expect. Closer to

the Alleyn’s experience, the reporters for the Fifty Club lamented in the magazine that

Unhappily the minute-book had been lost in the turmoil of evacuation, so that the events of previous

meetings could not be recalled99

.

Evacuation pastimes

The ‘solicitous government’s’100

primary concern for the evacuated children was one of their safety

rather than their education. Mr Thain remembers that ‘it was a real experience of life. Staff were

very good – they still had to look after us. You had to look after yourself quite a bit. You got plenty of

help though.’ David Alexander – one of the older evacuees – remembered this as an exciting time

and as an adventure. The prevailing circumstances of war gave many new opportunities for learning.

Individual teachers sometimes found themselves able to break out of the formal structures which

had conditioned their teaching in pre-war times and try out more informal methods. The Junior

School boys ‘had very little in the way of books and equipment for the first few days until the arrival

of two lorry loads from London.’ The magazine editors described a peripatetic existence – reliant on

those much-coveted bicycles:

a three-mile journey to School, and, in fact, School every day, are now again taken as a matter of

course. Latin in a crypt and maths in the hall of a Unitarian chapel; P.S. in M.G.S. library and bicycles in

a garage. This is our new life.

At the outset the editors of the magazine detected ‘a certain boredom ahead, and worse – a time of

mud and wet and cold in unfamiliar places.’ The boys – and their masters – were involved with ‘hay-

96

A cough syrup of the time. 97

Ibid, February 1940, p305 98



Ibid, November 1939, p283

29

making and fruit-picking, of trench digging and adventure’101

in Kent and you can hear the sniggering

editors when they write ‘there have been sights and feelings to console us. We have seen men,

worthy men, Housemasters some of them, working digging, stripped to the waist, sweating….’102

.

Robert Young was not surprised to find that there weren’t any staff for Maidstone’s underground

telephone headquarters, and equally not surprised when Headmaster

Henderson, being on the spot, and being that sort of man, promptly volunteered all members of his

staff! We found ourselves manning telephones, and spending sleepless nights, waiting for the air-raid

incidents which did not immediately occur.103

The boys entertained themselves in their various billets with singing, darts, whist drives, chess, table

tennis, bowls and handball. Dr Philpott remembers the ‘heavy snowfalls in January [1940] and [we]

enjoyed tobogganing nearby’. This is recorded by the attentive editors who described,

The steep snow-bound slopes of the North Downs [which] provided some excellent toboggan runs,

and a miniature winter sports season was enjoyed by many of us, although we suffered a few minor

casualties. A severely curtailed ‘bus service obliged us to walk the three miles between Detling and

School, and emphasised the rural seclusion in which we live.104

Dr Philpott remembered that ‘we were still sharing with Maidstone Boys’ Grammar School for a

while, but moved into Albion Place School (rather battered after being used by the army) before

Easter’. Like many schools, Alleyn’s was paired with a local school and each school worked a double-

shift system, the host school using the premises in the morning and the visitors in the afternoon. In

the magazine’s Football Notes, ‘SI’ [Sidney Incledon?] expressed Alleyn’s

gratitude to the Maidstone Grammar School Sports authorities for their kindness and assistance

throughout the term. By providing us with every facility in the matter of grounds and changing

accommodation, and in every way, they have made it possible for us to carry on our games efficiently

and effectively.’105

This period covered the ‘Phoney War’ and, following a national pattern, boys began to drift back to

familiarity of their homes. In September 1939, 764,900 school children had been evacuated under

the official scheme; the number remaining in the reception areas in January 1940 was 420,000, i.e.

55% of those who had come on the outbreak of war106

. In the magazine of November 1939, the

editors commented on

the abnormal circumstances and the increased number of leavers, the Editors have found it

impossible to complete the usual Valete, but ask all leavers to furnish them with details of their

school careers, which the Editors will be pleased to publish in the next issue.107

WJ Smith in Music in Education remembered that after the evacuation to Maidstone, ‘The numbers

fell very sharply, and about 400 boys left the school in 15 months. This was a testing.’108

This state of

flux continued throughout the war to the confusion of editors and authorities alike.

101



Young, p107 104

EAM, June 1940, p347 105


Gosden, p18 107

EAM, November 1939, p260

30

Blitz and to Wales

By May 1940, ‘things changed dramatically with the German Blitzkreig, the French surrender and the

evacuation from Dunkirk,’ explained Dr Philpott. ‘The war suddenly seemed very close as trains

loaded with evacuated servicemen passed by the end of our orchard’.

Government departments discussed ‘ways of adjusting the evacuation scheme in view of the new

dangers threatening the East and South-East coasts and were considering whether to order the

evacuation of some of those areas on 2 June…. Many London children still evacuated to the South

and South-East coasts were moved to South Wales before the end of May and during June the

remainder were sent to safer areas’109

. This was true for the Junior School boys but the Senior School

boys had to sit it out in Kent ‘watching the circus overhead’ from their ‘front seats in the stalls for

the Battle of Britain’110

. Mr Johnson was one of the Junior School boys who went to Wales. Mrs

Johnson, his widow, wrote:

They were moved to Rogerstown in Wales. This would have been a safe area except that Rogerstown

had a huge steel works. Flames of fire came out of the factory chimneys all the time, and could be

seen for miles. In an effort to conceal these flames, all round the town and round the factory oil

drums were placed. These were lit, and I understand that the smoke used to go straight up to a

certain height, and would then fan out, creating a fog, hopefully concealing the flames. What it did

do, however, is create filthy dirty smog!

Les was quite happy here, though he didn’t particularly enjoy his breakfast. Shredded wheat with

water (not milk)!

Sandy Alexander remembered the Northern Aluminium factory in Rogerstown and how it was a

target for bombs – the aluminium was used for making aeroplanes. He was billeted in a house where

he discovered the practice of ‘hot bedding’ – ‘I would be turfed out of bed in the morning once the

owner came home from his night shift at the factory!’

Junior School boys Mr Doubleday and Mr Pratt were again billeted together when they were

transferred to Rogerstown, this time staying with a Mr and Mrs Morris. In her letter to Mrs

Doubleday after the boys had left, Mrs Morris wrote asking her to ‘Thank Buster for his letter, I just

had a little weep when I read it… We both felt quite lost for a few days after he and David left,’

adding that even their dog missed the boys. She referenced the war, writing

Needless to say we have been thinking about you every day since the dreadful raids on London. We

have been having a much quieter time here, perhaps it has something to do with the fact that we now

have a balloon barrage. It was a Newport balloon which brought down a bomber on Wednesday

night.

Not surprisingly, by September, 1950, in the understated words of the HMIs helpful précis:

parents were showing a disinclination to send their boys either to Kent or to Newport and so in June,

1941, the School was again moved, this time to Rossall, where it remained until the end of the Easter

108

Smith, p20 109

Gosden, p36 110 Allison’s papers, Maidstone evacuation notes, September 1940

31

of the Summer term, 1945, reassembling with 217 boys from Rossall and approximately 400 from the

South London Emergency Secondary School.111

Escape to Rossall

At the end of 1940, Allison wrote a letter to solicit parents' views on a move to Rossall (see

Appendix). In it he explained

The difficulty about finding an alternative centre outside London was that it must be as safe as

possible, and must provide us with living quarters and teaching accommodation. Increased

evacuation from the cities has made such a centre hard to discover. After several fruitless journeys to

different parts of the country, I think I have found the most satisfactory solution to our problem.

The solution was Rossall School in Fleetwood, Lancashire. In this letter, Allison recommended the

School’s evacuation to Rossall saying,

In my view, though Rossall is some distance from London (approximately the same as Plymouth in

another direction), the advantages of a quiet life and uninterrupted schooling for your boy at such a

time as this, outweigh almost every other consideration….

What is startling is the size of the tiny tear-off permission slip at the bottom of the letter which

parents were to complete giving their (hardly insignificant) decision on whether they would wish

their son/s to join the ‘re-evacuation’.

Enough parents signed-up, and so on 6 January 1941, Alleyn’s left Maidstone for Fleetwood. The

contingent from Wales joined the Senior School on 16 January. The editors wrote:

this magazine has to record Alleyn’s second evacuation. This time we have moved much farther afield

than before; the land of hops and custard powder gives place to the land of tripe and Gracie Fields.

Mention must be made, too, of another change, no less striking, which also has affected everybody:

the change in climate. The heavy malt-laden air of Maidstone has been left behind and now we have

the crisp sea breezes of Rossall. Their bracing effect has proved too much for many members of the

school, who have succumbed to minor ailments… When we arrived at our new home, Colonel Trist,

the acting Headmaster, warned us that we were not enjoying a Typical Rossall Day if we could keep

our hats on our heads in the school corridors.

Another point, almost forgotten in the flurry of our settling-in process, is the fact that we have no air-

raids at Rossall; but a form of hockey, played on the sands, more than compensates for the

excitement and risk which they offered.112

Headmaster RB Henderson, having led the ‘Vackies’ to the wilderness of Kent, stepped down as

Headmaster of Alleyn’s and was replaced by CR Allison. Professor Donald Leinster-Mackay D 1943-

50) in his monograph Alleyn’s and Rossall Schools: The Second World War, Experience and Status,

explained that Allison’s first task was:

to bring the two scattered parts of the school together. Rossall School had been negotiating for

another public school, Westminster, to share its buildings, but arrangements fell through and Allison

eagerly seized the opportunity to secure his new school in one place.113

111

HMIs’ report, 1950, p2 112

EAM, March 1941, p398

32

Some schools almost lost their identity during the war but most – like Alleyn’s – successfully survived

a whole series of upheavals. The Board of Education were aware of this risk at the start and advised:

So far as possible the visiting school was to retain its own ‘individuality’ as a separate unit with which

its pupils were familiar although there would naturally be scope for close collaboration with the local

school.114

Alleyn’s and Rossall – as we shall see in the following pages – worked exceptionally well in their co-

existence with Allison claiming in 1944 that ‘the Alleyn’s association with Rossall was often spoken of

as the most successful of the war-time pairings of schools’115

.

End of evacuation

The government rather rashly announced the end of official evacuation on 7 September 1944, the

day before the first V2 rocket fell on London. London’s turn to be declared ‘go home’ areas finally

came on 2 May 1945, six days before VE Day. For our boys in Rossall,

The Home Guard stood down on 2nd December and all realised, some with mixed feelings, that the

days at Rossall were numbered. The Lent Term of 1945 went very quickly. On 26th March the sun

shone, ‘Alleyn’s weather’ as the natives of those parts had learned to call it over the past four years,

and the boys entered Big School for a combined final assembly. The two School Captains, Cranfield of

Alleyn’s and Peters of Rossall, expressed genuine feelings of mutual respect and goodwill in farewell

speeches. The two Headmasters echoed the same sentiments which the two Schools endorsed with

cheers for each other. Parting gifts were announced – Rossall was to present Alleyn’s with an inter-

House Cricket Trophy to be known as the ‘Rossall Shield’ and Alleyn’s would send to Rossall (when

they could be bought) wooden seats for ‘The Square’ such as the Rossalians had often envied the

Alleyn’s boys using during their stay. Approximately 200 boys and staff left Rossall and came, led by

Mr Allison, to the ‘Promised Land’.116

Casualties of war

It is surprising, when you consider the stark statistics about war-time casualties, especially in

London, that not more Alleyn’s pupils and staff were killed in the course of the war. In total, 60,595

civilians were killed by enemy action in Britain.117

For the first three years of the conflict more

women and children were killed by German action than were British soldiers.118

Of the 60,000

people killed by German bombing and (later) rocket attacks, half were in London, and 43,000 were

killed during 1940-41.119

The statistics get grimmer: in the Blitz (1940-41), children accounted for

one-in-ten deaths.

As described in the chapter on the Second World War, one Alleyn’s pupil, Peter Jenkyn, was killed as

a direct hit by enemy action. He was an Alleyn’s pupil at SLESS who was killed when his home was

struck by a V1 in 1944.

113

DLM, p7 114

Board of Education circular, August 1939, quoted in Gosden, p15 115

DLM, p29 116

Chandler, p77 117

Longmate, p133 118


Ibid, p385

33

There were other deaths amongst the evacuees, but not owing to enemy action. Donald Double

(Cribb’s) died in July, 1940, ‘while the school was at Maidstone’ and Gerald Stephenson, ‘died at

Rossall, on February 6th, 1941.’120

The obituary for Gerald Stephenson said that he had ‘had a very

short illness – he had been with the Junior School on evacuation first at Deal and later in South

Wales’121

.

Given the fear, uncertainty and the chaotic time endured by boys and staff alike in the preceding six

years, it is quite easy to understand that the reunion back at Alleyn’s did indeed feel like a return to

‘the Promised Land’.

120

EAM, March 1941, p401 121


34

Exile in Rossall

‘…my study, in Rose House, was on the second floor and its windows were partially frosted by wind-

driven sand.’ Bill Jones (R, 1935-42)

‘The Eton of the North’

Rossall School was set on the bleak, rugged Lancashire coast, with hardly a tree in sight and was

quite a change from the leafy downs of Kent for our ‘sons of the Foundation’.122

It was a boarding

school with an array of outward signs of being an English public school:

its monumental dining hall, its magnificent chapel, its Gothic style three-decker boarding houses, its

ample grounds with manicured lawns, if somewhat bare of trees, its 18th-century gazebo, Spartan

swimming pool and its Sumner Library standing in the midst of a large and open quadrangle.123

Its motto was taken from Virgil’s Aeneid: ‘Mens Agitat Molem’ [The mind stirs the mass] and one

can’t help feeling that our Alleyn’s boys certainly stirred the mass of minds up on the Fylde coast

during their three-year, two-month-stay at Rossall.

In September 1940, the boys and staff of Rossall had just returned, Aeneas-like, from their own

unsuccessful wanderings. Like many schools, Rossall’s buildings had been requisitioned for war use

and so the Rossall pupils were evacuated to Naworth Castle, a medieval pile near Carlisle. Their

experiences were not good; after a few weeks of staying at Naworth it became clear that there was

a major main problem with the drains which, like much of the Castle, were mediaeval. Derek

Winterbottom wrote that: ‘because the dormitories were overcrowded and also badly ventilated on

account of the blackout regulations (the Bursar was fined fifty shillings by the authorities in

Brampton for not observing these sufficiently),’ there was an outbreak of

a virulent streptococcal infection. Six boys had to be taken to a nursing home in Carlisle, and three

underwent operations. At Naworth [the Headmaster] Young had to convert a wing into a hospital

ward… as boy after boy fell victim to disease.

The doctors, surgeons and nurses worked hard to stave off disaster: between them they succeeded,

but as the Headmaster of Rossall Charles Young admitted ‘they kept death away from Naworth,

though he came extremely near.’124

These weren’t the only problems the authorities at Rossall were facing. Mrs Johnson remembers

that

Years later… the Headmaster [of Rossall] told us the story of how the school re-opened after the long

summer holiday of 1939 – only to find they had barely any students! Rossall was the type of good

school that parents working and living abroad… sent their sons back home for a first class English

education. No parent would send their son back home to a country that was at war – so Rossall had

barely any pupils!

122


Donald Leinster-Mackay, p10 124

Winterbottom, p99

35

This boded well for the wandering sons of Alleyn’s who were looking for a united and safe war-time

home: within weeks of the Rossall boys’ return to their school in Fleetwood, the governing body of

Rossall [the Council] was asked by the Board of Education to give a home to Alleyn’s School. This was

welcome news to the Council who had been struggling with financial crises since the 1930s as Rossall

would receive rent for their visitors’ accommodation. It was agreed that Alleyn’s would pay 6s a

week for each resident boy and 2s for non-residents, with 8s for resident masters, plus a shilling a

week per boy for use of the dining-hall.125

The Acting Headmaster, Leslie Trist,

was required to reorganise the Rossall boarding houses in order to make room for the Londoners

from the beginning of the January term in 1941. Alleyn’s were given the use of the Headmaster’s

House, James House, and the three boarding houses closest to the Archway – Rose, Spread Eagle and

Crescent … Alleyn’s used the Mod. [sic] Schools classrooms and clever timetabling enabled them to

use the Chapel, laboratories, gym, swimming-bath and tuck shop at different times and to live a

separate existence on the same campus. Fortunately Trist and Allison got on well together – indeed

Trist described Allison as ‘one in a 1000’ – and the two Common Rooms mingled on social occasions

quite cordially. 126

Winterbottom writes that ‘the Rossall boys seemed to get on well with these “London

intellectuals”’127

. However, he cites one of Rossall’s school monitors, one Ben Strahan (later British

Ambassador to the Yemen, Lebanon and Algeria) who felt that,

the two schools worked together harmoniously enough but there was no serious attempt to

fraternise because, in his view, most Rossallians at that class-conscious time considered the Alleynians

[sic], with their off-Cockney accents, to be beneath them by a social class or two.’128

Whilst these sentiments make this reader wince somewhat, it is clear from notes Allison made at the

time ahead of speaking to his staff about the move to Rossall, that he too was conscious of a

possible social divide between the Alleyn’s day-boys and the Rossall boarding school boys.

We shall be sharing the buildings with another school whose boys have been brought up in the

boarding school tradition. We may expect them to be wealthier and more self-assured than our boys.

It will be important that from the first, Alleyn’s should feel that it has much to give to as well as take

from the partnership, that perhaps our fellows should have certain peculiar advantages that may have

the effect of redressing any natural feelings of inferiority.

And, as if steeling himself to see this challenge through, Allison steadies his troops:

There is much of course that cannot be decided now: it can only come as the result of trial and a

certain amount of error I daresay. I don’t think that that will matter provided that we have the right

attitude ourselves towards this experiment and can instil something of it into the boys,

before rallying:

It is, as I have said before, a piece of positive and creative educational work in a world given over the

destruction. It has some of the refreshing qualities of the irrelevant and the eccentric. It is I believe

something of an adventure and will demand certain of the pioneering and frontier virtues in its

125

Council Minutes, 1931 cited in Winterbottom, p105 126


Ibid 128

Ibid, p108

36

accomplishment: loyalty to a common cause and a zest for improvisation. I hope you will take it as a

compliment when I say that when I came last September it was with the hope that our problems

might be solved in just this fashion, but it was only after getting to know you that the hope became a

possibility.

This is a clear admission by Allison of an extemporising approach to the war-time education and care

of his charges. The education historian, Professor Peter Gosden, in his reflection of the education

children received during the war comments that

one of the more intangible gains which contemporary reports frequently mentioned was the

broadening of human interests and the more intimate association and growing understanding

between teachers and children sharing a common experience in new surroundings.129

Sandy Alexander (B 1938-47) identified that ‘what we lacked were staff with boarding experience.

We didn’t have matrons. It was very much a new experience for everyone’. Mr Alexander went on to

describe Rossall as ‘a mixed experience. We took over half of Rossall’s School. They didn’t want us

and we didn’t want to be there. There was a sort of truce.’

Rossalleyn’s ventures

At our Memories Day reunion, Derek Smith (not at Rossall) brought in a newspaper cutting

of 1941, which is headed up 'Rossall' and it’s from the Sunday Times: The arrival of Alleyn's School

from Dulwich was the chief feature of the Lent Term at Rossall. Both schools have kept their

individuality, but both boys and masters have met on friendly terms and, although differences of code

have prevented them meeting at games other than athletics, the schools have joined for many out of

school activities, such as musical recitals, chess clubs and philatelic societies.

The magazine recounted many incidents of Alleyn’s and Rossall coming together on various

enterprises, even creating a combined noun – ‘Rossalleyns’ – for themselves, for example, ‘a

Rossalleyns show was presented by the cream of both schools’130

. But few were recalled by our

visitors. In March 1943 the schools held an International Forum in a bid to redress the charge that

‘our life as members of a boarding school community was robbing us to some extent of the

opportunity to make contact with the outside world, and current affairs in general.’ Representatives

from the Allied countries came to ‘lecture to both Rossall and Alleyn’s Schools about their respective

countries. They would endeavour also to outline the part each country would play in the great post-

war plan of world reconstruction.’131

A year later another of ‘our joint educational experiments with Rossall’ took the shape of an Anglo-

American Weekend. The rationale behind it was to try to learn more about the United States’ given

there were so many US troops based in Britain at the time, and in turn, ‘to give the chance to a few

Americans to learn the truth about us, about our real friendship for them as allies,’ interesting final

point given Allison’s earlier reservations, ‘and about English Public School life’132

. This weekend was

remembered by Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44):

129

Gosden, p75 130

EAM, June 1941, p451 131

Ibid, May 1943, p35 132

Ibid, May 1944, p108

37

There was a visit from USA soldiers, VERY memorable. It was a weekend of various functions. We had

a very interesting time talking to these chaps and a very enjoyable weekend. There was a lane

opposite the front entrance to the school. A straight lane. I remember them taking me in a jeep down

this lane. Whether it was 80mph or 100 it was certainly the fastest I’d ever been and ever went for a

long time.

Education at Rossall

Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) wrote that ‘Life at Rossall for my seven terms there was very full, and

provided me with a more rounded education than would otherwise have been possible and for

which I have always been grateful.’ At our reunion, Gerry Thain told our interviewers that:

I absolutely loved Rossall. I felt privileged having a study. Sharing it with other boys… I liked the life

there. I remember getting money to buy paint to decorate our study walls. What a marvellous life!

John Merrill (R 1942-48) reminded us that ‘there was a war on, and, I didn’t get to Rossall until 1944.

So when I got up there it was very nice to have a good night’s sleep. My mother’s house got bombed

three times! And so when I did get evacuated up there it was like Heaven!’

Frank Halford (R 1942-49) found that by being in the relative safety of Rossall during the war ‘was a

good thing for me, because being up at Rossall you had, in the evening, Prep which you did.’

Professor Leinster-Mackay commented that events in the boys’ lives took on ‘an institutional

character’. When pressed on their prep and cheek by jowl existence by our interviewers, our visitors

expanded:

Frank Halford: It’s not necessarily an ethos, it was merely the fact that you had to do it [prep]. You

know, there was no getting out of it.

John Merrill: You were in the same environment, all the time.

Frank Halford: Everybody’s doing it, all at the same time, in the common room, you have the House

Master or House prefect invigilating, supervising, you do it. And you’re there.

Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) said that ‘‘everything revolved around the school’.

The question of how to occupy the boys’ time at Rossall was paramount in Allison’s mind as he

prepared his notes for his speech about the move from Maidstone to Rossall to his colleagues.

There is no fundamental difference of opinion between a good day school and a good boarding

school: the difference is one of degree. Both aim at the same end – the production of a happy and

intelligent man who shall, if possible, be a good citizen as well, but whereas the day school can

foment the ?process? [illegible] for at most 36 hours a week leaving the rest to chance and the

parent, the boarding school can command, and has to plan, for 24 hours of every day in the term. It is

this extension of responsibility that is our real agenda this evening.

It is not to be supposed of course that the School should or could monopolise the whole of a boy’s

time at Rossall: his own devices will be as important to his education there as elsewhere. On the other

hand we have got to arrange the ratio of work to games, games to quiet occupations, quiet

occupations to entirely free time, to include Sundays as well as week-days in our timetable, to think of

the term as the unit both for ourselves and the boys..

38

Dulwich traditions

Throughout the evacuation period, the magazine reporters hark back to the pre-war standard of the

School’s sporting prowess. In May 1944, the reporters lament:

The general standard of PT continues to improve, but it is not yet as good as it could be, principally

because it lacks the support of the whole school. If more support were given to this essential part of

the school’s activities it might reach the old Dulwich standard.133

Many of the Dulwich traditions were seized upon to bolster the delicate structure of Alleyn’s in exile.

In 1943, the magazine writers painted a nostalgic picture of Founder’s Day in ‘the Great Hall,

Dulwich, packed to capacity with AOBs and parents awaiting the start of the Founder’s Day concert.’

The reality was Rossall, and ‘despite the different surroundings, the same atmosphere was

maintained, and we had the feeling that yet another of the Dulwich traditions had been saved.’134

In

reading the magazines I was surprised to learn how many AOBs visited Alleyn’s in its peregrinations.

The Alleyn’s House-system came into its own with Houses doubling up in Rossall’s boarding

houses.135

The boys arose in the morning as one to the sound of the bugler playing reveille, washed or showered

and dressed and at night congregated in customary places for prep before assembling for evening

prayers and bedtime with the bugler signalling ‘lights-out’ with a rendering of ‘Last Post’. During these

years the corporate spirit, the esprit de corps of a boarding house was imbued in the lives of the

boys.136

This constant bugling did not go unnoticed by their Rossall fellows. In the Rossallian, one pupil

complained:

I write to you to request that something may be done. I refer to the amazing system of bugle blowing

at present in vogue among the members of Alleyn’s School. When our visitors first came amongst us, I

am sure we all welcomed the innovation…. Now bugles sound all hours of the day and upon the very

slightest pretext. This, to say the very least of it, is disconcerting…. Daily the reveille becomes earlier

and earlier, and daily the great Rossall public becomes angrier and angrier.137

In Allison’s notes for his speech to the staff about the move to Rossall he demonstrated that he

shared Henderson’s vision of the importance of public school in maintaining order:

On the one hand that very community life [of a boarding school] is going to give us our biggest

chance. Mr Middleton Murray138

in a recent book accused the secondary schools of failing to produce

the many leaders that democracy needs. I am not prepared altogether to admit the accusation, but, if

there is a real luck in some quarters today of people ready to shoulder responsibility it is perhaps

because there are too few who receive the right kind of training for it. The successful running of a

boarding school house implies a great deal of wise delegation of authority. Dormitories, bath-rooms,

133

Ibid, May 1944, p96 134


Brading’s and Tulley’s became Crescent House; Cribb’s and Roper’s became Rose House; Brown’s and

Dutton’s were The Hall; and Spurgeon’s and Tyson’s became Rose House; the Junior School was housed in

James House. 136

DLM, p2 137

AJE Besch quoted in DLM, pp26-27 138

If John Middleton Murry (1889-1957), writer and critic.

39

studies, day-rooms resolve themselves into new administrative departments and the smallest boy in

the House easily realises that their organisation cannot be left to a single head or even a small group

of prefects at the top. There is no reason why everyone in a House of 40 should not have real and

regular services to perform for the community in which he lives.

Pastimes

Our guests were quizzed about how they spent their free time at Rossall. Micky Stewart (T, 1944-51)

remembered that there were ‘various societies, weren’t there? There was music and drama, there

was always something going on. Everything really revolved around the School.’ Mr Halford added ‘I

don’t think we were ever bored’.

John Merrill confessed to horse-riding, explaining to his fellow AOBs’ surprise:

There was a gentleman who wanted youngsters like me to go and exercise his horses. I used to do

that on a Saturday afternoon. On a Sunday morning, when I’d skipped off Puff Smith, who was music

master at the time and was responsible for all that went on, he used to have a choral practice and he

always said ‘even if you can’t sing and can’t play an instrument, when you’re older at least you’ll

recognise the tune’ – and I think he was right in that. Anyway, I always used to put my hand up after

half an hour and I think he thought I was going for a pee…. And I used to get on my bike and go and

ride the horses. So I’m ashamed to say that I was one of the naughty ones.

Micky Stewart: What age were you when you were riding the horses?

John Merrill: I came up to Rossall in 1944, so I would have been 14.

Peter Reeve: It’s amazing what you find out after 60 years, I had no idea!

Mr Thain recalled getting ‘a cup of coffee in Cleveleys for just four pence. There was a tuck shop

beside the neighbouring shooting range. I remember we used to pick up the cartridges from the

rifles and use them as money when we played cards.’

In the magazine of October 1941, the writers reported on the Bear Pit’s reading of JB Priestley’s

When We are Married declaring it ‘the most successful of our readings’, adding, ‘the success of the

play was largely achieved by the convincing display of assumed Lancashire accents, which we have

had so many opportunities of acquiring up here…’.139

(For more information about the musical,

dramatic, sporting and debating activities of the boys, please refer to relevant chapters.)

Some of the boys took their bicycles to Rossall. Three even cycled back to London on them. Dr

Philpott and his friend John Larcombe, both keen cyclists, returned to London at the end of the

Easter term 1941. ‘We cycled from Rossall back to Dulwich. We took 2 ½ days for the 260 miles and

enjoyed the journey very much. The roads were very quiet and we had to work hard at our map-

reading as there were no signposts or place names anywhere during the war for security reasons. At

the end of the summer term we repeated the journey, but this time we cycled up to the Lake District

first and then crossed the Pennines to reach the A1 road which we followed to London (we returned

to Rossall by train on each occasion!)’ Mrs Johnson relayed the pitiful account of how the 12-year-

old Les made the same journey on two wheels:

When Les was about 12 his father was in the army, and Leslie’s mother was very hard up. He wrote

home asking if she would send him the fare to London so that he could go home for the Easter

holidays. She replied saying how sorry she was, but she couldn’t afford the fare for just two weeks’

139

Ibid, October 1941, p489

40

holiday. She would send him the fare for the long summer holiday, of course. Les was so upset to find

he was the only boy left in the school that he got his bike out and rode all the way back to London!

The dinner ladies made him a large wad of sandwiches, and told him to take a blanket as well as his

cycle cape. This was worth its weight in gold to him as he had to sleep rough at nights. On the fourth

night some lorry drivers took pity on him when they learned the huge distance he was riding. They let

him sleep in the back of their lorry and treated him to supper! Les always spoke of the tremendous

sense of achievement when he came to the top of Highgate Hill, and could see London and St Paul’s

dome set out before him! ‘I’ve made it!’

David Wallace (C 1941-46) spent much of his time ‘involved in technical support and maintenance

[of sport & drama], e.g. helping mow pitches, stage fittings/electrics…. I helped maintain the School

as there was a shortage of skilled men. I also caught rats and once recovered a dead airman from the

sea.’ This was remembered by our guests: Mr Merrill explained that

Not a mile away [from Rossall] was an American dive bombing range. And they had this thing that

they were trying to dive on. And I remember when I was there, there were two of them who didn’t

make it. And then they were washed up on the beach a couple of days later.

As has been related earlier, the boys did not operate in a vacuum away from the communities in

which they lived or from the war. Chandler wrote that

Alleyn’s had not become isolated at Fleetwood, it had become part of the community, associating

itself with local events and special war efforts. In Fleetwood’s ‘Wings for Victory’ and ‘Salute the

Soldier’ weeks Alleyn’s played its full part. During half terms and some of the holidays, the boys would

help on local farms and really proved their worth.140

At Speech Day in 1944, held at Rossall, the Mayor of Fleetwood, Tom Roberts, JP, took the chair at

Prize-giving. Allison took the opportunity to recognise the friends Alleyn’s had made on the Fylde. He

pointed out that the presence of the Mayor of Fleetwood was symbolic of the kindness and interest

that the School had met with everywhere since its arrival at Rossall and went on to give thanks to the

many friends of Alleyn’s in Cleveleys and Blackpool as well. He recalled that Alleyn’s association with

Rossall was often spoken of as the most successful of the wartime pairing of Schools and said that the

forbearance and cordiality we had met with took their tone from the lead given by Mr Young

[Headmaster] and Col Trist [Acting Headmaster].141

Again, returning to Allison’s speech to his staff on the eve of the move to Rossall, he debates why a

parent, during war-time, should send his or her 14-year-old142

son to Alleyn’s at Rossall.

What can we offer? What are we hoping to give in exchange for the £70 or £80 a year the boy might

otherwise be earning? I think we are trying to give an added chance of happiness. By stealing one year

or two from the beginning of his working life we are trying to add a little lustre to the other 41. We

offer responsibility in small things to prepare for greater, we offer a further two years, and a most

sensitive two years in an atmosphere where spiritual values are important, we offer a further period

of preparation for the time when these same values will have to be defended against the wiles of the

devil and the propagandist; we offer the chance to learn to do a job of work for its own sake… And I

140

Chandler, p76 141


This was the school leaving age at the time

41

say that such a programme as this, particularly for the boy between 14 & 18, is easier to work out in a

boarding than in a day school.

May I end with a quotation from WB Yeats which is the counterpart of the Vicar of Bexley’s sermon of

last Sunday week? ‘….in the beginning of important things – in the beginning of any work – there is a

moment when we understand more perfectly than we understand again until all is finished.’ It is this

Olympian preview of the situation that I hope we may be able to take this evening.

Welfare of the boys

The wives of various masters acted as ‘aunts’ to the boys under their husbands’ care. There are

various mentions of Mrs Bate and Mrs Spring in the magazine for their efforts in keeping the boys

fed and cared for under trying times. In the valete for Albert Spring, the Headmaster of the Junior

School [‘James House’ at Rossall], Mrs Spring is mentioned ‘at Rossall [where] she acted as Matron,

Nurse and Mother to the boys of James House.’143

In November 1943, James House reported that:

At the end of the school year we feel that we must record our grateful thanks to Mrs Spring for all her

motherly care at all times of the day (and night), to Mrs Bate for her provision of such excellent meals

in spite of all ration difficulties, and to Dorothy, our house maid, for all her good work in the House.144

Our visitors remembered the maids…. Mr Dann remembered ‘the sixth form boys used to meet on

the promenade of an evening with the maids who served in the dining room’. Mr Stewart regaled us

with a tale:

I don’t know whether I should tell this story, but when I went I joined one or two days before my 11th

birthday, and the boys who were the new intake up to Rossall went two or three days before the

school began. And you were met at the station, wherever it was going up north, and we were taken

up by the School Vice-Captain (I’m not going to say any names). And there he was in a black Alleyn’s

blazer, stiff collar and tie, and my mother said ‘Michael, if you turn out like that boy there I shall be

forever proud of you for all my life’. And that boy didn’t see the end of term, because he made one of

the parlour maids pregnant!

Happily Mrs Stewart had plenty of other reasons to be proud of her son with his long international

cricketing career.

The health of the boys – like the weather – was a frequent subject covered by the magazine. Writing

as if reassuring over-anxious parents about their sons, the editors report that

Generally speaking, the health of [James] House has been very good this term. Of course there have

been the usual minor complaints – chills, bilious attacks (usually the result of over-indulgence in

‘tuck’) and the various ailments which necessitate the application of a bandage.145

And even when a more serious illness – scarlet fever – hit the boys, it is still reported in a jolly, albeit

whimsical style:

143

EAM, November 1949, p601. In 1941, the EAM reported the death of Mr and Mrs Spring’s daughter, Mary.

Could it be that Mrs Spring’s motherly devotion to the boys at Rossall went in some way to assuage her grief

for her own child? 144



42

This term a scarlet spectre stalked the school, leaving its mark on study after study, passing its six

weeks’ sentence irrespective of age or position. Thirty-one times its dismal tumbrel conveyed a

further victim to Moss Side Isolation Hospital. It caused many pints of gargle to splash and gurgle in

many apprehensive throats. It decreed the segregation of Alleyn’s and Rossall: separate entrances to

the dining hall, different hours at the tuck-shop. Nothing seemed to stop the coming and going of that

little red van with its musty odour of disinfectant; and even as this goes to press some last victim of

the ‘fever’s reign’ of power spends Christmas in the grim confines of Moss Side and the New Year in

the draughty emptiness of the Sanitorium.146

One of our AOBs was a victim of the ‘scarlet spectre’. John Burley (D 1942-48) ‘joined the new intake

in September 1942 and was accommodated in James House with the other 27 new boys. Within the

first week I contracted scarlet fever and spent my first term in the Moss Side isolation hospital. It

was there that I met Laurie Andrews who has been my closest friend to this day’.

Mr Thain remembered this sanatorium as being ‘just behind the back of the promenade. I was in the

sanatorium once with mumps and once with chicken pox. It was at the very edge of the grounds.

You could walk out and be on the sea front. A bleak place.’ Mr Alexander made regular visits to the

santatorium: ‘I was in the sanatorium frequently because of boils on back of the neck.’ When he

went back home to London, he would get the train ‘from Blackpool North to Euston, [and] my

parents were appalled by the ragamuffin that came off the train. My clothes were in tatters.’

When we asked what Mr Wallace remembered most about Alleyn’s, he replied ‘All being in it

together. The malnutrition and associated ill health.’

Food

Mr Reeve remembered the food at Rossall – it ‘was absolutely and utterly poor. It was the most

diabolical, revolting muck’ – hardly surprising given the shortages and rationing. Mr Stewart told us

about his first breakfast at Rossall. It was a

bit of the old porridge, and I looked down at it, and there was a bit of a hump in the middle of it.

Turned out to be black! It’s the biggest black beetle I’d ever seen! And I was so hungry that I ate

around it!

Mr Thain described the communal dining at Rossall:

Going into the dining hall everyday; and I remember breakfast – I was in Spread Eagle House and the

dining hall was on the other side of the quadrangle, so in the morning you’d run across the

quadrangle to get your breakfast. I remember that we’d sit something like a dozen on a table with the

master at one end. You’d sit down at your meal and one boy would be given the job of dividing the

butter. It was their job to mark it with a knife; the chap who got the last portion got the smallest. You

didn’t have a lot of choice. I was spoilt as a child and I didn’t like milk puddings. But at Rossall you

didn’t get much to eat so it was eat or starve really. I remember one experience when we had prunes

and custard and the custard jug came down and I looked inside and I thought ‘Oh, wow! Look there’s

a prune in the custard!’ So I poured a bit more and out emerged a cockroach. So I didn’t eat it after

that. I think it went back down the table at the end.

146

Ibid, January 1943, pp4-5

43

For Mr Halford it was the smell which evoked his memory of cooking; on a visit back to Rossall he,

‘walked into the dining hall – that superb looking building – and that smell hit me! It was the same

smell. It was ling! Do you remember ling? Who eats ling today!? It’s a revolting kind of fish. But

ling…eugh.’

But the food was not always so dire. In the Lammas Term of 1944, when the boys had to stay up

over the summer holidays in Rossall because of the bombing in London (see below), Mr Reeve

remembered the silver-lining to this hardship: ‘they brought in this Italian chef from the hotel. Aah!

[Sighing in happy recollection.] We ate like fighting cocks. You’d never seen anything like it, honestly

the food! We couldn’t believe it! How could it be like that yesterday and it’s like this now! It was

fantastic. You know, beautiful cakes, everything!’

Lammas term

From 5 July-8 September 1944, 118,000 children were evacuated to areas of safety because of the

new threat of flying bombs147

. The Board of Education asked HMIs to encourage local education

authorities in the reception areas to arrange activities for the evacuees ‘during the forthcoming

summer hols… The schools were to be kept open if at all possible’.148

The Alleyn’s boys at Rossall

were duly discouraged from returning to London so stayed on at Rossall over the summer. At the

reunion, Mr Halford brought the letter which was sent to parents explaining what the Lammas Term

was:

Lammas Term is the name of the period that we’ve given from August the 1st to September the 7th

[1944]. We are working rather differently in the hours of the school. We have increased the variety in

every boy’s activities outside the classroom without sacrificing important periods. The boys have

responded very well indeed and not losing heart.’

Some boys, ‘under the charge of Mr Smith, spent a week at Langdale in the Lake District’149

. Mr

Reeve remembered the gym being open all the time for their use.

Out-houses

It was just after this Lammas Term that our boys had to move again. The North West was being

recognised as a safe place to send children and so Rossall became an attractive prospect for parents

who wished to send their boys to boarding school. In September 1944, following the Ministry of

Health’s announcement that it planned to suspend the general evacuation scheme, Alleyn’s

announced its intention to return to London. Rossall therefore offered places to some 324 senior

school boys for the September term of 1944 but then it became apparent that Hitler was not yet

finished in London. He countered the success of the allied invasion of Normandy with a vicious

campaign of V1 and V2 rocket attacks on the capital.

This meant that it was not safe for Alleyn’s to return after all, which caused a serious overcrowding

problem at Rossall. The not entirely satisfactory solution was that Alleyn’s had to give up Spread

Eagle and Rose as boarding houses and move to hotels in Fleetwood.150

147

Gosden, p60 148

Memorandum to Inspectors, 22 July, 1944, quoted in Gosden, p60 149


44

This marked Eric Buisson’s (C 1941-49) favourite time at Rossall: ‘the period when we were billeted

in a small hotel at Thornton Cleveleys on the promenade by the sea. We had to walk along the

promenade every morning and return every evening to go for lessons at Rossall School.’ These

hotels were referred to by the magazine editors as ‘out-houses’. Upbeat to the end, they reported:

We soon adapted ourselves to the unusual and exacting routine which this change necessitated, and

by next term we shall have made ourselves very comfortable. The promise of a speedy return to

London had greatly helped us to bear difficulties with a light heart, but the hope of our return in April

will serve no less to ease our burdens in the coming term, and we are confident that we shall make a

success of it.151

They were not to return to Dulwich’s ‘promised land’ until March 1945.

Return

And cheery to the end, ‘Shy’ writes of Alleyn’s departure from Rossall:

Rossall fades but

Often in our minds we remember.

Never to be forgotten:

Sunshine, breeze, and darkness,

Wind, rain, and happiness.

Towers red, chapel grey,

And friendships made.

Four years passed,

Four years of life.

Wasted? No!

Worth it? Yes!152

Hall House [Dutton’s & Brown’s] wrote as its final magazine piece:

Now we close the book. We have had our moments, we have fought our battles. On looking back at

the Hall with its music, its hopes for the future, its garden, its ‘maniac nights’, its committee, its

importations, its boxing, its exile and, throughout, its maintained individuality and struggle, we

consider its darker days and survey with satisfaction its ultimo triumph, and we advised convincedly

‘Rebus angustis animosus atque fortis appare’153

.

After six years in exile, Alleyn’s came back to a building occupied by strangers. Since March 1940, the

South London Emergency Secondary School (SLESS) had been using the buildings on Townley Road.

Roy Barnes wrote that ‘half SLESS's complement of staff and pupils were Alleyn's remainders and

integrating them back into the body of people returning from Rossall that autumn was far from

easy’154

. In the valete for Hudson, the writer remarked that on Hudson’s promotion to headmasterial

150


EAM, March 1945, p146 152

Ibid, July 1945, p188 153

Ibid, July 1945, p173; ‘Wisely show yourself spirited and resolute when perils press you.’ (Horace) 154

Barnes, p96

45

duties: ‘A task of major proportions faced him in welding together some 150 boys who returned

from Rossall with the 500 boys of the South London Emergency Secondary School’155

.

The boys weren’t the only strangers: masters returned from the Forces and were unknown to both

sets of boys. Equally, these masters did not know where the boys had spent the war years.

In his notes for the first assembly back at the Alleyn’s building, Allison ended his speech with hopes

for an end to the war:

We are all awaiting momentous news. That may interrupt with two days of public holiday.

Therefore get down to the job efficiently – learn your way about – find out where you should be –

make yourself useful.

You have all something to give to Alleyn’s.

If you give it this Trinity Term 1945 will be the happy and successful one that I wish you all.

On Mr Stewart’s return from Rossall he was surprised by the SLESS boys’ difference in attitude to the

School:

I was only 11 or 12 at Rossall, so at a very young age, but as I said everything revolved around the

School. After being back here, there was that feeling of loyalty to the School. So come four o’clock, my

best mate at the time – a chap called Bob Bedford, we used to stand at the gate and people used to

come out and we’d say, ‘where are you going?’ They’d say, ‘we’re going home,’ and we’d say ‘well,

what about going to this society or why don’t you do that?’

We found it difficult to understand that there was, in a way, another life outside the School, by

comparison with the 24-hour day that we had had at Rossall. And that was the feeling for the school,

really. No matter whether it was sport, or any society, or drama, it was… we found it difficult to

understand that they didn’t look at it the same way, when you came back here. Because the School,

SLESS, it represented a number of schools, didn’t it – it wasn’t just Alleyn’s – so it showed how much…

the school meant to us.

For Mr Halford, Rossall stood him in good stead for joining the forces: ‘I noticed that the big

difference was when I joined the army, because it was such a surprise to me that so many people of

my company there were homesick because they’d never been away from home before.’

The Rossall years were not to be easily forgotten. At Founder’s Day in 1949, there was an exhibition

of photographs under the title ‘Dulwich and Rossall’ held in the Library. The magazine editors

reported that ‘it was great fun to see again the scenes which were so familiar to us. You could always

tell those that had been to Rossall, because their conversations invariably began with “do you

remember…?”.’ 156

155



46

The South London Emergency Secondary School:

a strange child of the war��

Emergency schools

As we have seen, the Alleyn’s pupils whose families wished them to join the School’s official

evacuation to a reception area (Maidstone) went in September 1939. However, not all pupils left

Dulwich.

Andrew Marr points out in his book The Making of Modern Britain that, in fact, ‘fewer than half

those eligible to be evacuated actually went. Many refused to believe the imminence of the threat.

Other families decided that, if they were to be killed, they preferred to die together.’157

The

government felt it had a duty to provide an education for those children remaining in the evacuated

areas – but it didn't want to undermine its evacuation scheme. An announcement was made in the

Houses of Lords and Commons on 1 November 1939 that some of the schools in the evacuated areas

would be re-opened. However, the government emphasised the need for local education authorities

and teachers 'to use all their influence to prevent the return of children from reception areas.'158

SLESS

We entered only by the North stair and did not use the top floor (though it was sometimes explored –

there was a stuffed tiger up there).159

Alleyn’s School historian and SLESS-boy himself, Arthur Chandler (Bn 1941-48), explained what had

been happening to those Alleyn’s boys left behind:

Masters and others had educated those not evacuated in private houses and local halls. Henderson

felt that the boys in London should have a proper education and sent Hack and Tyson to re-open the

Alleyn’s building. This was undertaken not only to educate Alleyn’s boys who wished to remain in

London but also, in conjunction with the London County Council Education Department, to offer a

Grammar School education to others whose schools were evacuated but did not themselves wish to

leave London. SLESS kept Alleyn’s buildings alive.160

And so, ‘March 18th

, 1940, saw parents entering their boys as members of the South London

Emergency Secondary School, a strange child of the war.’161

Alan Thomas (SLESS 1940-41)

remembered his first day at the SLESS:

It was chaotic – there were boxes, we were given things to identify our ‘House’ – a new concept for

me! I can just about remember I was assigned to Allison House. The first days at SLESS were scary – I’d

been away from normal education for perhaps a year – and I thought of it as a public school. My

brother had been to Alleyn’s itself for some years, and I’d gained an impression of rigour! The notion

of Latin and sports appeared daunting…. It was war-time, an emergency, disorganisation and changes

were accepted. But it was a pleasant sort of chaos – interesting, novel, unpredictable.

157


Board of Education circular, 1483, 11 November 1939, quoted in Gosden, p22 159

Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48) 160

Chandler, p79 161

EAM, July 1945, p176

47

Regular reports from SLESS (written by ‘T’; perhaps Charles Tyson?) began in the magazine from June

1940, where it justified its appearance amongst the magazine’s pages:

Once a term the call of late has rung out in Maidstone, to be echoed in Deal, and now it is heard again

from older haunts. The S.L.E.S.S., recruited and commissioned at headquarters, is thriving and

developing. On the rolls there are members of 17 schools, and 11 Masters from six schools, but since

Alleyn’s is represented by some 70 strong, we are pleased to be allowed to appear in the Edward

Alleyn Magazine. Yes, there are fellows here from all the Alleyn Houses as well as the Junior School,

and most of them have come back from ‘Somewhere in England’…. There were no books, no

stationery, no rules, no tradition, everyone new to the game, whereas now, after a short four weeks,

the visitor will find a smoothly working school. We are not yet by any means satisfied, but hope to

improve in many ways. There will be no cricket this summer, for we have neither the equipment nor

the ability to do the game justice. All the same, there will be no lack of exercise and relaxation, since

we are to have swimming, physical training, basket ball, and base-ball. The buildings, which looked so

forlorn and deserted when we came, are now living again. It is indeed very pleasant to see our fields

looking so green and fat, and rest is surely a fine thing for them…. Our elms have gone162

and the

planes along the crescent have been pollarded, so the view from the library is rather different. Still,

there is a feeling that our old grounds are inviting inspection – they are looking well…. The old place,

always the same place, is awaiting the return of its real owners, and in the meantime, as an advance

guard, we hope we are doing something, not only for ourselves, but also in preparation for the happy

day when we shall all be together again.163

The country’s emergency school-system had become well-established by the end of July 1940 with

152,000 pupils on the rolls of 605 schools. Back in Dulwich, in 1941 there were 240 boys on the

SLESS roll (of whom 114 were Alleyn’s boys), and by May 1944 there were 460 (‘Alleyn’s forming the

larger half’164

). By the end of the war, SLESS was – in comparison with Alleyn’s at Rossall where

numbers never rose above 200 – the much larger school.

Fluctuating rolls

Numbers on the SLESS roll fluctuated throughout the period. Chandler explained that:

Throughout the war there had been a slow but continuous two-way traffic of boys – some wanted to

‘go home’ and therefore returned to Dulwich with education at Townley Road, a few ‘did not like the

bombs’ and left London for Rossall. By 1944 Alleyn’s numbers in Lancashire had declined

considerably.165

In areas where the bombing had been severe, school attendance dropped to a very low level. In

Southwark it varied from 0 to 5%. In secondary schools attendance varied from 10% to 50%

depending on the area.166

Defying these statistics, the magazine noted in June 1941 that ‘our

average attendance [is] nearly 100%,’ which was ‘much better, we are told, than that of any other of

our emergency schools.’167

Towards the end of 1941, SLESS was beginning to feeling confident in

itself:

162

Chandler writes that these were ‘felled by a blast’, p79 163

EAM, June 1940, p351 164

Ibid, May 1944, p100 165

Chandler, p76 166

Gosden, p41 167


48

This despatch from the South-eastern front finds us more firmly established than ever. The word

‘emergency’ has almost ceased to have any significance for us and we are more and more inclined to

consider ourselves a well-established school. This is inevitable since there are now so many boys

attached to us from schools which they have never known; at the same time we do try hard to

prepare for the day when each shall return to his own, and we hope that no boy will be the worse for

the time he spends in these emergency surroundings. Traditions and customs have formed and grown

with us as they do in schools. The House system is strongly rooted and discipline is based largely on an

efficient body of prefects, whilst the life of the school has so well developed that masters and boys

this term agreed that we should have a School Captain. AK Cooper (Tn) has been elected to this

office.’168

War in Dulwich

War was ever-present. The magazine related that ‘School work is done in the form-rooms, the

shelters and at home, with many of the boys showing courage and determination in carrying on

when they might readily be excused for letting things drift’169

. Ron Smale (B 1940-46) remembered

that

School was conducted, as far as possible, in a normal fashion. The spirit of ‘Carry on Britain’ was

generally upheld. Many masters still wore gowns; for the boys strict, respective school uniforms with

caps were enforced; and football and cricket continued to be played, despite arriving one morning to

discover a big bomb crater adjacent to the top-side pitch. Time was lost to air-raids, when we retired

to the basement, and maths lessons with ‘Teddy’ Eayrs were forsaken, on occasions, in the pursuit of

digging for victory on the corner of the playing fields.

Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) remembered the war-time disruptions at SLESS:

for a short period the school’s opening time varied depending upon whether or not there had been a

raid the night before. As we came from a very wide area and the sirens were not necessarily sounded

across it, this proved not to be very practical. I usually biked to school with a friend ‘Eddie’ Edwards,

who lived nearby but he was seldom ready and often we arrived only just in time. Fortunately he was

also late on the morning of 12th July 1944. At about the moment we should have been going along

Gallery Road, a flying bomb dropped near the Dulwich Picture Gallery, causing it serious damage.

Luckily, we were late that morning.170

Archly wagging his finger, Chandler declared that in spite of these disruptions, ‘academic work was,

however, the main reason for attendance and this was not forgotten. On some days more lessons

would be taken in the basement (the air-raid shelter) than in the classroom, owing to enemy air

activity.’171

Mr Cox explained the air-raid drill for our pupil-interviewers:

During a raid the Form Captain sat nearest the door at the front and the Vice-Captain at the back at

the diagonal corner; when the siren went – whether there was a master there or not – the Form

Captain led the way out and the Vice-Captain closed the door, it was emphasised that he had to shut

the door.

168


Ibid, November 1940, pp394-95 170


Chandler, p79

49

The ‘Carry on Britain’ spirit which Mr Smale recalled even extended to exams. Chandler gave an

unbelievable account of the boys taking their General School Certificate which: ‘was undertaken in

the most unusual conditions, bombs dropping and lights failing. Twenty-four took the exam, 14

obtained Matriculation exemption and five the Certificate.’172

The magazine possibly hinted to this

cohort when it reported ‘The first event of importance during the term was the news of our very

creditable results in the General School Examination and we are pleased to record our

congratulations to the boys who obtained the certificate…’ mysteriously adding: ‘they will not

readily forget this examination, for reasons known to them and all of us’173

.

Staff

Of the staff at SLESS, Professor Pat Harvey (1940-46) wrote asking

If only something could be done to mark the way a number of very senior Alleyn’s staff kept SLESS

classes running so successfully all through the bombing of London. I am thinking of stalwarts like Mr

Rudd, Mr Hutt and above all of course, Mr Tyson. His name may be kept alive as the name of a House,

but has his service as Head of the emergency school ever been properly honoured? He provided

leadership in incredibly difficult circumstances. What other Head ever had to organise his prefects

into gathering up the abundant harvest of sharp shell splinters, all to be picked up from the playing

fields before games could safely continue?

Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45) thought that ‘many of the staff had passed retirement date to cover for

the younger men who had been called-up into the services’. Teachers were in short supply and many

were persuaded to come out of retirement, such as Messrs Eayrs, Evans, Hack, Hutt, McClymont,

Rudd, Wright. Even women were being admitted to teach and SLESS introduced the first female

teacher to Townley Road: the inestimable Dora Wiggs (see p78). The magazine editors rather

gauchely reported in 1942 that ‘we are to have another lady [Miss GC Gaukrodger ] to teach us Art,

which means that with Mrs Bell, the Headmaster’s Secretary, there will be three ladies working with

us – it all seems so natural, nobody minds!’174

Activities of SLESS

SLESS, like its Alleyn’s progenitor, was divided into eight houses; these were all named after Alleyn’s

masters: McClymont’s, Fowler’s, Wright’s, Allison’s, Evan’s, Crewe’s, Bryant’s, Rudd’s. It also

replicated many of Alleyn’s clubs and societies, such as the Forum Club [a debating society]; one of

its interesting debates which I would have loved to hear was the motion ‘That co-education would

benefit Alleyn’s School’ [note Alleyn’s, not SLESS]175

– the motion was defeated.

Whilst their Alleyn’s brothers based in the north regularly trod the boards with school productions,

the tradition of drama and music did not wither in these SLESS years. The magazine reviewed an end

of term concert, stating

we had a very successful concert when a long and varied programme seemed to give great pleasure

to a large audience…. Mr Wright gave us an amusing recitation and Mr Rudd, besides taking us in his

172

Ibid 173

EAM, March 1945, p149 174



50

own way down to the West Country, supplied all the piano-forte accompaniments in a way which

went far to make the concert a success.176

Jim French (R 1941-46) wrote of the prohibitions enforced on the boys:

We were not allowed to use playing cards. However, there were other card games with four suits of

13 cards – one was Sexton Blake, which featured pictures of heroes and villains, including Gaspard

Stepponit, a get-away driver, and Belisha, which featured 52 scenic places on a trip from London to

Oban. With these packs it was possible to play the sinful game of Solo! In that 1943 summer holiday

some of us would turn up to play football at school, morning and afternoon, every weekday….177

Ian Smith (R 1942-49) said that ‘during the war years there was hardly any sport played’. Recounting

the differences between the school at Rossall and SLESS, Robert Young claimed that SLESS

‘disregarded the compulsory system of games that Alleyn's at Rossall set such store on’178

. As we

have seen, this lack was alluded to in the very first report about SLESS in the magazine – ‘There will

be no cricket this summer, for we have neither the equipment nor the ability to do the game

justice’179

. This was probably due to the fact the grounds had been requisitioned for the purposes of

growing much-needed food. In 1941, the magazine reporters described a bucolic scene in Dulwich,

albeit with touches of war-time detail:

Late in the term we made a praiseworthy effort to play cricket… The surroundings were completely

rural, so that we had some old-fashioned village cricket, the enjoyable game we used to dream about

whilst watching the stately parade of peace-time. The school gardeners busy with their cabbages,

potatoes, beans, etc.; a haystack in the corner where our elms used to stand; happy laughter mingled

with cheers and applause coming from somewhere in the middle of the meadow; over the road a

dozen horses and ponies grazing in a paddock where it now seems impossible that any cricket ever

could have been played’ – that is the picture. Under the circumstances the cricket was surprisingly

good. 180

A year later games are resumed and ‘there was enthusiasm on all sides and we heard once more the

crack of the Fives ball, the thump of the football,’ along with a chorus provided by the ever-present

gardeners: ‘and the ring of spades in the garden…’181

Food

The boys stayed at School to eat their lunch – in 1944, some 300 boys are listed as staying for school-

lunch. Mr French was perhaps referring to the British Restaurant at Heber Road School (see p19)

when he wrote that at SLESS the

School lunches originally cost 4d, the price of a wartime loaf of bread that was mid-way between

white and brown. I think they later went up to 5d. Most of the school used to traipse along Townley

Road to Heber Road School on the other side of Lordship Lane. The food was not too bad for wartime

– but we were not gourmets then. Occasionally some of us opted for 3d-worth of chips at a shop off

176

Ibid, January 1943, p11 177

Arthur’s SLESS, p19 178

Young, p196 179

EAM, June 1940, p351 180



51

Heber Road. Later our lunches were provided at the British Restaurant at Grafton Hall in Village Way,

halfway to Herne Hill.’ 182

Mr French described the daily doling out of milk at the School:

Free milk was provided in the Tin Tab[ernacle], a two-classroom, WW1 corrugated-roof building on

the lower (east) side of the Quad which was much smaller than today. Many chaps did not drink their

milk which was provided in one-third pint bottles. One day I drank seven bottles in my break.’ 183

Other schools at SLESS

John Williams (R 1943-49) listed some of the other schools which were represented at SLESS: ‘there

was St Dunstan’s, Battersea Grammar, Wilson’s, Haberdashers’ Aske’s and others’, adding that ‘each

school wore their own uniform’. At this distance of years, it seems as this mix could have been a

disaster but John Merrill (R 1942-48) emphasised that, rather, ‘the classroom was full of boys from

all sorts of schools and it didn’t make any sort of difference, we seemed to get on.’ Ian Smith (R

1942-49) elaborated:

We all came from different backgrounds as you can imagine, but got on well together. We were all

members of SLESS, our parents, our fathers were in the war, just one big happy family really.

This friendliness at SLESS was often referred to by our visitors. Gordon Feeley (SLESS 1941-50, a

Strand School boy) told us ‘...the friendliness of the school really helped me settle in. The teachers

were new and the pupils were new – especially in 1940 when it had just started – so I enjoyed the

whole school.’ He recalled that

when I walked in on my first day, a boy asked me if I’d like to play chess. He had the only chess board

and that was when I played my first game of chess… we were always doing things so it was exciting to

be alive and doing things in those days.

A model for the comprehensive school?

One effect of women returning to work to combat the war-time shortage of labour, was the

introduction of holiday clubs to look after children. It was also hoped that these would occupy older

school children and prevent juvenile delinquency; in fact, these clubs were poorly attended: only

10% of secondary school children attended, and more often it was below 5%184

. One such holiday

club took place at SLESS in 1943. Charles Tyson in the magazine heralded this new initiative:

The Easter Holidays were somewhat extended and in response to the wishes of the Board of

Education and the London County Council we arranged to use the School premises for a Holiday Club.

Curiously, and given what was to come with the LCC’s push for comprehensive schools, Tyson

naïvely added: ‘As an educational and social experiment this was a definite success and may easily

lead to more ambitious things.’185

182

Arthur’s SLESS, p18 183

Ibid, pp18-19 184

Gosden, p118 185

EAM, May 1943, p35

52

Professor Leinster-Mackay (D 1943-50) suggests that SLESS, with its large number of pupils

‘combined with the sheer heterogeneity of SLESS might be seen as suggestive of future English

comprehensive schools where the numbers are large and the background of pupils very varied.’186

Certainly, with the benefit of hindsight, it does look as though some officials from the LCC were

keeping a watchful eye on SLESS at Alleyn’s in the context of the educational reforms for a post-war

Britain which were being energetically debated at the time.

End of the war

Against many odds, SLESS at Alleyn’s survived the war despite the challenges of fluctuating rolls,

bombing raids on South London, the shortage of staff and equipment. Between 15 June and 2

September 1944, London saw one of its secondary schools completely destroyed, 10 damaged and

11 reported minor damage. It was in this flying bomb period that SLESS suffered its one casualty:

Bruce Cox’s best friend, Peter Jenkyn:

He was about the closest friend I had at school. We were 16, in the same form, and were fellow

members of the OTC and the scouts. Thus, we did many things together and during the summer

holiday of 1944 it was agreed that on the 31st July I would go to his home at 32 Lovelace Road,

Dulwich, to play with his train set (I did not have one).

For a reason I cannot now recall, I went for a bike ride with another friend… on the agreed day. A

flying bomb hit the Jenkyns’ house full on and Peter and his mother were blown to pieces.187

In March 1945, the Alleyn’s boys at Rossall returned to Townley Road. It was a strange and

unsettling time. Despite SLESS being by far the larger school at this point – ‘we have for the moment

over 600’188

– the Rossalleyn’s boys were seen as the conquering heroes returning as ‘ex-public

school boarding school boys’ to their promised land, a promised land in buildings which the SLESS

boys had only tenanted. Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) described how

Away went many friends made over the previous six years and in came others soon to become

equally firm friends until I left Alleyn’s in 1950.189

Mr Williams bitterly remembered how the Rossalleyn’s boys

monopolised everything here. CR Allison was the Headmaster at Rossall… and Tyson was the

Headmaster here at SLESS, and when Allison came back he took over from Tyson, and everything was

based on the Rossall principle and the people – the whole of 1st XI cricket and football, and it may

have been the same in other things, was made up of people at Rossall. I went up to Terry Garret and

said “I think this is wrong” and he said “well you can have a trial” and I immediately got into the

cricket side, but it was quite difficult, and there was in my mind a bias towards Rossall people.

Mr Rodway – and others – remembered the injustice in that all ‘the SLESS school prefects were

demoted to House prefects, apart from one, which was AC “Basher” Bate’.

186

DLM p35 187


EAM, July 1945, p166 189

Arthur’s SLESS, p22

53

It must be remembered that SLESS was an amazing achievement and one of which to be proud:

during its existence, 36 masters and mistresses had been on the staff roll and over 1,200 boys from

24 schools had benefitted from its instruction.190

So let us leave the final words on SLESS to its Headmaster, Charles Tyson:

Our last service of dismissal in the School Hall was a solemn and sincere business for all. Cheers and

rejoicing were naturally out of place, but, mixed with regret, there was a note of satisfaction both in

the knowledge of a job well done and in the resolve to put forth every effort to help in the days of

reconstruction which lie ahead.191

190

Chandler, p84 191

Ibid, p85

54

‘Their own devices’�

�‘We have now settled down in our new surroundings and have so many occupations that it is difficult

to record them all. During last term we played football, had House runs, or played Fives when the

weather permitted. When out-of-door activities were not possible, our spare time was spent playing

table tennis, or chess, or other of the indoor games of which we have a plentiful supply. Also we have

a large library in our play room, the books of which have been contributed by the House Master or

the boys. It will be seen that there is no need for any boy to spend a dull moment.’ Edward Alleyn

Magazine, June 1941, pp437-38

With a parent’s hat on I would hope that by reading this report (by the Junior School) about the

range of activities on offer to my child who had been evacuated (indefinitely it seemed), its words

would indeed reassure me. At Rossall, Alleyn’s managed to continue all the sports and clubs which

were previously held in London. It even expanded its range of activities.

The list of clubs which operated in the 1940s is a long one: Bear Pit, Chess Club, Fifty Club, Forum

Club, Middle School Club, Model Society, Modern Language Society, Natural History Club, Record

Club, Scientific Society, Stamp Club. The inspectors of 1950 remarked on this range: ‘The Clubs cater

for many tastes. They embrace many aspects of cultural life’192

. Some of these were recalled by our

AOBs whilst others had their activities diligently recorded in the magazine.

Even before reaching Rossall, some of the boys had put together a club for those billeted in Sandling

in Kent. The Auld Barn Klubb’s function was ‘to lighten the dark evenings,’ and it reported its

autumnal activities as ‘Pinga-Ponga, Singa-Songa’.193

Table tennis and singing continued at Rossall.

Now ‘all the boys’ waking hours belonged to the School’ (what joy for RBH!). There were additional

activities such as gardening and ‘Dig for Victory’, ably inspired by VK Haslam. Much more drama was

organised in which the Headmaster himself often took a leading role. These were peaceful

occupations and helped to fill in weekends, holidays and even evenings after prep.194

Fifty Club and Bear Pit

The School’s debating society the Fifty Club was a mainstay of occupation for the older boys and for

‘those who attended [it] came away with present trials far from their minds.’195

As reported in

‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, the Fifty Club is an excellent barometer showing what was uppermost in the

boys’ thoughts at the time. In 1942, they debated the motion that ‘There has been no substantial

progress in education during the last fifty years,’ perhaps in response to the post-war plans which

were being made for education at the time. The motion was ‘rejected by the House’.196

A year later,

another interesting debate was ‘that this House envies its grandparents, and pities its

grandchildren…. The House finally defeated the motion, and was left rather with the impression that

192

HMI Report, 1950, p20 193


Chandler, p73 195

EAM, March 1942, p523 196

Ibid

55

it pitied both grandparents and grandchildren, and envied itself.’197

And this, a conclusion from boys

who were enduring war and living far away from their families at home.

After the war the Fifty Club resumed at Dulwich and the debates continued their topical tone. In

1947 the Club debated ‘whether it was better for the Government of a country to have a small well-

educated section of the population or to have the whole population half-educated.’ Hot topic indeed

and one particularly pertinent to Alleyn’s given its state of limbo in terms of the School’s status. In

this discussion, the ‘advocates of a small well-educated minority led by the oligarchic Mr B___ were

successful, after an interesting debate.’198

The boys were quite capable of silly debates. There is one amusing account of an ‘Airship Debate’:

Nobody knows how ‘Little Miss Muffet’ and ‘His Satanic Majesty’ happened to be on the same ship,

nor Frankenstein and Mr Bevin. The latter’s rather sorry appeal as the hero of British youth and the

bribe of important posts in the Ministry of Labour did not gain much approval, and Hitler’s ravings fell

upon cynical ears. However, Father Neptune and Frankenstein… found most favour among their

fellow passengers and were awarded book prizes.199

The masters were capable of being silly too:

Perhaps the most memorable incident [of term] was Mr G__er [Goldner?] admitting to sleepless

nights in endeavouring to invent a Heath Robinson machine for producing Blackpool rock.200

Mr Goldner probably appeared in this account of a Brains Trust held by the Fifty Club where

participants were ‘recruited from the Staff. The President [Mr RHD Young] amused the Club by

introducing Mr G___r as the representative of the fourth dimension, and Mr Jo___s as that of steam.

The battle raged furiously for one and half hours, over questions ranging from beans and bath water

to the supremacy of Oxford and Cambridge. The President intervened to avoid bloodshed, and

closed a most enjoyable evening.’201

It is interesting to note that the SLESS equivalent of the Fifty Club, the ‘Forum Club’ was

incorporated into the Fifty Club when the schools merged after March 1945.

Another way the boys spent their evenings at Rossall was attendance at the Bear Pit.

We set up the Bear Pit which was a play-reading society…. I was a founder-member of the Bear Pit

and I can remember now some of the plays which we read then. A very good way of spending a

Saturday evening or a Sunday afternoon in winter-time.202

The Bear Pit had been instigated in October 1940. The magazine reported that its name ‘caused

some controversy, but eventually the name ‘The Bear Pit’ was chosen for its connection with

197

Ibid, May 1943, p44 198

Ibid, June 1947, p355 199

Ibid, May 1944, p108 200



David Alexander (B 1932-44)

56

Elizabethan amusements in general and Edward Alleyn in particular, and it did not set too narrow a

limit to the activities of the Society’203

. The Pit had the blessing of Headmaster Allison:

He was a very active supporter of the ‘Bear Pit’ Club, of which Mrs Allison was the president [‘chair

bear’]. This was a club or society that held frequent cultural evenings of play reading, poetry reading

and debates.204

Efforts by Bear Pit members to re-establish the Pit on the School’s return to London were in vain:

‘owing to the bustle and hurried flurry of a civilised community the denizens found it too much for

them. Perhaps we bears find the atmosphere too soporific and the tendency is to hibernate.’205

Middle School Club

The Middle School Club was a version of the Fifty Club but for younger members – those below the

Fifth Form. It was set up by Allison in 1940 and its ‘meetings included play-readings, a mock-trial, a

penny-reading, impromptu speeches, and an Entertainment Night.’206

Other activities included whist

drives, balloon debates, dumb crambo207

, charades and plays. On one occasion, Rossall master, Capt

Johnson ‘came one Sunday evening to entertain us with the “true” ghost story of Rossall. This was

heard in candlelight and proved the most popular meeting of the term.’208

I wonder how many boys

slept well that night?

Stamp Club

The School’s Stamp Club reporters noted that ‘If there is one thing that bad weather favours, it is the

indoor hobby. With plenty of such encouragement this term it is not surprising that the stamp club

has flourished.’ This club proved to be a joint Alleyn’s-Rossall venture, even acquiring the name

‘Rossalleyns Stamp Club’. One old Rossallian, a Mr JW Frost, gave a lecture on European Stamps

during the War in 1945. Alleyn Old Boys also contributed to the collecting efforts of the Stamp Club:

We received many gifts of stamps, among which is a packet of ‘Penny Reds’ from CJR Jackson, AOB,

provided us with an interesting afternoon, spent in examining the idiosyncrasies of these stamp

varieties, many of which were rare.209

AOBs took an active interest in the Rossalleyns Stamp Club sending it ‘good wishes, practical

suggestions and a contribution to the Stock Book, for all of which we are most grateful. We are

always glad to hear from Old Boys, and even to exchange with them by post if their wants are not

too ambitious.’210

The club ran auctions, quizzes, competitions and exhibitions – in its first exhibition

the stamp collectors pored over ‘a sheet of Hitler stamps’. One ‘R Cooney’, the later playwright, was

listed as having tied for the second and third prize in the Stamp Club’s Junior Section competition211

.

203

EAM, March 1941, p416 204

DLM, p12 205

EAM, November 1945, p214. The Bear Pit has since been revived at Alleyn’s and flourishes today. 206


A guessing game, similar to charades in which players act out or mime words that rhyme with a clue word. 208

Ibid, May 1944, p109 209

Ibid, March 1945, p158 210

Ibid, March 1942, p519 211

Ibid, November 1943, p68; Ray Cooney OBE, playwright and actor; his biggest success, Run for your Wife ran

for nine years in London’s West End.

57

The club was able to report that ‘cold may come and sunshine go, but those who follow the hobby of

stamp collecting pursue it with unflagging vigour, whatever the season,’212

and, whilst none of our

AOB-visitors mentioned stamp collecting at our reunion, in 1944 the Club was boasting that ‘one in

six of our population now attends’.213

Modern Languages Club

Some of the clubs had an educational value as well as being a means to occupy cold, dark winter

nights, for example, the Modern Languages Club and the Scientific Society. WJ Smith gave a ‘Lantern

Lecture on Italy’ to the members of the Modern Languages Club:

We had secured the loan of some 30 slides from the LCC, and with these, aided by his personal

memories, Mr Smith kept a large audience keenly interested for an hour and a half.

As if justifying its existence, the club’s reporters stressed ‘this aspect of the [Modern Languages]

Club’s activity’ in war-time

as we can no longer visit continental countries and acquaint ourselves at first hand with their

buildings and scenery, it is the next best thing to be shown these by people who have been there.

Studying Modern Languages means not merely acquiring a knowledge of language and literature, it

means an attempt to penetrate into the civilisation of foreign peoples, and we are helped greatly in

this aim by seeing their architecture and their national treasures.214

Scientific Society

The School’s Scientific Society was revived at Alleyn’s and met during the winter months. Its first

meeting was chaired by Allison and they discussed the connections between science and the

humanities. The members heard lectures about vibrations in airscrews, plastics, iron and steel, the

mathematical universe and synthetic rubber. They also watched films, one of which was Gearwheels:

the Society was in general, amazed at the theoretical and practical principles to be considered in the

manufacture of such a seemingly simple object as a cog-wheel.215

The Junior School’s Natural History Society was put on the spot by Form IIIB’s discovery of an 18-inch

grass snake in the school’s grounds.

Surely this must be a very rare occurrence for Alleyn’s – we cannot remember one being recorded

before. The intrepid Form Master of IIIC [Mr Wright?] seized with his handkerchief and followed by a

host of awed and admiring naturalists, brought it in for identification.216

Model Society

A new club set up at Rossall was the Alleyn Model Society. It was ‘formed for the stimulation of

interest in the construction and operation of models’. It is amazing this got off the ground at all

given the huge shortage of materials at the time. Lack of materials or not, the society was

212

Ibid, March 1942, p519 213



Ibid, May 1943, p43 216


58

oversubscribed and ‘it was decided that a separate branch should be formed to cater for all those

bent on aeroplane construction. In this way a large aircraft club was started….’217

For the ship-modellers, the club suggested: ‘a visit to the Fleetwood pond, which is situated on the

sea front, and is a fine model boating lake.’ Perhaps as an offshoot of these modelling activities, toy-

making classes were started. ‘Under the guidance of Mr Waters there has been a toy-making class

throughout the term. The toys made have been sold and the proceeds given to charity.218

Chess

The boys also took up chess to while away the hours. The Junior School highly recommended the

game as ‘of great value to them as a leisure time occupation.219

The boys even entered the Inter-

Schools Tournament of the British Chess Correspondence Association.220

Chess as an activity continued after the return to Townley Road. Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) wrote,

We were even allowed to play chess [in the Library]. I remember one day playing in a simultaneous

game, where the New Zealand champion, Robert Wade221

, who also won the British championship

twice, played about 30 of us at the same time. A hollow oblong of tables was arranged with us sitting

on the inside playing black, while the Grandmaster walked swiftly around the outside playing white

never pausing more than a second or two at each board. Of course he didn't lose a game, but two of

us, including me, managed to draw.222

His Majesty’s Inspectors looked approvingly on: ‘The [Chess] Club has a very large membership,

almost all the boys in the Lower School being enthusiastic chess players and many of them

exceptionally good players considering their age.’223

Gardening

As we have seen, the boys put their backs into the country’s ‘Dig for Victory’ effort.

It is pleasing to note the number of boys who are taking a keen and active interest in gardening.

Under Mr Haslam’s guidance, they have cultivated plots and produced vegetables which have been of

great value to the producers and their friends.224

The Junior School’s horticultural efforts under Mr Haslam continued after the war:

In addition to the fact that they are helping to produce something which is going to be useful, they

are also being well trained for the time when they grow up and have gardens of their own to

cultivate. They are fortunate in having such expert guidance.’225

217

Ibid, June 1941, p450 218


Ibid, May 1944, p100 220

Ibid, May 1943, p43 221

Robert Wade OBE (1921-2008), was a British chess player, writer, arbiter, coach, and promoter. He was

New Zealand champion three times, British champion twice, and played in seven Chess Olympiads and one

Interzonal tournament. Wade held the titles of International Master and International Arbiter. 222

Barnes, p99 223

HMIs’ report, p29 224

EAM, October 1941, p470

59

And in 1948, the gardeners crowed: ‘you should see our Runner Beans – the pride of all young

beginners’!226

Entertainments

There have also been films and plays and we were specially interested in the conjuring show given by

Captain Johnson (Rossall). At Half-Term we were taken to the Circus at Blackpool, an outing which we

thoroughly enjoyed.227

The boys were entertained with films and visits to the theatre. A cinema projector was purchased in

1942 and the magazine reported that it

was in great demand both for the entertainment of the school and for the instruction of the select

few interested in such things as Cathode Ray Oscillographs and Diesel Engines. As well as a varied

selection of Charlie Chaplin, the following full length films were shown: ‘King Solomon’s Mines’,

‘Rhodes of Africa’, ‘Owd Bob’, ‘Forever England’, ‘Frozen Limits’, ‘The Vicar of Bray’, ‘The Lady

Vanishes’. 228

Films were generally shown on Saturday evenings and were ‘eagerly looked forward to.’ One of the

films screened was The Scarlet Pimpernel with AOB Leslie Howard (T 1907-10) in it – but there’s no

mention of his Alleyn’s connection in the magazine229

.

The boys were even used as guinea pigs for films as in 1944, the Board of Education sent the School

some trial films school to find out if they were suitable for general presentation. ‘It was our task to

criticise, which we did most willingly!’230

At Christmas in 1942, the boys greased up and put on a show:

…the grand Christmas entertainment shone forth like a beacon to lighten our darkness. A committee

of miniature CB Cochrans231

was formed, and the resulting show was something unbelievable.

There were three parts: Circus, Drama and Pantomime.232

Visits were made to see the real circus at Blackpool – ‘the clowns were the funniest we have ever

seen’233

– and the pantomime – ‘was a real pleasure to see a stage play, and we enjoyed it very

much’.234

It is interesting that none of our AOBs recalled the theatre and circus visits but did remember the

sojourns into the countryside. Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) remembered,

225





Ibid, May 1943, pp41-42 230

Ibid, May 1944, p96 231

CB Cochran (1872-1951), English theatrical manager. He produced some of the most successful

musical revues, musicals and plays of the 1920s and 1930s. 232

EAM, March 1942, pp523-4 233

Ibid, March 1942, p507 234

Ibid, May 1943, p34

60

a couple of day-excursions for the more senior boys; one to Garstang and the Trough of Bowland, and

one to the Lake District where we climbed a modest mountain. On our descent, however, the weather

closed in and two of our number followed the wrong line of cairns and finished up in a village police

station far from the rest of us and had to be rescued the following day!

The magazine described how, on one of these excursions, ‘Mr G___r [Goldner?] again demonstrated

the agility worthy of an acrobat in jumping nimbly from rock to rock on the top of Scafell’.235

One

party who went to Ingleton had this sorry tale to relay:

It rained. Three coaches returned very soon to Lancaster and the shelter of a cinema, while the

remainder were steadfast in their resolve. A small but select party under the expert leadership of Mr

JA Taylor climbed to within 200 ft of the summit of Whernside, and other scattered bands roamed the

Yorkshire moors. We have never been wetter.236

Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) explained that trips were rare in the immediate period following the

Second World War, and John Hughes (C 1945-51) added that ‘there was little in the way of foreign

travel back in those days. However, in 1947, two lucky boys [P Walker & G Garrett] managed to join

a trip to ‘a Youth Rally at Rouen, in which children from all parts of Normandy took part. The French

Government kindly invited 50 London school children to attend this rally and two of us from Alleyn’s

were lucky enough to be chosen.’237

One of the first group trips beyond the White Cliffs of Dover was the First XI cricket and football

team tours to the Channel Islands to play Victoria College, Jersey and Elizabeth College, Guernsey. All

the visitors were accommodated in our family homes. Mr Barnes went on this trip and witnessed

some after-effects of the war:

The house I stayed in in St Helier had a black swastika painted outside the front door, which

somebody had unsuccessfully tried to remove with white paint. The Channel Islands were the only

part of the UK occupied by the Germans during the Second World War.... families who were deemed

to have collaborated with the Germans... often had swastikas painted on their houses... At the time I

had no idea what a swastika on the wall meant, and assumed it was something the Germans had

done to display their presence, rather like dogs with lamp-posts.238

The boys also caught a taste of industry after the war. A group of 18 members of the CCF visited

Ford’s Motor Works at Dagenham:

We travelled by lorry, in no great luxury, and arrived at 1.45pm. For the next three hours we toured

the factory and its grounds under the direction of an official guide. The tour was planned so that we

followed the course of a tractor and car from the arrival of the raw material up the Thames, to the

time when the finished vehicle was driven off the assembly-line ready for sale.239

‘JFM’ noted that, from the point of ‘the main assembly-line on which, beginning as a frame, a car,

lorry or van is completed in a little over 2 ¼ hours,’ adding:

235

Ibid, June 1941, p454 236

Ibid, May 1942, p531 237


Barnes, pp118-19 239


61

We left Dagenham very highly impressed by the efficiency, cleanliness and high standard of

production in the Works. Everyone of the workers we saw was doing one job well and not two jobs

fairly well which, it was pointed out, accounts for the fact that every vehicle, without exception, could

be driven off the assembly-line.240

Shooting

To my health and safety conscious-eyes, the fact that the School had a shooting range on its

premises in the 1940s is a trifle alarming. One of our pupil-interviewers asked her group about the

shooting at Alleyn’s.

Connie: I think you mentioned earlier that you did shooting competitions?

Mr Merrill: Yes, we had the ranges next door

Connie: I can’t imagine us having that now!

Mr Stewart: And there was Bisley. Bisley [home of UK’s National Rifle Association in Surrey] was a

very big thing. We used to do all right, didn’t we?

Mr Reeve: We did extremely well. I don’t think we ever won it, but we did well. In fact one of the old

boys was number one shot for Britain. His name was Philip Hall and he won the highly prestigious

Queen’s Prize…. Shooting was a big thing. We had a big Corps. We did lots of it. We went to School

competitions, and the next thing we’d go down to Bisley and be shooting against other schools. It was

very important.

As with many of the sports played at Alleyn’s, the School looked back to a pre-war glory. In the

magazine, it reported that

The reconstruction of the School’s shooting activities has been continued during the term…. It has not

yet been possible to have the stove in the range repaired, so excellent training has at least been given

for operations in Arctic theatres…. A number of possible shots have been discovered, but much

practice is needed before the pre-war standard is reached.241

As in athletics, AOBs were called on to help out in getting the pre-war standard back.

Liaison with the AOB Rifle Club has once again proved that those stalwarts are ready and anxious to

help the shooting of the school by coaching on both miniature and open ranges, and by repeating

their standing invitation to the School VII and masters to attend the Tuesday evening Club meetings

whenever they wish.242

Two years later, it didn’t appear that any trophies were going to be presented anytime soon to

Alleyn’s with night-time distractions such as this: ‘No prizes were awarded for the pillow fight that

took place one evening in the barrack room.’243

School activities

240

Ibid, p534 241


Ibid, June 1948, p454 243


62

We did pay at least lip service to Our Founder's wish that Godliness should come even before good

learning. On four days in the week the whole Upper School assembled for a 20 minute-service in the

school hall, while on the other two prayers were read by Housemasters in House assembly. On

Mondays the first period in the morning was Divinity, taught in Houses by House-masters and House

tutors, with the Thirds and Fourths reading the text of the Old Testament.244

Our AOBs remembered the day-to-day activities of the School, the assemblies, the journals, the

breaks and lunches.

Mr Williams: We met every morning for assembly.

Mr Rodway: And the prefect read the lesson. And we had a termly march to the chapel for a service.

Mr Smith: We had divinity lessons.

All: Yes, yes.

Mr Rodway: We had divinity lessons…

Mr Williams: First on Monday morning.

Mr Rodway: And if you got Steve Jenkins taking you on divinity lessons.

Mr Williams: You could talk about the supernatural –

Mr Rodway: Oh the black mass! He was very into the black masses. Very interesting divinity lessons,

far better than Soapy Hudson’s economics theories on Friday mornings.

Up at Rossall – not surprisingly for a school initially named ‘The Northern Church of England School’

– the Chapel looms large on its campus and accordingly played a key role in the lives of the boys.

After settling in, the magazine published ‘a list of the voluntary services held during the Advent Term

on Wednesday evenings.’ This was, it explained,

an experiment in communal worship; for the preparation and the conduct of the services were shared

between masters, boys and visitors. Recommendations were made by the School Committee at the

beginning of the term, and from the attendance at and the atmosphere of the services themselves,

they obviously corresponded to a genuine need. They were a source of strength and inspiration for

those who came, and their continuance has much to contribute to the building up of a stronghold of

Christian faith as the centre of the School’s life.245

The contribution of pupils was by no means a token gesture, DD Alexander, RJ Doubleday, PG

Philpott were all named as having given sermons in the Lent term of 1942. Headmaster Allison

instigated ‘Morning Quiet’ for the boys, explaining that:

…certain variations from the normal form of Morning Prayers have shown that within that daily ten

minutes may lie something of value for everyone. The practice of Morning Quiet, the few minutes of

dedication are the necessary prelude to a day in ‘the good life’, and by one of those great religious

paradoxes, only through discipline in such matters can we ‘stand fast… in the liberty wherewith Christ

hath made us free’.246

244

Young, p205 245

EAM, March 1942, p517 246


63

Bed-making

We are all becoming expert bed makers and the desire to produce the tidiest dormitory each day is

very keen.247

One innovation at Rossall was the bed-making competition within each House which appeared to be

eagerly adopted by the younger members of the School. In one issue of the magazine Roper’s

reported ‘The Dormitory Competition this term was won in January and February by Dormitory 3’.248

Desk inspections

For the boys based back at Townley Road, there were desk inspections. Derek Smith (R 1947-53)

remembered ‘we had desk inspections regularly and ink wells were topped up from time to time

which often became clogged up and stuck to your pen nib.’ Mr Barnes recalled the advantage of the

ink well in causing havoc:

…we all had individual desks, complete with inkwell, very convenient for putting carbide in and

making a stink, and pen with steel nib and wooden shaft….’249

Journal

Ian Smith (R 1942-49) brought in one of his school journals. Robert Young explained its rationale:

…the main stimulus was the invention of the 'Journal'…. all marks were entered in ink, checked and

added up and a weekly form order was produced…. The boy top of the form took up the list to the

Headmaster on the platform at Assembly on Tuesday morning. There was no nonsense about all the

competition being bad for the weaker brethren.250

I was especially pleased to see that Mr Smith Mjr had marked up 8 May as VE Day (holiday) – see

Appendix. His younger brother Derek Smith also remembered the ritual behind the Journal:

We had journals to write up each day, which recorded the marks for each subject every day and were

added up at the end of each week. The total number of marks decided the position you came in the

class and also indicated your progress. The master gave a written report in your journal and a final

report at the end of each term which you took home to be signed by your parent.

Breaks

During mid-morning breaks we would be given one-third pint of milk and, in the lunch hour break, we

would play hand-cricket using a tennis ball or a small homemade bat using a hard composition rubber

ball. Our jackets or blazers would be used as wickets.251

Eric Hirst (C 1944-50) remembered the cricket: ‘we used to make our own little bats. [We’d play] On

the grass with a marble, my uncle made me some bats. At break we used to play, we didn’t score

centuries’. Another break-time activity was conkers and John Williams (R 1943-49) looked back to an

247

Ibid, June 1941, p438 248

Ibid, May 1942, p536 249

Barnes, p100 250

Young, p93 251

Derek Smith (R 1947-53

64

age before health and safety rules: ‘conkers were played (without goggles or gloves). Even with

conkers which were baked hard no injuries occurred. Another favourite game was five-stones.’

Mr Barnes described the Buttery

where at breaks we could buy superb pastries, Russian slice, doughnuts and my favourite, Chelsea

buns. We also had lunch in the Buttery, a cooked meal of two courses, one with meat or fish, and two

vegetables and a dessert, which was always some kind of sticky pudding like spotted dick with thick

yellow custard plonked on top. I never took a fancy to this and fortunately was not forced to accept it.

Taking food and leaving it was frowned on. Nothing was thrown away.252

Young despaired of the attention to milk

…after the War… an equal amount of time was spent in arranging for free milk to be poured down the

throats of everybody, under a scheme presided over by Mr Tyson and blessed by Mr Williams the PE

Instructor…. As for Tyson, he behaved each day as though milk was far more important than

knowledge. Perhaps it was!253

In a Roper’s House report, its writer also complained about the milk – but for slightly different

reasons: ‘the House does not take enough care of its House Room. It ought to take a pride in keeping

this room tidy and avoid leaving milk caps and small puddles of milk on the floor.’254

Founder’s Day, 1945

For the first Founder’s Day after victory, the magazine reported on a war-weary – but not defeated –

Alleyn’s. The School even allowed pride of place to one of its friends [the Rev J Watt, vicar of Boxley

in Kent] it had gathered in the course of its peregrinations. There is a wisp of normality in the air as

the School returned to its customary ceremonies and traditions:

this year [Founder’s Day] had more of the traditional attractions than any previously held in war-time,

despite the fact that there was no Shooting Match against the Old Boys, that the Laboratories, the

Woodwork and Art Rooms could not exhibit, that there was no triumphal march up and down Big Side

[1st

XI pitch on lower school field] by the OTC band.

But the usual heroic band collected early to cut the cornflowers. At 9.30 the School attended the

customary service at the College Chapel, where the preacher was our great friend, the Rev J Watt,

MA. The First XI pitch, although bomb-scarred was in use again… But the scene was not complete, for

the old majestic elms no longer stand.255

252

Barnes, p90 253

Young, p99 254



65

Headmasters at Alleyn’s

‘I had several [Headmasters], didn’t I? I had Charlie Hack, he was the first one at SLESS, and then it

was Tyson, and then it was Allison, when he came back from Rossall, and then Soapy Hudson.’ Ian

Smith (Roper’s, 1942-49)

In the decade between 1940-50, there were three Headmasters of Alleyn’s School: Ralph Bushell

Henderson [‘Piggy’, ‘RBH’], C Ralph Allison [‘Claude’] and Sidney R Hudson [‘Soapy’256

or ‘George’];

the Headmaster at SLESS was briefly Charles Hack but he was replaced by Charles Tyson in 1940.

Robert Young wrote that,

It was Charles Tyson who was most deeply frustrated when the Governors chose Hudson [as

Headmaster]. He returned to the task of Housemaster. He had once been an international football

player, but now all he was left with was special responsibility for the distribution of milk, which the

LCC was making more important than the distribution of learning!257

Ian Smith (R 1942-49), an Alleyn’s boy at SLESS, reminisced:

Charlie Tyson, super Headmaster. He had a very good personality, while some of the others just came,

you saw them in the morning at assembly, then they dived away into the Headmaster’s study and

that was it. Well, Charlie Tyson had been a very good footballer in his day, and he was very much into

sport generally and he made himself known to everyone, which I thought was so important.

I wonder how differently the boys might have remembered Alleyn’s had Tyson taken control? For

this chapter I shall be concentrating on the Alleyn’s Headmasters, Henderson, Allison and Hudson.

Ralph Henderson

At the end of the account of, ‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, we left RBH defending the public school system

at an Alleyn Old Boys’ Annual Dinner258

. His ambition at Alleyn’s had always been to provide a day

school worthy of public school status – an ambition which was recognised by the LCC Inspectors of

1938 who wrote that Alleyn’s gives ‘pupils residing in their homes the benefits of a public school

training’259

. At the start of the 1940s, RBH just saw the evacuation of the School to Maidstone

where, memorably, history master Robert Young gave a description of Henderson. In it RBH appears

Ozymandias-like:

The Headmaster, Mr Henderson – a great enemy of the Hun – took up residence in the Star and

Garter at Maidstone, but he was already beginning to lose interest in and hope about the school he

had so lovingly built up.260

It was as if Henderson had given up the battle before the war had properly begun. In June 1940, his

departure from the School was announced in the Edward Alleyn Magazine:

The Headmaster is leaving us at the end of this term to take up his appointment as Manchester

Reader at Oxford University. We should like to take this opportunity of wishing him and Mrs

256

So called because of Hudson’s the soap flake manufacturer of the time. 257

Young, p196; the 1946 School Milk Act provided one-third of a pint free for every school child under 18. 258

EAM, February 1938, pp43-44 259

LCC inspection report, 1938, p189 260

Young, p107

66

Henderson, on behalf of all our readers, a long period of happiness. At the time of going to press the

new Headmaster has not yet been appointed.261

When Alleyn’s later faced its educational battles with the Dulwich Estate governors, Henderson took

their actions personally; ‘he regarded the Governors as assassins intent on murdering his child!’262

Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41) concurred with our AOBs of the 1930s that Henderson was an aloof

figure: ‘I cannot recall any sighting or words direct with Mr Henderson,’ but he admitted that he and

his fellow pupils understood ‘that he [RBH] and the school could be greatly proud of having no fewer

than seven Old Boy bishops.’

Ralph Allison

Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) recalled that while ‘Henderson was distant,’ Henderson’s successor,

‘Claude Allison, I think, was terrific!’ The magazine introduced Allison in its issue of November 1940:

On behalf of parents, Old Boys and the School we welcome as Headmaster Mr CR Allison, MA, St

Catharine’s College, Cambridge, BA Lond., former Headmaster of Reigate Grammar School’263

.

Professor Donald Leinster-Mackay (D 1943-50) painted a detailed picture of Allison’s career history

up until this point:

Allison, whose father was a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants, was educated at

Caterham School and University College London, before going as an Exhibitioner to St Catharine’s

College, Cambridge. He, therefore, had a very strong educational background to take on Alleyn’s in

1940. His teaching career was also very recommendatory with his having been an assistant master for

a brief time at Worksop College and at Malvern College from 1929 to 1936, where he made a

considerable impact on the College’s extracurricular activities. He was an English tutor at Stowe

School from 1936 to 1938, where he later became a school governor, and from there he became

Headmaster of Reigate Grammar School. He had thus had successful teaching experience and had

also been a Headmaster, albeit for only two years, prior to taking up his post at Alleyn’s.264

RBH must have been reassured when he read Allison’s first open letter in the Edward Alleyn

Magazine published in 1940. In it, Allison expressed the importance that Alleyn’s – and similar

schools – would play on the wider stage.

The world after the war is not going to be the same that we knew before September 1939, but it is,

nevertheless, going to be a world in which a school such as Alleyn’s will have even more important

work to do than formerly. For to me, as an outside observer, the School has always appeared to be

engaged on an important piece of pioneering: it has taken the best elements of the English public

school system and transplanted them successfully in a great London day school. This is what must

increasingly happen if the English tradition in education is to shape the future of England as it alone

can.265

261

EAM, June 1940, p339 262

Young, p195 263


DLM, p9 265


67

Little could he have known that he was presciently uttering ideas and themes which he would be

returning to in 1944 and 1945 in defending the School from threat of extinction at the hands of its

governing body and the LCC.

Allison’s first task as Headmaster was to re-gather the boys to one place ‘somewhere in England’

from the various parts of Britain that they had been flung by the evacuation. Allison succeeded in

persuading Rossall at Fleetwood in Lancashire to share its premises and on 6 January, 1941, ‘Ralph

Allison led his School to the North-west coast’266

.

In the notes Allison made ahead of a meeting to brief staff about the move from the scattered billets

in Kent to everyone living and learning under one roof at Rossall, Allison underlined the differences

the boys were going to encounter.

From the boys’ point of view the change is going to be one from freedom to restraint, from the varied

surroundings of a life divided between home and school to the uniformity of day and night in the

same environment.

More so than with either his predecessor or his successor, there are glimpses of Allison, and his wife,

rolling up their sleeves to occupy and care for the boys during their ‘freedom from restraint’. In the

summer holidays of 1941, Allison even joined a group of boys on a cycling trip from Rossall to

Seascale. The AOBS spoke and wrote warmly about Allison. David Wallace (C 1941-46) told us that

‘Mr Allison was excellent in all respects. I felt he listened to me.’ Mr Williams said that ‘I think he was

a very upstanding, considerate but firm Headmaster.’

Frank Halford (R 1942-49) remembered that Allison ‘was very keen on appearance, and we used to

go regularly to Cleveleys for a haircut. It cost sixpence, or 2½ p in today’s money’. David Alexander (B

1933-42) looked on Allison as ‘a considerable influence in my life’; Allison was

Very relaxed… an enthusiastic man, a bit of an actor himself. Even his delivery had something of the

old fashioned stage about it but he encouraged us to do a lot of drama and he taught us current

affairs and various other parts of the curriculum which made it lively and interesting. We set up the

Bear Pit which was a play reading society… I was a founder-member of the Bear Pit and I can

remember now some of the plays which we read then. A very good way of spending a Saturday

evening or a Sunday afternoon in winter-time.267

Ralph and Rita Allison threw themselves into drama productions, the Bear Pit, the Fifty Club and the

Middle School Club. Mrs Allison acquired the title of ‘Chair Bear’ when made chair of the Bear Pit. At

times, Allison comes across, like Edward Alleyn before him, as a Master of the Revels; Sidney Giles

(Bn, 1933-42) wrote that Allison

mounted a production of The Importance of Being Earnest as a sort of farewell to our Kentish hosts….

The Headmaster, dressed in a hired costume worn by John Gielgud in the then recent famous London

production, spoke a prologue specially written by, I think, Basil Davies, which began:

‘Ladies and gentlemen; it is our plan

To play (without disturbance, if we can)

A piece which, in a less fantastic age

Won much approval on the comic stage.’

266

Chandler, p71 267

Alexander, p76

68

….the reference to ‘disturbance’ was of course to the possible air-raid sirens.268

Allison was clearly an excellent actor and we get a peek of his dramatic powers in the magazine

review of Thunder Rock: ‘The Headmaster, as the labourer Briggs, was a pathetic character who was

always convincing, and by a single expression or gesture could bring laughter to the audience or

reduce them to the verge of tears’269

. The Rt Hon the Lord Higgins (D, 1940-46) mentioned Thunder

Rock saying:

The Headmaster, CR Allison…. was outstanding. He was married to a former actress and together they

put on a whole series of plays and entertainments, including Judgement Day by Elmer Rice and

Thunder Rock by Robert Audrey.270

In a review of Ruddigore, the magazine reported that the audience ‘obtained so much pleasure from

duets like “I know a youth” excellently acted by Mr and Mrs Allison…’271

Mr Thain stayed in touch

with Allison after they had both left the School: ‘I wrote [Claude] a letter for a reference or

something, he was very friendly. He always sent me tickets for Shakespeare plays that he and his

wife were both performing in. First class chap.’

Professor Leinster-Mackay compared Allison to the Admiral Crichton, another role he played before

the boys, and in doing so we get an even more vivid picture of Allison:

In many ways Allison as Crichton was a ‘natural’. His personality, very redolent of a typical English

gentleman, displayed urbaneness and suavity. Such was his urbanity (by comparison RBH was

ungainly) that Charles Ralph Allison was nicknamed ‘Claude’. He was diplomatic in his dealings with

the host school, having a very good relationship with Rossall’s acting Head, Colonel Trist….272

The Allisons whiled away the long, dark evening hours at Rossall with readings by the fireside. The

Bear Pit reported:

These plays [Charley’s Aunt, Hay Fever & The Last of Mrs Cheyney] were read, owing to the customary

rigours of the climate, round the fire, and during the intervals the Headmaster, with beneficence as

customary as the aforementioned climatic rigours, supplied the denizens with refreshment.’273

Reading such heart-warming and cosy accounts in the magazine must have gladdened every parent

who was suffering the war-time separation from their sons. Allison’s sense of humour also shines

through in the magazine’s pages. At Speech Day in 1944, after hearing a concert version of Gounod’s

‘Faust’, he reminded his audience that:

the story was associated with the name of Edward Alleyn. He was the creator of the title part in

Marlowe’s Dr Faustus and it is said that on one occasion he was playing it with such fervour and

conviction that the Devil himself appeared upon the stage at his invocation. Alleyn realising what had

happened vowed to his Good Angel some notable good work if the visitor was removed. Removed he

was in the traditional sulphurous manner, and, says the legend, Alleyn, as good as his word, founded

268

Drama and Music, p46 269

EAM, May 1942, p549 270

D&M, p52 271

EAM, May 1942, p547 272

DLM, p8 273


69

the College of God’s Gift, where ‘thousands of innocent children have received their education

ignorant of the fact that they owe it to His Infernal Majesty in person.’274

Reminding his audience about the School’s identity and heritage was a regular theme for Allison. He

was keenly aware of the dangers of Alleyn’s losing its sense of identity whilst so far away from

Dulwich. To reinforce the continuing traditions of Alleyn’s, he invited Alleyn Old Boys to visit the

School at Rossall (they did). Two years into their stay at Rossall, Allison wrote a letter to AOBs,

recalling the old alma mater:

It is my great pleasure to convey this [message] to you all, through the Magazine: wherever you are

when you read this, in training, on active service, or carrying on essential work at home, please

believe that you are still part of Alleyn’s and that we who continue in the tradition that you in your

generation helped forward, read with pride of your service to the country in all spheres of its activity,

and look forward to the first Old Boys’ Day after the war when there will be the chance of meeting

again in Dulwich.275

Looking ahead to a life after the war was uncertain and, even in the grip of the fighting in 1941,

Allison was conscious of having to plan to reconstruct the School after the war. He appealed to the

AOBs for help to build up rolls, spelling out the School’s unique selling point at Rossall in war-time:

In my let to you in the last issue of the Magazine I asked that you should hold yourselves ready to help

with the re-establishment of the School in Dulwich after the war: I now write to ask you co-operation

in a more immediate task.

If we are to have the right foundation on which to build later we must maintain our numbers here at

Rossall. We cannot take, at present, more than about 210, but I should like to feel that our

recruitment up to that number was assured as long as we are here. This is where Old Boys of the

School can help us. By letting people know where Alleyn’s is to be found: by handing on, particularly

to parents in London, details of our opportunities at Rossall to continue full-time education, free so

far from the interruptions of war, you will be doing the School a real service, and, I believe, a service

also to those boys who may come to us through your persuasions. I would add the all-important

information that the basic school fee remains the same: the only extra contribution expected from

parents towards boarding expenses is the ordinary payment to the Government Billeting Fund of from

6/- to 9/- a week… I am confident that I can leave the pages of the Magazine with its record of so

many varied activities to speak further on our behalf.276

The School’s finances were uncertain and he reminded his audience at Speech Day – and readers of

the magazine – about ‘a fund, founded by Mr Henderson with a subscription of £100, for the

reconditioning of the School’s grounds and buildings after the war. Parents and friends of the school

were invited to contribute to this fund.’277

A boarding school existence meant the pupils had a lot of spare time on their hands after lessons.

Allison used this to the good of the Alleyn’s community by running team and group activities. At

Speech Day in 1944 Allison said that Alleyn’s had learnt a good deal more about community making

in the past year. He said

274


Ibid, May 1942, p555 276

Ibid, June 1941, p456-57 277


70

The form, the team, the platoon, the orchestra, the cast, the squad, the chorus, the House, the

School: these are associations in which we find ourselves by losing ourselves. Success in all these

spheres is the measure of what each can give.’278

In October 1943, Allison spent a week at SLESS to the Alleyn’s buildings in Townley Road and also to

speak to the Alleyn’s boys who had chosen not to leave London. But when the time came to return

to Alleyn’s at Dulwich, Allison was Headmaster for only one term as he had accepted the headship of

Brentwood School – a direct grant boarding school – to commence in the Advent Term of 1945. He

remained there until his retirement in 1966.

Sidney Hudson

After Allison’s departure, Sidney Hudson, Geography master, commanding officer of the OTC (later

the JTC), and since 1944, Second Master, was made Acting Headmaster in September 1945; his

position was confirmed in 1947. He had been appointed by Henderson as an assistant master in

1926 and was to spend a total of 40 years at Alleyn’s.

In 1945 Alleyn’s future, despite all of Allison’s battles on its behalf (see the chapter on the ‘Alleyn’s

education crisis’), was very uncertain.

Unlike his predecessor Allison, Hudson does not leap from the page or from the words of our

witnesses of the time as a bon vivant who held centre stage. Roy Barnes described his admissions

interview with Hudson:

During the interview with the Headmaster, I sat passively on an upright chair, while he questioned my

mother and Uncle George and from time to time shot a query or two at me. He was a small man with

thin greying hair and sat behind a huge desk.279

What emerges is an unimposing man – perhaps even an eminence grise – but one who nevertheless

worked tirelessly for Alleyn’s, to keep the School afloat and safe. By 1945, Hudson had already been

at Alleyn’s for 19 years and in that time served in many capacities; his valete recognised that,

For a dozen years he commanded the OTC, later the JTC; for many years he was master in charge of

Athletics…. It was under his guidance that in 1933 our running track was laid with schoolboy labour,

making Alleyn’s one of the earliest schools to be so equipped….

The war years imposed difficult administrative problems when the school was evacuated to

Maidstone. Mr Hudson undertook the duties of master in charge of billeting and when in January,

1941, the school moved to Rossall he held the onerous office of Bursar and was Housemaster of

Crescent House….280

Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) admitted that ‘I don’t think I saw him until I left really!’ and John Cleary (B

1945-51) said ‘The only time most of us saw him was at morning assembly’. Mr Cleary realised that

Hudson was probably busy behind the scenes:

278


Barnes, p96 280

EAM, November, 1963, p76

71

… you didn’t really see him, Major Hudson. He didn’t do much in the way of lessons because there

was a considerable amount of administrative work to be addressed to get Alleyn’s back on its feet. In

hindsight this work probably laid the foundation for the tremendous progress the School has made.

Young concurred: ‘...the Headmaster was so confined to his office by red-tape and form-filling, that

he could only take a couple of periods a week for teaching boys.’281

Some of our boys remembered

Hudson teaching them – he taught Peter Wrench (C 1945-49): ‘He used to take us in political affairs:

one lesson a week. He always used to bring a copy of the Spectator in with him and just read from

it.’ Before Hudson was made Headmaster, Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) spoke of Hudson’s geography

lessons:

he used to pull down a map and there’d be on it India and China and he’d talk about the Himalayas

and Afghanistan and so on and so forth – this had got absolutely nothing to do with what was coming

up in the exam in the following May, nothing whatsoever, and it was not surprising that nobody got a

distinction at School Certificate for years: several boys got credits, a few others got passes, but all the

others failed. Geography at O Level, it’s horrendous. I was lucky; Tojo Phillips moved in and took over

Geography when Hudson went on to be Headmaster. Seven of us got distinctions, God knows how

many got credits, a few boys got passes, nobody failed. In one year.

This is an interesting insight set against Young’s moan about,

Hudson's attention to statistics of results in exams. At least one head of a department (George Dodd

in Modern Languages) began trying to poach the brightest boys at the age of 11 to become linguists.

My loyalty to other members of the staff dimmed when I caught them at it.... Henderson had always

ditched statistics about the proficiency of certain teachers or subjects, but Hudson at first didn't

realise that a 100% pass record for three musicians was not comparable with, say, a 40% pass record

for 200 English candidates...282

The post-war world of work was becoming unionised, and this was true at Alleyn’s. Young explained:

…the trade union attitude was affecting the non-teaching staff. Instead of a Headmaster next under

God, he was being reduced to some sort of equality with the superintendent of the meals service, the

cleaners and the ground staff. He resisted this manfully, and never agreed to pressure from teaching

unions to publish salary scales or positions of special responsibility; but he failed to hold in check the

caretakers who complained about discipline in form-rooms, or groundsmen who refused to work in

the rain, or stay after 5pm. This made it extremely hard to continue, as Hudson wished, to make

Alleyn's the nearest approach to a Boarding School.283

Young complained too that under Hudson ‘…the united masters common room of pre-war days had

been succeeded by an abundance of cliques. Mid-morning breaks took place in the Common Room,

Orderly Room, Chemistry Laboratory, Visitors' Room and Buttery. All alike brewed up tea or coffee.

Hudson never managed to tackle these splits, and it was left to Charles Lloyd to restore the vestiges

of unanimity some 15 years later.284

Given this catalogue of complaints against Hudson (and there

are more in Young’s book), I wasn’t at all surprised to hear from Mr Cleary that ‘Soapy Hudson had

281

Young, p199 282

Ibid, p216 283

Ibid, p199 284

Ibid, pp196-97

72

the audacity to send Bob Young home because he was wearing a Paisley jumper under his tweed

jacket that he always wore.’ Perhaps the antipathy was mutual?

Our AOBs relayed an amusing anecdote of Hudson making an (illogical) stand over an issue:

when Soapy Hudson gave a boy detention because he was seen walking through the village with a

JAGS girl. He then rings their Headmistress and the girl gets a detention. They were brother and sister.

And the parents objected to the pair of them getting detention and they were told ‘the rule is that the

boys of Alleyn’s will not fraternise with the girls of JAGS, and that applies to everybody.’ That was

Soapy Hudson’s comment to them apparently.

One of our boys caught a glimpse of a kinder side to Hudson. John Holt (S 1945-51) remembered

that, in his last week at School,

I was summoned to the Headmaster’s study and I remember knocking nervously on the door. A voice

bade me enter and on opening the door, I was amazed to see that he had a smile on his face! He had

always looked so strict at Assembly or if you encountered him in the corridor or the grounds. I cannot

remember seeing a more icy stare, if you displeased him in any way. But, this time, he was friendly

and smiling. He wished me well in my job and for the future and being a retired Major, seemed

particularly anxious that I did well in my forthcoming National Service….

His parting words to Mr Holt were: ‘“Holt,” he said, “Once a member of Alleyn’s – always a member

of Alleyn’s”.’285

Given his length of service at Alleyn’s, perhaps this had become Hudson’s mantra?

His obituary in 1967 concluded that ‘His, then, was a lifetime of service to Alleyn’s, a school he loved

and of which he was extremely proud’.286

The HM inspectors who came in 1950 also noted the

Headmaster’s devotion to duty and that he had,

inherited a necessarily difficult task and one which has been made more difficult by recent changes in

his staff. For many years he has devoted himself to promote the welfare of the School and certain of

the excellent aspects of school life…. reflect his determination and his ability to maintain the fine

traditions of Alleyn's School.

Indeed, after the war there ‘had been dark days in 1944 and 1945 when it had seemed that Alleyn’s

might belong to the Foundation in nothing more than name.’287 Professor Leinster-Mackay summed

up that,

Hudson’s 18 years as Headmaster from 1945-63 gave a breathing space to the school after the

traumas of war. It was not for Hudson to embark on any brilliant adventure – merely to do what he

was best at – holding fast to the Alleyn’s tradition, or as much as could be retained in changing

circumstances and the absence of money.288

In his obituary the magazine writers commented that Hudson’s,

greatest achievement was to preserve what was best in the traditions of Alleyn’s and yet adapt those

traditions where necessary to meet the needs of a changing society.289

285

King, p79 286



DLM, p37 289


73

Observing Henderson, Allison and Hudson’s roles at Alleyn’s, especially when all of them at one

point or another likened a school to a micro-society, perhaps it’s not too fanciful to see some

parallels between our headmasters with the prime ministers of this time. Henderson was becoming

out of touch with the reality of education reform – in a way that is (somewhat) reminiscent of

Chamberlain’s clinging on to appeasement as a solution to divert Europe descending into war.

Allison was the flamboyant, Churchillian leader who led the School through its darkest hours; and

Hudson, Attlee-like, was the dogged administrator and overseer of great change at Townley Road.

74

Masters and mistresses at Alleyn’s

‘The staff were a motley collection, several having retired long before the war.’ Dr Norman Wetherick

(B, 1941-48)

The staff at Alleyn’s were a dedicated, if fractured, collection of men (and women) in the 1940s. War

– as with all aspects of life – threw routine into disarray and as teachers were called up to join the

Forces, retired members of staff were persuaded out of their rest to return to the school gates to

teach. Peter Wrench (C 1945-49) remembered ‘”Mumbler” McClymont (1929-53)290

, who was a very

elderly gentleman who had come back because of the shortage of teachers and I think was then in

his eighties’. Latin master, Mr RE Taylor (1906-45), who, but for an absence during the First World

War, had taught at Alleyn’s since 1906, extended his working life for Alleyn’s at the outset of war:

When after a long and arduous career he was looking forward to a well-earned rest in retirement he

was plunged into all the worries and extra work of the evacuation and was Second Master while the

School was at Maidstone and Rossall… He returned to the Emergency School in 1944 and finally

retired at Easter, 1945.291

Alan Thomas (SLESS, 1940-41) saw an advantage in being taught by retired teachers because they

‘had gained command of their subject and how to teach it’.

Masters were called up from within the Alleyn’s Common Room – Robert Young (1935-71) was the

first to be called up, and he claimed that ‘the authorities soon got onto other members of the staff

as well, and if Henderson had not been a personal friend of the then minister for war, he would have

lost most of his staff’292

. Mr Eayrs (1905-45) straddled both serving the School and joining the war-

effort in these years.

Mr Eayrs joined the staff in 1905, after going through the school as a boy. To all present members of

the staff this is almost a pre-historic date, and… he has been a witness of all the changes through

which the school has passed…. In 1939 he was called up by the War Office and spent two years in

charge of an internees camp. Reaching the age limit, he returned to the Emergency School, and is now

retiring to his well-earned rest.’293

.

Mr Wrench told us that ‘as the war time went on there were more masters coming back from

service – probably got injured or something and then came back to the staff’. It is likely that another

reason men were returning from the Forces was because the teaching profession became a reserved

occupation294

. This state of flux continued after VE and VJ Day when teachers were demobbed and

returned. Arthur Chandler (Bn 1941-48) commented ‘From serving in the Forces, came Masters

unknown to both sets of boys. In turn, these Masters did not know where the boys had spent the

290

Years in brackets by teachers’ names denote their years of teaching at Alleyn’s. 291

EAM, July 1945, p177 292

Young, p107 293


‘By 1943 there was a real danger of a collapse of science teaching in some secondary schools…. When the

age of reservation from the call-up for teachers was raised from 30 to 35 an exception was made for graduate

teachers of mathematics, physics, chemistry and engineering…. The situation had become so grave that the

Ministry of Labour agreed in principle to the release from the services of science and mathematics teachers of

28 and over where this could be agreed with the particular service.’ Gosden, p104

75

war years,’295

whether this had been at Townley Road or up at Rossall. One such demobbed master

was Mr Bickford-Smith (1936-43) who ‘returned as Modern Languages Master after being in the

Intelligence Service since 1940.’296

After the war there was a severe shortage of manpower. Sir John Maitland (1920-49) was one

elderly teacher who, the magazine explained in his eventual valete: ‘Partly from personal reasons,

partly owing to the shortage of masters, Sir John has stayed on many years longer than the normal

span…’297

Additional duties

During the war, the masters and mistresses had additional duties thrust upon them. Not only were

they to impart an education but they were involved in the pupils’

welfare matters arising out of such war-time circumstances as air attacks and evacuation to savings

campaigns and school meals. Civil defence, fire guard, and Home Guard duties, milk, National savings,

school salvage collections, evacuees' wellbeing, holiday clubs and classes, the supervision of children

on agricultural camps and activities and the issue of children's additional clothing coupons.298

John Williams (R 1943-49) told us that ‘Mr Williams (who taught PT) had an office in the Gym and he

was the official person to have us weighed and checked for height, and I believe this had a bearing

on the issue of clothing coupons’.

There have been times in the course of this research that I have wondered whether, especially

during the war, the teachers ever had a break from the confines of the School as there are frequent

mentions of them taking boys on holidays, to harvest camps and trips. The Edward Alleyn Magazine

reported the stalwart efforts of Victor Haslam (1928-55) at the Farm Camp of 1947 – though to my

eye it looks like he went above and beyond the call of duty:

The arrival of Mr Haslam at the camp had what can only be described as a devastating effect. The

sandwich party on reporting for duty was overwhelmed to find that alone and unaided Mr Haslam

had done all the work. Henceforward the camp graciously waived its right to prepare sandwiches.

When the kitchen was unable to find work for this model of industry he insisted on helping in the

bean field, and irritated the other workers by constantly making the unpopular remark that he just

loved picking beans!299

Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45), in his personal memories, paid tribute to the masters’ – and their wives’ –

devotion, especially at Rossall:

In the main, schooling at Rossall was great fun. Because we lived in a closed community we got to

know the staff better than simply [as] our teachers. Many of them were Housemasters, doing a

previously unknown job extremely well. Also their wives were ladies that we could turn to as ‘Mums’.

We never appreciated how much these adults sacrificed to ‘parent’ us ‘war-orphans’. We certainly

owe them a belated tribute.

295

Chandler, p109 296



Gosden, p116 299

Ibid, October1947, p392

76

This dedication was – as we have seen – recognised by the 1950s inspectors: ‘as a body the Masters

are extremely hard-working and give unsparingly of their time out of school hours’300

. Headmaster

RB Henderson (1920-40), in an appreciation of Albert Spring (1909-49) to mark Mr Spring’s

retirement in 1949, gave an indication of what he felt about the teaching profession:

Schoolmasters are the worst paid and most richly rewarded of all creative artists – good ones that

is.301

(Mr Spring was included in that number of good schoolmasters according to Mr Henderson – as well

as many of Mr Spring’s former pupils we have spoken to for both the 1930s and 1940s oral history

project.) In Ralph Allison’s papers about the School’s move from Maidstone to Rossall, he had this to

say about teaching:

As schoolmasters we are members of a profession with a strange and often not very flattering

reputation. Some like Mr Shaw are satiric about us, others like Mr Hilton sentimental, while the

majority of parents are frankly suspicious and I hope rightly so. They are suspicious of our long

holidays, of our proverbial aloofness from mundane affairs (an impression often founded upon

recollections of 30 or 40 years ago), and apprehensive of our desire to steal their sons from them.

Robert Young, for all his complaints about Sidney Hudson (1926-63), ‘never once in the next 25 years

attempted to leave Alleyn's’302

after his return from the Forces. Of Alleyn’s, he wrote:

The school… was a pleasure to teach in – the pupils eager to know and to do well, the staff open-

minded and talented. It had almost as distinguished a collection of colleagues as in pre-war days, and

it was strong in Music, Drama, Cadet Force and Athletics.303

The inspectors wrote approvingly in their 1950 report that the Headmaster

is helped by 37 full time Masters, one Mistress and one part-time Master, 24 of whom he has

appointed himself. As a staff the Masters are well qualified, almost all holding Honours degrees or

equivalent specialist qualfications in the subjects which they profess.304

Nick-names

Another aspect of the teaching staff of this era which continually strikes me is the nick-names they

all acquired. Ron Smale (B 1940-46) explained apologetically:

You will note, although now in my 80s, I still refer to the nick-names we gave to our past tutors, as

much out of reverence as for any other considerations, I hasten to add.

Our post-war group at the reunion gave a roll call of their teachers’ nick-names ‘”Soapy Hudson”,

“Ma” Wiggs, “Bub Jones” [short for ‘bubble’, his shape, said Derek Smith], “Puff Smith”, “Daddy

Haslam”, “Pussy Wright”, “Cis Upward”, “Lofty Logan”, “Mumbler Mack”, “Dom” Maitland, known as

“D.O.M.” [short for “Dirty Old Man” because of the stains on his tie]305

, “Doc Giles”, “Loopy Young”,

300


RB Henderson quoted in EAM, November 1949, p602. 302

Young, p203 303

Ibid, p202 304


Bill Jones (R 1935-42), in a letter, has another explanation for the ‘DOM’ epithet: ‘if lost for words he would

rub the knuckles of his hands together saying “I am Dominus-the-master”.’

77

“Wally Waters”, he was the woodwork master, “Wally Wastewood” was another one.’ Alan Eaglen

(Tn 1939-44) told us that Maths master, Mr ‘Polly’ Hutt (1907-44), would say to his class ‘I know you

called me Polly, and it’s not because I look like a parrot!’; in fact it was because, according to Bruce

Cox (Tn 1941-44)):

he taught us about triangles and squares and the next thing he would say was ‘a polygon, boy, a

polygon, and I know what you’re going to say when I go out “poly’s gone”,’ and he kept the nickname

even though he knew it. He had fingers six inches long and he would wag his finger whilst twisting his

moustache.

Many of the teachers were a little eccentric. Mr Smale concurred:

Nearly all schoolmasters in the eyes of their charges have weird mannerisms and ours were no

exception. I have fond memories of our classics master, Mr McClymont or ‘Mumbling Mac’ as he was

more popularly known. He would roam the corridors reciting Latin and Greek verses, totally

regardless of his surroundings. When teaching, he would make the boys decline Latin nouns and

conjugate verbs out loud. This led to a chorus of obscenities of which he, lost in a world of his own,

was entirely oblivious.

Dr Wetherick also remembered ‘Mumbling Mac’: he ‘had the habit of addressing small boys in Latin

or Greek (sometimes also Hebrew, I was told) and clipping their ear when they failed to respond.’ He

brings to question the wisdom of keeping teachers on beyond their retirement age:

With [Mr MyClymont ] I did Latin subsid. for HSC [Higher Schools Certificate], which meant that I had

to write three papers in one day. The third (Latin set books) turned out to be about Virgil, Aeneid VI

and I had studied Virgil, Georgics. So I failed Latin… CJ McClymont had not noticed the change of

syllabus but what was more interesting was that I could not persuade him that it mattered. As far as

he was concerned if you could read Virgil you could read Virgil and that was that.

But that said, Dr Wetherick generously declares that McClymont ‘was by far the most important

cultural influence on me,’ although curiously adding, ‘we spent very little time on Latin.’

Mr Smale wrote about Maths master ‘Polly’ Hutt’s ‘pet idiosyncrasy’ which was

to go all round the form asking each boy to recite the theorem of Pythagoras which reads, as every

schoolboy knows, ‘In a right-angled triangle the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the

squares on the other two sides’. Boys, anxious to demonstrate their knowledge, duly trotted out

these words only to be contemptuously dismissed. Eventually the mystery was explained. He objected

to the penultimate word ‘two’ on the grounds that, since a triangle has only three sides, the word

‘two’ was irrelevant (grammar and maths all in one lesson!).

Derek Smith regaled us with the bizarre way 'Pussy Wright' (1926-49) would start his day:

He used to cycle to school round the road we had, in to the junior school and someone would have to

open the door and he'd cycle down the corridor, cycle in, someone would have to open the classroom

door, he'd cycle up to his desk, park his bike on the edge of the desk and commence.

Women teachers

The 1940s saw the arrival of female teachers at Alleyn’s School. Jim French (R 1941-46) expanded:

78

Mistresses were an innovation at SLESS… The most memorable and formidable was Dora Wiggs, a

feisty spinster who was a brilliant teacher of French…. We had a handsome, cheerful tall lady Miss

Gaukrodger, who explained it was an old fashioned Yorkshire surname. She departed too soon. And

we had the delightful, petite and pretty art mistress, Terry Ratzer. As I have written in the Edward

Alleyn Magazine, most of the pupils, and I suspect many of the staff, were in love with her.306

Mr French was probably right about the boys being in love with the young Miss Ratzer (1943-47) –

several of our AOB-guests listed her as their favourite teacher. Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) admitted

to one of the tricks the boys got up to in her classroom:

Apparently during the art lesson, when Miss Ratzer walked up and down the room, the idea was to

drop your pencil on the floor and, as she walks past, you look up her skirt! How terrible, hey?

Disgraceful….

Mr Rodway remembered the boys’ envy of ‘“Basher” Bate, the School Captain, when he played the

lead in the School production of You Can’t Take it With You307

in 1945 – he got to kiss Miss Ratzer…

who was playing the female lead.’308

Mr Smale named the first female teacher to climb the steps to teach at Alleyn’s as ‘Miss Gaukrodger

followed by Miss Wiggs. The former was greeted with awe by the boys who were somewhat

overcome by the presence of a lady in the form room. Miss Wiggs was more down to earth and was

quickly accepted.’ At SLESS more female teachers joined the payroll and they were given their own

Common Room situated immediately to the right of the School’s entrance.

I think it fair to say that ‘the redoubtable’ French mistress Miss Dora Wiggs (1942-67) made a strong

impression on her ‘élèves’309

. At a recent Annual Dinner a new award was announced before 144

guests. This was the ‘Scrase, Wiggs and Wrench’ award310

and as the award was being introduced,

the name ‘Dora Wiggs’ brought a groan of satisfaction from the assembled guests – some 44 years

since she last taught at Alleyn’s. Certainly our visitors remembered her well. Alan Eaglen (Tn 1939-

44) told us about her first lesson:

I had her for her very first lesson in school. She started speaking to us in French to a completely blank-

faced class: she never spoke a word of English as far as I can recall during that lesson.

John Holt (S 1945-51) described her in great detail:

I came face-to-face with the ‘rather fierce-looking lady’ – I was in Form ‘Shell B’ and she was my form

mistress. Her name was Miss Wiggs and to my surprise I found that she was usually a most charming

lady. However, this was provided you did not step out of line! If you did, she could be a real dragon.

She was also our French teacher and woe betide anyone who gave her less than 100% effort in class

or in their homework.

Mr Holt expanded on her exacting standards:

306


By George S Kaufman and Moss Hart. 308

Ibid, p22 309

Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) 310

AOBs Rodney Scrase DFC (Tn 1937-39) and Peter Wrench (C 1945-59) created this award as a tribute to the

Alleyn’s CCF and their French teacher in 2011. This award recognises the best Year 13 air cadet in the CCF.

79

we started to discuss a piece of homework that she had recently marked. I then said to her, in view of

the mark that she had given me, ‘I should obtain a Pass all right in my School Certificate exam’.

She turned on me – like some dragon – ‘Listen laddie!’ she said, ‘If the sum total of your ambitions is

just to obtain a Pass you can leave my class right now. I am only interested in Distinctions!’

In the event, out of a class of 19 pupils, her class obtained 12 Distinctions (over 70%) and seven

Credits (over 50%) – not one mere Pass…. There was even an article mentioning her outstanding

achievement in one of the national newspapers.311

It is worth including David Taylor (T 1956-63)’s reminiscences of Miss Wiggs here – although, strictly

speaking, he is from a later decade – but his memories of her are shared by many AOBs:

She was possibly the best teacher of my school career. Her enthusiasm and energy for French

conveyed itself to most of us – me, certainly, and I retain my schoolboy French learned with her to

this day. From the second year when I was first taught by her, lessons were conducted almost wholly

in French. She seemed to have boundless energy and humour.…

I wasn't in the least surprised to learn a few years back that she had links with the Resistance during

the war. There was something charismatic about her that was indefinable. She didn't brook any

nonsense whatsoever, but there was a twinkle in her eye and a ready smile too.’

Mr Rodway probably wouldn’t have agreed with Mr Taylor as naming Miss Wiggs as his favourite

teacher: ‘She once read a French essay of mine I had done for homework, out to the whole class –

she said it was a perfect example of how not to write a French essay! I still don’t know what actually

wrong with the essay but it was quite humiliating.’312

Mr Rodway explained that Miss Wiggs:

was renowned for disappearing for lengthy periods – nobody quite knew why until after the war. She

had actually been flown out to France every now and again to help out with the Resistance.

Mr Thomas told us that he thought Dora Wiggs ‘was the least likely Resistance-worker you could

imagine, very, very quiet’ – perhaps this worked to her advantage in her Special Operations

Executive (SOE) career? John Cleary (B 1945-51) lived near Miss Wiggs and he told us that

In the latter stages of the war she was dropped into France and was brought back out after about

three weeks. In actual fact she only lived round the corner from me in Clapham. And famously on one

occasion she came into the class and handed out all the exercise books then she’s standing there with

mine – and she knew all the French people in Clapham – and she said “Cleary, who helped you with

your homework?” And I said “No one Miss”. “It wouldn’t happen to have been Madame Raymonde by

any chance, would it?” She knew. It was too colloquial and she knew the region of France that it was

from.

I’ve been unable to find out exactly what Miss Wiggs got up to in her SOE missions. Indeed it would

be wonderful to find out – and to see how she squared her prolonged absences with the school

authorities. She was decorated by General de Gaulle in 1946 for her services to the Free French. In

1951 she was given the Palmes Académiques by the French government for distinguished service in

the teaching of French.

311

King, p74 312

Mr Rodway clearly overcame his humiliation as in 1948 he shared, with Mr Wrench, the School’s Canon

Carver Languages Prize.

80

Favourite teachers

We asked our AOBs who their favourite teachers were from the 1940s. Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41)

said ‘I didn’t really have a favourite. In fact I was awesomely overwhelmed’. Mr Robinson later wrote

to defend his lack of a ‘favourite’ teacher, saying:

Intake pupils to the Junior School (in 1938) had to cope not only with new subjects, but with

considerable homework and weekly tests. Repeated failure with, for example, the inability to recite

the week’s minimum 12 lines of verse was punished with the cane. Schooling then was Spartan,

awesomely so. Only later, when teaching would become a more personal communication of advice,

facts and instruction between teacher and pupil, could one think in terms of a ‘favourite teacher’.

Some of our pupils did own up to having a favourite – these were ‘Monty’ Crewe, Freddie Goldner,

‘Daddy’ Haslam, Dicky Rudd, ‘Puff’ Smith, Albert Spring and Mr Tribe.

Monty Crewe (1931-70), Mr Cox told us, was

the commanding officer of the OTC. He was quite a character as far as I’m concerned: he used to

come up on parade on his wife’s bicycle – a big old bike with a basket on the front. In particular he

taught physics and chemistry and he used to demonstrate mercury to show us how to light

phosphorus; it was great fun running around with mercury in your fingers! We didn’t have goggles, no

health and safety, didn’t know what it was in those days.

Mr Eaglen added ‘It was great fun he also used to say “if you mix this together it would make a

terrible smell, stink to high heaven”.’

Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) wrote saying ‘I have fond memories of… having coffee in Fred Goldner’s

rooms with fellow Barnstormers [a Sixth Form group at Rossall]. He was a great and positive

influence on us and became a friend after the war.’ Dr Philpott added that Mr Goldner (1932-65)

‘was very much our mentor in academic matters and encouraged us into working for Cambridge

scholarships’. Mr Smale too ‘shall always be grateful to Mr FN Goldner, Brading’s Housemaster at

that time, for his sympathy and wise counsel.’ Mr Goldner sounded like a lot of fun too – and

certainly one of those members of staff who sacrificed his own time to care for the evacuated boys.

Dr Philpott remembered cycling back from a water polo match in Kent where, consummate teacher

that he was,

Fred explained that the reason that he could free-wheel downhill faster than the rest of us was due to

his greater girth, since the pull of gravity was proportional to the cube of his radius whilst the air

resistance was only proportional to the square of his radius!

Dr Wetherick had fun with Fred too: he ‘assisted him in stage managing school productions. We used

an ancient flash powder apparatus (pre-electric) for the entries of Amor (god of love) in the school’s

Orfeo (Gluck)….’.

Mr Haslam, with his rather peculiar nick-name of ‘Daddy Haslam’, understandably won the affection

of the boys. Derek Smith had Mr Haslam as his form master

and he was a kindly, soft spoken men. He taught maths, algebra, geography, history, English and

nature study, which seemed to be his favourite subject. He set us projects, such as collecting different

81

wild flowers and tree leaves, which we pressed into writing books; also drawing all different birds and

naming them.

He clearly was an approachable man; Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) nominated Mr Haslam as his

favourite – and gave us another nick-name for the man – ‘Wooje [sic] Haslam’. Mr Thain said he was

‘a very friendly master, very easy-going, good sense of humour. His room at Rossall was on the

landing of our dorm and you could feel free to go into his room without any problem’. There is an

idyllic scene of boys at Rossall being occupied with the Middle School Club. In Drama & Music: The

Performing Arts at Alleyn’s, the Revd Canon Michael Swindlehurst (R, 1941-48) wrote ‘Play-reading

was a popular activity. We had a splendid Middle School Club, run by a laid-back master, Victor

Haslam, whose chutney we had to stir while rehearsing.’313

Another favourite master was Dickie Rudd (1907-44), an English teacher. Mr Eaglen said of him ‘he

was a Somerset man, lovely chap. I had him every school year and I remember a book called In

Chimney Corner by Jan Stewar, set in a small, West country village. It was great because he would

read it to us in his Somerset accent every term, lovely man.’ Mr Rudd was one of those masters who

returned to the Alleyn’s buildings to teach at SLESS and it sounds like he worked hard to keep

everyone’s morale up. In a defence to the accusation that at SLESS, the boys ‘had not been taught

any music whatsoever at SLESS,’ Alan Mackesy (D 1943-50) countered

one suddenly remembered these performances by Rudd (who Arthur Chandler was later to write, was

one of the ‘bastions of strength in the consolidation of SLESS’) and realised that they had (and that

Tyson had obviously so intended) veritably boosted the morale and solidarity of the (Emergency)

School during London’s dangerous war-torn years. We looked forward to them with enthusiasm, we

came away from them uplifted ‘and’ in Swinburn’s words ‘our hearts were fulfilled with the music he

made with us.’314

Rudd and Tyson (1911-47) sound like a talented duo: Rudd’s

‘music lessons’, delivered in the Great Hall to the whole of the first year (3A, 3B & 3C) – and

occasionally to the whole of the first and second years together, invariably consisted of Rudd himself,

inspired and encouraged by Headmaster Tyson, playing the piano usually to accompany himself

singing solo especially when introducing songs previously unknown to his audience, e.g. ‘Riding down

from Bangor on an Eastern train’ and ‘Oh lucky Jim! How I envy him!’315

For Sandy Alexander (B 1938-47) ‘My favourite teacher was ‘Puff Smith’ in music, no question!’316

–

although Dr Wetherick admitted ‘Smith I mainly recall for his vicious temper tantrums….’. Given the

numbers of operettas, concerts, ballets and other performances Puff produced during his teaching

career at Alleyn’s, Norman Spurdens (Tn, 1932-41) – like me – pondered ‘I shall never know how he

managed to fit all this into his other teaching work’317

. The Rt Hon Lord Higgins KBE, DL, (D, 1940-46)

wryly observed that Smith’s ‘physical method of inculcating French verbs would be illegal today.’318

313

Drama & Music, p55 314

Chandler, SLESS, pp20-21 315

Ibid 316

For more information about WJ Smith, please see ‘Musical wonderland’ chapter. 317


Ibid, p52

82

WJ Smith (1925-48) was largely responsible for the entertaining the boys during their ‘exile’. Whilst

in Kent, the magazine reported that,

Last term the Director of Music added to his many musical enterprises the production of Molière’s Le

Médecin Malgré Lui in modern dress….

It is greatly to the credit of the players that many among the audience who were on their own

confession no French Scholars witnessed the performance with obvious relish, for the zest with which

the cast entered into the spirit of Molière’s fun owed more perhaps to the traditions of Hollywood

‘slapstick’ that to those of the classic French comedy. Which amply demonstrated that the

fundamentals of comedy have not changed with the centuries.319

Let’s hope these actors did not have to endure Smith’s method of inculcating French verbs… As

indicated in the Molière review,

Puff had a ‘strange knack of spotting talent’. When he heard HC (David) Franklin bellowing at the

Officer Training Corps, he told him: ‘If you can shout like that you can sing’. Franklin indeed went on

to sing Principal Bass roles at Covent Garden and Glyndebourne, after many appearances on the

Alleyn’s stage.320

Smith was no back-seat educationalist. In March 1944, the magazine reported that he went to a

conference on ‘Education for Democracy’ and spoke about it to the Fifty Club.

Mr Smith had added to the conclusions reached by the conference knowledge gained from his own

hard reading and experience. Discussion afterwards further stimulated interest in both the theory and

practice of education. An interesting and instructive talk was much appreciated.321

He later went on to publish Music in Education and, for one so involved with his pupils, it feels

pertinent that he, one who involved the boys in every project he carried out, developed his

burgeoning theories on music in education in discussion with his pupils. In his book, Smith advocates

knowing the boy, having his friendship and trust so that you discover why he is lazy, and working with

and for him until you have turned him into an industrious enthusiast.322

Hudson recognised Smith’s magic and at the end of his final concert acknowledged that Smith did

‘great and important work… during the past 24 years in giving to generations of Alleyn’s boys

something fine which would remain with them for the rest of their lives.’323

Quite a number of our boys cited Albert Spring, Headmaster of the Lower School, as their favourite

master. Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) told us that ‘the greatest influence upon me from the teaching

staff was Mr Spring who seemed to be respected by everyone. I was very fortunate to spend my

second year with Bert Spring as my form tutor.’ In the years up at Rossall, as we have seen324

, Mr

Spring’s wife, Doreen, acted as a mother to the boys. She was also a musician and an expert in

dramatic make-up. Later their son Ken (1946-66) joined the staff as art master and ‘the Spring family

319


D&M, p40 321

EAM, March 1944, p84 322

Smith, p110 323


See ‘Rossall’ chapter.

83

was the nucleus for two generations of the support team for school theatricals.’325

At Rossall, Frank

Halford (R 1942-49) remembered Bert Spring’s ‘wonderful reading voice. He would read to us on a

Sunday evening before bedtime – Prester John I recall was one book’. As we have seen, Ralph

Henderson was a great fan of Albert Spring, writing that there is a ‘…small select company of born

schoolmasters, and it is to these that we are bold to say that Mr Spring belonged.’ Henderson

concluded that

All the countless boys who have been through the Junior School owe much – some owe all – to him,

and he has had the joy of seeing them pass through the School after they have left his hands… He has

seen promise fulfilled time and time again and

(in an oddly realistic vein)

even in the case of those who were not quite so successful as they ought to have been, he could

always say to us ‘Well, you have been warned!'326

Of Ken Spring, Robert Young wrote that he spent his ‘war career as a pacifist bomb-disposal officer

and then a captaincy in the Gunners in Burma.’ This ties in with what Derek Smith recalled at our

reunion:

Mr Hughes: Ken Spring… he’d served in the war and been injured, captured was he? He was an

art teacher if I remember right?

Mr D Smith: … I remember the first term he served at Alleyn’s he was the art master and our

first project was to draw a picture of Burma – a train in the jungle. And he worked I

believe on the Burma railway…. He clearly had a ghastly time but he never spoke

about it. It was just part of the impression in my mind. At the time he didn’t really

mean much. We were just doing these paintings and drawings of trains in a jungle.

For Gordon Feeley (SLESS 1941-50), Mr Tribe, the woodwork master, was his favourite master, ‘who

I got on very well with… He taught me lots of different skills. I was never very good at it and he

taught me how to make a chessboard by stripping down a piece of wood and cutting them into

perfect shapes but when mine came out you really couldn’t tell what was white and what was

brown. I do remember one occasion when he taught us safety with tools and not to whack two

hammers together. One boy did that and ended up in hospital with a bit of metal in his eye so we

never did that again.’

Memorable masters

There are some masters who remain in the memory of our AOBs for their excellence of teaching,

their timid nature, the strictness as well as eccentricities.

Micky Stewart still remembers a rather unkind comment made to him by Geoffrey Charnley (1947-

58), the geography master who also (not surprisingly given Mr Stewart’s interaction with him) ran

cricket.

325

Young, p95 326


84

The first words he ever said to me – what, I would have been 14, I think – he just stopped whatever

he was telling us, and started looking at me for ages and said ‘Stewart, that’s not a nose you have in

the middle of your head, it is an additional limb’. And then just carried on.

The boys were as capable of making rude comments and playing cruel games on their masters. One

master, Mr Dodd (1917-55), who limped. Our AOBs had various explanations for the cause of his

limp.

Mr D Smith: Do you remember ‘Beadle Bob [or ‘Bop’ according to Peter Wrench]’?

Mr Wrench: Oh yes. He was called that because of the sound of his walk (rubber soles and creaking)

Mr D Smith: He was injured in the First World War, wasn’t he?

Mr Wrench: No he actually lost that leg under a tram in Lordship Lane.

Mr D Smith: He always came in on his stick to the form; he was a funny old boy….

Mr Wrench: It was a funny noise he made.

Mr D Smith: He’d put his stick on the front desk, then he’d hobble up and he’d start chalking up on

the board in French, and he’d look around, leaning on the desk, and then suddenly he’d come down

and start looking for his stick, and the lads had taken it all the way back to the back of the classroom

or hid it under the front desk, or something like that. He was a kindly man; it was sad, sick really.

Mr Wrench: He didn’t suffer fools gladly.

Mr D Smith: He would tell you off verbally if he found out who it was, but of course no one ever

owned up to it.

Mr Wrench: I remember on one occasion in the Upper Sixth when Peter Rodway and I were

translating, and it was about these workmen…, and Pete said all these Frenchmen were sitting there

with their hands round a hot ‘brassiere’ instead of ‘brazier’, and he said ‘Rodway!’ and rapped the

desk with his stick – so that was one of the funniest episodes with ‘the Beadle’.

Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) too remembered Mr Dodd; he ‘was a small man and never smiled; he was

clearly often in pain, but though on the verge of moroseness, he was never bad-tempered, never

raised his voice. He had been at Alleyn's since 1917….’ Mr Barnes too recalled a cruel joke played on

‘the Beadle’ – which one can’t help thinking that with a little aforethought could have been avoided

on Mr Dodd’s part:

In the corner of our form-room was a stock cupboard, where Mr Dodd kept stationery and stocks of

books for all the Sixth Forms. He would unlock the door and 'be-bop' in every morning, leaving the

key in the lock until he came out. One morning, another joker crept up when he was inside the

cupboard, shut the door and locked it. Nobody laughed, but we all waited. Sure enough, Mr Dodd

knocked on the inside of the cupboard door, politely like a chamber-maid at a hotel.... The same boy

crept out, unlocked the door and returned to his seat. Mr Dodd came out, went to the dais and his

desk, placed the pile of books there, and began the lesson. Not a word of complaint.327

Another master who perhaps shouldn’t have been in the school classroom was Dr Giles (1942-70),

English master. Dr Wetherick thought ‘He should have been a university lecturer (in Spanish

327

Barnes, p153

85

Literature). The ignorance and insensitivity of his pupils sometimes moved him to tears in class….’.

But Dr Giles managed to impress the boys on the football pitch in a match between the School 1st XI

against The Masters. Mr Holt reported we

were amazed to see that Dr Giles had been picked to play at centre-forward for the Masters XI. He

was a small, frail-looking man and I would guess, not that strong.

The match started and it was not long before we saw that Dr Giles was running rings round the

school’s defence. Nobody had told us before the match that he had been a Welsh Amateur

International centre-forward!328

Dr Giles taught English with Edward Upward (1932-61). Mr Barnes ‘found [Upward] a charming man,

very quietly spoken and gentle. There were only four or five of us in the Lower Sixth, preparing the

English subsidiary paper for Higher Certificate, so we had this brilliant man to ourselves; no class-

room was available, so we used to sit round a table on the stage in the Main Hall, discuss literature,

read poems from the set book Palgrave's Golden Treasury, discuss Shakespeare's Julius Caesar and

have our essays analysed.’329

As is widely known,

EF Upward was a minor member of the Auden/Isherwood set but I did not find out till 20 years later

that he was the most hard-line Marxist of them all. Possibly he had been warned against

indoctrinating his pupils but the effect was that he would never express an opinion on any subject,

including English literature. That limited his usefulness as a teacher.330

Mr Barnes added an interesting insight:

Like so many gifted writers of the 1930s, who had social consciences, he [Upward] joined the

Communist Party and later became disillusioned. The late 1940s was not a good time to be a

Communist, since most of us expected to be at war with the Soviet Union before the end of the

decade, and Upward was viewed with some suspicion by many boys and masters.331

I do wonder how the School reconciled its continuing appointment of a known Communist during

this time? Mr Halford, a former teacher himself, named ‘Captain JA Taylor ‘Boob’ who taught Latin’

as an excellent teacher at Alleyn’s. ‘We would repeat by rote the declensions and conjugations until

they were firmly fixed. I can still say “Bonus, bona, bonum, bone, bona, bonum” and so on until

“bonis six times”! His invariable punishment for a latecomer was to write out 100 times, “Punctuality

is the politeness of princes”.’ Mr Barnes also remembered Captain Taylor (1934-48):

He wore blue-tinted spectacles, which gave him an air of perpetual mystery, was not a tall man but

was strong and ferocious. He was also commanding officer of the Cadet Corps and ran his Latin

classes like a military drill parade. We learnt the declensions of nouns and conjugations of verbs by

reciting them in unison with him conducting us from the front....

Mr Barnes added:

…he also believed in the value of silence when he set us written exercises, total silence that is, no

shuffling of feet, no sneezing, no coughing, clearing of throats. No-one dared to whisper, hardly

328

King, p86 329

Barnes, p108 330

Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48) 331

Barnes, pp107-8

86

breathe in fact, let alone talk. One day I dropped a pencil in one of his classes, which caused him to

raise himself up from bending over the homework books he was marking on his desk and approach

me down the aisle. Uncanny how, without looking, he knew exactly where a disturbance was coming

from, even behind his back. He'd shout your name if you were quietly staring out of the window in a

daydream. I sat and waited. I feared only his voice, his sarcasm, he never used physical violence

against us and I don't remember his ever caning anyone, but his look, his voice, his presence…. 'You,

boy, have disturbed the peace, and will write out 100-times in your best copperplate “I must not hurl

my false teeth up and down the room”, and let me have them by Saturday.' No-one even dared to

giggle.332

A colleague, Mr Shackleton (1937-67), a cousin of the great explorer Ernest Shackleton, also had the

unnerving ability to identify miscreants with a sixth sense:

Mr Shackleton (we called him ‘Shack’ – behind his back, of course!) – was reputed to be the most

strict master at the school. He used to take us for both English Grammar and English Literature and

during our first English lesson, someone at the back of the class spoke. ‘Detention, Smith!’ said Mr

Shackleton, without even bothering to look up. As far as I can remember, he did not put anyone else

on detention, as nobody dared put a foot wrong after that.333

John Hughes (C 1945-51) fell foul of ‘Shack’s law’:

I was keeping goal just the other side of Townley Road. In my youth, one of my heroes was a player,

Vic Woodley, who kept goal for Derby County and Chelsea. He always wore a cap, so I borrowed my

father’s peaked cap. I was keeping goal thinking I was Vic Woodley and Mr Shackleton came by. He

said, ‘what an earth do you think you are doing boy, hand that cap over to me?’ I had to give it to him

and he said I could come and get it from the staff room; I had to go home and tell my father ‘you

won’t have your cap for the moment’. I had to retrieve it, but I never ever forgot that incident. Mr

Shackleton was beside himself because I was ‘disgracing’ the school.

Another disciplinarian was the aforementioned Mr Hutt. James Maple (Bn 1942-50) was caught, off-

site:

I remember walking home with two friends in December 1942 up Beauval Road, when we saw a holly

tree in a garden. We climbed on the garden wall and picked some branches with berries. Suddenly a

voice behind us said, ‘what are you boys doing? Do you live here?’ It was Polly Hutt. ‘No sir! We were

just picking some holly!’ ‘You are stealing some holly!’ ‘But sir, it’s only a little bit!’ ‘Oh, you know, a

young lady once stole a baby from a pram? The judge said to her, “why did you do it?” “Well, it was

only a little one!” she said. ‘Big or little, it’s still stealing,’ said Polly Hutt. I’ve always remembered.334

Sir John Maitland335

was a character. Mr Savory wrote

I have fond memories of being taught Latin by Sir John Maitland right up to Matriculation. Sir John’s

enthusiasm for his subject was such that he brought alive even such phrases as ‘All Gaul was divided

into three parts’. At the end of one term he taught us to sing ‘Sub lata castanea ego amat tu et tu

amat me’ [‘Underneath the spreading chestnut tree I loved you and you loved me’]. Sir John was also

a great character. Catching a boy running across the Quad he demanded his name; followed by, ‘and

332

Ibid, p105 333

King, p76 334


Sir John Maitland inherited the title of 6th

Baronet of Clifton in the County of Midlothian in 1936.

87

who is your Form Master?‘ ‘You are, sir,’ the boy replied. ‘Very well,’ said Sir John, ‘I’ll have a word

with him in break.’

Mr Barnes gave a good description of Sir John: he ‘… was another military man of the old breed, but

he had become eccentric and was a smallish man without an imposing presence. He was also

forgetful and absent-minded, and had probably been so for a long time…. Most of his sentences to

us used to finish, “You fool”.’336

For Mr Barnes, the key lesson he learned as a young boy who was

rather in awe of the aristocratic Sir John was that ‘He spoke to everybody, school servants,

gardeners, bus drivers and even 14-year-old schoolboys as absolute equals, everybody was worth

talking to.’337

One master was even prepared to wager his own money against his charge’s success. Mr Barnes

remembered Mr Lefevre:

…he was my history teacher… when I was preparing for the School Certificate examination in 1946.

One day he bet my half-a-crown, an enormous sum, worth about £10 today, that I would fail the

history paper. What a cheek!... He said that I didn't work hard enough. He must have been a very

shrewd psychologist, and a rich one at that, if he had very many such bets.... Mr Lefevre paid up

without a murmur.338

Another character was one of Bill Jones (R 1935-42) favourite masters, Sidney Incledon (1928-69).

Inky was an excellent physics teacher, very fit and a coach and player in practice matches with the

school soccer first XI…. Inky was with us at Maidstone, I remember more general science lessons in

the old Girls’ Grammar School. He did not go to Rossall, regrettably, and I only met him after the war

at the first Founders Day… Regarding Inky's fitness I can remember watching him playing in a 1st XI

practice match (the dreaded 'Compulsory Turnout') and out-pacing 17-18-year olds along half the

length of a soccer pitch. A great character!

Ivor Rees’s (1943-67) bold approach to the Ministry of Education’s inspection, so remiscent of the

blind confidence and enviable swagger of Henderson’s days, was reported by Young. He described

Rees as ‘one of the most competent teachers from SLES [sic]’ and he

really played [the Inspectors] up. He told the HMI that he, Ivor Rees, knew more about teaching

maths than he, the inspector, would ever know! And just left the inspector to take his form, while he,

Rees, went and chain-smoked and belly-ached in the Common Room.339

There is no mention of this incident in the actual HMIs’ report.

Two members of staff who are remembered by our AOBs creep on to the Alleyn’s stage towards the

end of this decade. They were both later to have an enormous impact on the lives on pupils and on

the School; they were the School Sergeant, Eric Randall (1948-88), and English master Michael Croft

(1950-55).

336


Ibid, p111 338

Ibid, p118 339

Young, p212

88

Discipline and prefects

Interviewer: What was the most important thing you learnt at Alleyn’s?

Mr Hirst: I think discipline.

Mr Williams: Yes, discipline.

Mr Rodway: Yes, discipline and friendship. You see discipline was different, it was very strict in our

dress and the Masters always referred to us by our surname.

Mr Williams: They all had gowns.

Mr Rodway: I don’t think I was ever referred to by my Christian name.

All our AOBs concurred that there was a certain amount of disciplined formality at Alleyn’s. As Peter

Rodway (C, 1942-50) said, first-names were never used, not even socially; John Merrill (R 1942-48)

explained that even ‘If your surname was Smith, it was Smith 1, Smith 2, Smith 3…’, or, added Peter

Reeve (C 1941-48), ‘nick-names’.

John Holt (S 1945-51) recalled that

Each morning, [the Junior School] joined the Senior School for Assembly, which was held in the Great

Hall. We all had to be seated by 9am, and at that point, the door opened and up some stairs and on to

the stage, came a rather fierce-looking lady [Dora Wiggs], followed by the Headmaster and the other

teachers. During Assembly we would sing a hymn and a psalm and say prayers, then the Headmaster

would address us, informing us of forthcoming school events and administering rockets for various

misdemeanours!340

Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48) remembered that ‘discipline was arbitrary’ and at our reunion,

our AOBs’ memories of their misdemeanours – and others’ – came tumbling out as if they had

happened only yesterday. John Cleary (B 1945-51), not realising that the long arm of Alleyn’s law

reached out beyond the confines of Townley Road, said:

I lived in Clapham, and so did one of the members of staff, Mr JA Taylor, and I was not far from my

own front door on Clapham Common. I had my blazer on, but I’d taken my cap off. He spotted me and

I got a detention for that, because I didn’t have my cap on! I was outside school, in school uniform,

without my cap on.

Mr Rodway told us about what happened to Ken Napper (D 1945-50) who fell foul of the uniform-

rules. Napper ‘was very good in all things musical’ and had been the

soloist in a Mozart piano concerto in a school concert one Saturday, and Monday morning he was

called to the Headmaster’s office, expecting to be congratulated for his performance, and the

Headmaster admonished him severely for wearing a green pullover under his school uniform.

Given the shortages and dependence on clothing coupons at the time, this admonishment seems a

little unfair. Dr Wetherick made me laugh out loud with this particular misdemeanour:

One senior boy was publicly caned for looking at a display of female undergarments in a shop

window, in school uniform.

340

King, p74

89

Adding more prosaically, ‘I myself was threatened with the cane for failing to clean my glasses’.

In the aftermath of the war, there was felt to be a disintegration of discipline among young people.

Towards the end of this decade, young people ‘generally were increasingly being perceived as a

social category – and social problem – of their own’341

. This is an issue which WJ Smith referred to in

his book, Music in Education:

Finally there is contained in these pages [of Music in Education] an appeal for a new understanding of

the word 'discipline'. It will probably be urged that discipline is a crying need of to-day. Six years of

war, unduly high wages among young people, certain films, and a weakness in parental control have

all done their worst.342

Corporal punishment

Corporal punishment appears to have been part of the fabric of the School; Derek Smith (R 1947-53)

explained ‘we had no choice [but to accept corporal punishment]; everywhere you went there was

the slipper on the cupboard or the cane...’

Robert Young, history master, outlined the supposed guidelines relating to masters administering

corporal punishment at Alleyn’s:

Beating by the Staff could only be carried out by form masters on members of their own form, or by

House-masters on members of their own House, and it had to be carried out in the lower changing

room in the presence of another Master, and after the Housemaster had been consulted. This was to

prevent it happening when either Master or boy had lost his temper.

All well and good but Derek Smith remembered his friend receiving a caning without the ‘safety’ of a

witness:

Mr MacDonald, the Latin teacher, caught my class mate looking out the window, because we were on

the top floor, looking out over Townley Road, and he was caught looking out the window, and he was

taken down straight to the basement (no witness!), and when he came back, after, he showed me his

back, and he had these stripes all the way down and across his back, not just on the backside, as it

should have been... and he was a chap who wouldn’t cry, and he was in tears.

Alan Thomas (SLESS 1940-41) owned up to the indignity of having been caned: he hadn’t been

very naughty. I was talking during a class – I think I was set up, that’s my defence anyway – and I was

sent to the Headmaster, Dr Hack. I was caned on the hand – worse than the pain was the

embarrassment when I went back to the classroom.

Hearing and reading some of these accounts makes me suspect that some of the masters were

bordering on the sadistic. Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) described a particularly awful episode:

Dr Eccott, nickname 'Old Buzz', goodness knows why, who was distinguished by immense, sticking-out

ears like jug-handles, would read to us from elevating tomes such as Darwin's Origin of Species. One

such morning, when the fog was thick outside and the windows of our form room on the top floor

were misting over, I sat in my favoured position by the window near the back of the class, quietly

dreaming and trying to keep awake – sleeping in an Eccott class was a heinous offence, punishable by

341

Kynaston, p368 342

Smith, p15

90

three strokes of the cane.... I turned to the window now covered inside by condensation and drew

with my finger a round circle, then inspiration filling my being, I added two big round eyes and a

banana mouth turned down, then two huge circular ears that no-one could mistake. But to avoid

error, I decided to give the work a title. I began to write underneath the drawing 'Old Bu...' I got no

further, but felt an mighty thwack around my left ear, numbing the whole of that side of my face and

knocking me sideways into the wall. He'd seen me and he'd crept up on me and he'd delivered

judgement and punishment all in one fell swipe. Nothing was said. Silence reigned and Old B went

back to the front of the class and continued from where he'd been so rudely interrupted.343

Gallantly, Mr Barnes doesn’t appear to bear any grudges and continued:

Not all our masters – they were never called teachers – were quite so brutal as Dr Eccott, but they all

had their ways, and, of course, in those days summary physical punishment was an accepted means

of keeping control (or wreaking vengeance, as in the case of my Eccott-battered ear).344

In our 1930s oral history project, David Alexander (B 1933-42) recalled Robert Young’s way of

keeping control. Young’s ‘method of keeping order was to seize you by the hair and whirl your head

around. It was painful but effective’345

. It is interesting to read Young’s own observations on corporal

punishment during the pre-war and post-war years:

Before the war a sore bottom conferred a boost to the ego of the recipient. After the war it was

dismissed as sadism on the part of the staff, and masochism on the part of the pupil, and degrading to

both.346

One who was a pupil on the cusp of these years was John Hughes (C 1945-51) who philosophically

admitted that ‘in the end it paid you to obey orders or the rules, because the alternative [corporal

punishment] just wasn’t worth exploring. So in general you did as you were told, because life was

much easier than if you tried to kick over the traces, with punishment not being very pleasant.’

Admonishments and rewards

Praise should not be withheld. Be gracious, ready and pleased to observe improvement even in so

small a matter as a clean neck.347

Fortunately, not all masters and mistresses resorted to physical punishment. Peter Wrench (C 1945-

49) told us about the punishment inflicted on him by Mr Taylor:

I remember coming into the class one day, and we were all making a hell of a racket, and he had to

pick on somebody, so unfortunately his gaze happened to fall on me, and I had to write 500 times ‘I

must learn not to throw my false teeth into the next county’. I’d never quite forgotten those lines.

Detentions were also meted out and remembered by our AOBs. Mr Holt wrote that ‘we had to

attend School on Saturday mornings therefore detention was held on Saturday afternoons between

2-4pm, where one usually had to write out lines, which was jolly monotonous’348

. Derek Smith

343

Barnes, pp103-4 344

Ibid, p104 345

‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, p76 346

Young, p92 347

Smith, p110 348

King, p76

91

resented detention because it could be held on one of the sport afternoons, ‘which deprived you of

playing football and cricket, and you had to work on “Daddy” Haslam’s garden area, where you

would dig and dig all afternoon, or you would go in a classroom and do some lines or some silly

lesson or something’.

Happily, the boys weren’t all deserving of punishment. There were incentives if boys managed to

avoid the cane, the silence room and detention. Alan Tait (Tn 1940-45) remembered the ‘Good

Conduct Holiday’: this

took place once a month, where those who didn’t have a detention or a cane would get to go home,

at mid-day one Friday. You would go off and do your own thing, and it was a really good idea which

made a lot students behave. I sincerely recommend for Dr Savage to reinstate it.

Indeed…..

Colours too were given out – as they are today – to recognise a commitment to, and prowess in, a

particular area of School life. Young despaired (again) that

Mr Hudson refused in his headmastership to give colours to younger boys. He still regarded such an

action as likely to make them swollen-headed.

Young took as his example to illustrate Hudson’s pig-headedness from the following decade, but it is

worth recording here: ‘I even had an argument with [Hudson] when young David Fournel [S 1953-

57], at the age of 16, broke the school long-jump record. I wanted to give him full colours, but

Hudson dug his feet in and absolutely refused to allow such an award to one so young’349

.

Another bizarre ruling that many of our AOBs sniggered at was the rule that JAGS girls must ‘walk on

one side of the road – on the top side – and we had to stay on the school side (west)’350

. Mr Wrench

elaborated: ‘The headmistress of JAGS at the time made a ruling that her “gals” weren’t to stand at

the same bus stop going home. Obviously we all met up on the bus anyway but…’ The schools

seemed to do their best to avoid the twain from meeting: Derek Smith explained

We weren’t allowed out until [the JAGS girls] passed us. We used to watch them going by. I think they

finished at quarter to four and we weren’t allowed out until the hour.

Mr Merrill was punished for consorting with a JAGS girl:

I used to get the 62 or the 58 tram into school that came down the road there, and we were told, as

the entrance to our school was on this side, you will be on the right-hand pavement, and the JAGS

girls on the left-hand pavement. But it so happened that I had a neighbour whose daughter used to

catch the 58 or the 62 with me, and invariably both of us appeared to be late, I don’t know why, but I

was very good at geography, and she wasn’t, and she was good at maths, and I wasn’t, so we used to

sit on the back of the tram doing our homework like this, so it seemed natural to me to walk on the

other side of the road with her and about the third time that I did this, I was called in, told what the

rules were, and I disobeyed it, and I got six of the best, for walking up the other side of the road with

a JAGS girls.

349

Young, p231 350

Derek Smith (R 1947-53)

92

This segregation was meted out beyond Townley Road. Alan Eaglen (Tn 1939-44) recalled that ‘if you

were taking the train down at Herne Hill to go home, the boys from SLESS had to walk on the right

side and the girls on the left.’

School uniform

One boy was caught out on this route by the long reach of Alleyn’s rules. Mr Wrench remembered

the incident: ‘one of the senior boys, he might have even been a school prefect, was expelled for

being caught smoking wearing school uniform in Half Moon Lane.’ I wonder if he would have been

expelled had he not been wearing school uniform?

Derek Smith reminded us that the school uniform ‘was a sign of pride too, you had pride in being at

the school, whenever you walked around, you wanted to wear it’. The boys wore boaters,

introduced by RB Henderson as an outward sign to get ‘us out from being at an ordinary grammar

school to a public school’351

.Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41) added that the ‘uniform was a discipline

worn with pride as the insignia of the particular school I had aspired to since the age of nine’.

It sounded as if the boys themselves gave their masters (and mistresses) a run for their money.

Young described how

The pupils would soon inform the teacher if he were to become unintelligible. Londoners loved wise-

cracks. If you used a word they did not know, such as the radio word 'juxtaposition', they would

mutter: 'We had one, but we put it in the pink plant pot, and it died!' Instead of rebuking, it was up to

the teacher to rephrase his remarks!352

Prefects

…the House system is strongly rooted and discipline based largely on an efficient body of prefects.353

The inspectors who visited in 1950 observed that these prefects ‘have power to punish any boy

above the Lower School; in fact internal discipline is largely in the hands of the prefects’354

. John

Williams (R 1943-49) shared an incident that, keen cricketer that he still is, must still rankle today:

An incident of discipline was the morning after I had made a 50 for the Junior School. Because of a

train delay, I came through the school gates 10 minutes late. The prefects on duty put a line under my

name and this was reported to Bert Spring, the Junior Head. At assembly he announced that Williams

(no Christian names used then) was 10 minutes late this morning and should this happen again, he

will not be playing for the School again this term. With that discipline, I took to getting an earlier train

thereafter, so as to not miss being in the School cricket 1st

XI.

Mr Eaglen mentioned the role of prefects in the supervision of boys at Alleyn’s.

I don’t know if anybody else can remember, but there was a silence room in which you were

supervised by a prefect and had to sit in for the whole of lunch playtime. It was a punishment which

could be given out by the masters and School prefects, unlike the cane which could only be used by

the Headmaster. You were not allowed to do anything but sit in silence, arms folded.

351

Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) 352

Young, pp210-11 353


HMIs’ report, p20

93

The prefect-system had been brought in by RB Henderson, Mr Reeve said, as one of the many ways

to ‘turn the School into a public school’. Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) remembered the prefects as

having ‘considerable responsibility – generally exercised sensibly and were respected’, although Mr

Merrill felt that ‘there were always some that were a little bit power-crazy...’. Derek Smith felt that

‘Generally they were respected, although some were considered a bit odd and others too

authoritarian. They ensured good behaviour in and outside School…’.

Mr Barnes, a School prefect, gave an interesting account of the scope of prefects’ duties and powers:

The School prefects had their own hut beside the main School building, where we met to discuss the

orders of the day, mainly looking after out-of-class discipline and stewarding School events and public

performances. We were allowed to cane offenders (I never did…). This had to be done before two

witnesses, who had to sign the entry in the punishment book made with the prefect administering the

caning. And we could give lines and keep people in detention. We were in fact the non-commissioned

officers for the teaching staff, and the School Captain was the Sergeant Major, who attended staff

meetings and had the ear of the Headmaster himself.355

There were two types of prefects at Alleyn’s: a House prefect and a School prefect. Mr Williams

explained the difference: ‘School prefects read the lesson EVERY morning and I believe had the right

to cane.’ As we have seen, Mr Williams knew from first-hand experience that these School prefects:

stood at the main gate and took names of late pupils or those that were improperly dressed. House

prefects looked after House matters in ensuring discipline was maintained.

For those prefects at Rossall, they added a guardianship role for their younger House members to

their duties. You can feel the warmth in Michael Gilbert’s (T 1944-50) recollection of his prefect, Jack

Lanchbery:

At that time, at nearly 11 years old, I was the youngest boy in the School [at Rossall]. Jack Lanchbery

was responsible for lights-out and at my dormitory he drew up the rules of our secret society, which

he sealed with the sealing-wax impression of his skull signet ring – we all adored him, and coveted his

skull ring too!356

Professor Leinster-Mackay (D 1943-50) wrote that at Rossall there was more scope for the exercise

of

leadership; invigilation of House prep; assembling others for House prayers before retirement to bed;

supervision of younger boys at mealtimes; supervision of House games and sports; supervision of

younger boys at mealtimes; supervision of letterwriting on Sundays – the opportunities for service

were legion compared with the 36 hours in a normal week of day school. As for School prefects –

those gladiators of gubernatorial power – their opportunities for leadership were much extended at

Rossall, not least of which was the responsibility of ensuring the safe arrival of new boys after a long

journey from Euston Station by the LMS Railway. They took on duties which you might say were,

pardon the pun, in loco parentis.357

355

Barnes, p155 356

D&M pp53-54 357

DLM, p10

94

Interestingly, by the end of this decade, prefects for younger boys in a day school were deemed

inappropriate – a point commented on by the inspectors; they reported that the Headmaster

[Hudson] and his staff believed

that when a boy of 11 years of age enters a large community from his primary or preparatory school

he is not sufficiently mature to take part in the full activities of a school run on the prefectorial

system. For two years [in the Lower School], therefore, [the pupil] is treated like a preparatory school

boy and at 13 is usually ready to play games organised by boys and to react satisfactorily to the

discipline of prefects.358

The drift and movement of boys caused by war meant that the usual year-long tenure of a School

Captaincy was shattered. School Captains would sometimes only hold office for a term – John

McAnuff (T 1936-43) was surprised, 70 years later, to be reminded that he had been School Captain,

albeit for just one term, in May 1943. In June 1941 JE Silvester was reported in the magazine as

being ‘Captain of the School for this term. Last term it was DG Bickford-Smith – he left to join the

RAFVR’359

.

The prefects – and Allison – at Rossall put on many concerts to entertain the boys. I suspect there

are a number of in-jokes in this tongue-in-cheek review of a Prefects’ Concert which was reported in

the magazine:

The rising hopes and fears of the day were at once forgotten with the announcement of an opening

item by ‘Allison’s Fallen Angels’, AP Herbert’s ingenious farce entitled ‘Hamlet, PC’, in which the title-

role was played by GN Coulter, a sketch, and community singing ably led by Sam Small, and a familiar

song by the Headmaster led to the climax of the evening – a grand new ballet.

We beg to quote from the local press: ‘Last night we saw a magnificent ballet with choreography by J

Lanchberikoff, a full corps de ballet, and pas seul by K Millerski… We did, however, observe a slight

disharmony between the simplicity of the décor and the lavish ensemble which imparted so aetherial

a quality to the prima ballerina’s perfect sense of movement. This new interpretation of Ponchielli’s

immortal masterpiece brings out to the full its sparkling vivacity, and M Lanchberikoff is warmly to be

congratulated on his venture. At the close of the performance MR Albert Rogers, the distinguished

horticulturalist, presented Mme Millerski with a beautiful bouquet de rutabaga as a token of

appreciation.’360

Being made a House Captain or School prefect was – and still is – a huge accolade. Mr Barnes was

made a House Captain and a School prefect, ‘giving me the great honour of being allowed to wear

the badge of Alleyn's College of God's Gift embossed in gold filament on the breast pocket of my

blazer’361

. This would lead to his later embarrassment as the ‘gold embossed badge bearing the….

the words 'God's Gift' on the breast pocket of our school blazer,’ would cause people to say, 'Ah,

here comes God's Gift'.’362

358


EAM, June 1941, p431 360

EAM, March 1942, p522 361

Barnes, p155 362

Ibid, p109

95

The House system

‘It seems a long time since 120 new and rather bewildered boys sat in the Great Hall waiting to hear

their fate – their Forms, their Houses and their Form Masters… Since that time these boys have

become quite at home, and are well on the way to becoming real Alleyn’s boys.’ Edward Alleyn

Magazine, February 1948, p409

This scene, rather reminiscent of the Hogwart’s Sorting Hat ceremony, emphasises the importance

of the House to the running of Alleyn’s School. ‘Real Alleyn’s boys’ had been divided into Houses

since 1907. The House system was key in building up a sense of community and responsibility for

fellow House members, who all operated under the guidance of a Housemaster who played – as

they continue to play today – a pastoral role over the welfare of pupils. Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49)

explained:

[The] House Captain… with the help of 'Prefects', other senior sixth formers, administered discipline

and organised compulsory games, mainly team games like rugby [sic] and cricket, with teams under

the direction of a team captain. These were said to teach discipline and unquestioning obedience.363

The House system had been expanded by RB Henderson – who added two Houses (Dutton’s and

Tyson’s) to the original six – and, as we shall see, it was flexible enough to adapt to changing

circumstances.

The House system went into abeyance when Alleyn’s was evacuated to Maidstone and boys were

billeted in villages all around Kent. However, when the Junior and Senior School boys were reunited

at Rossall the House system was reinstated and assisted in the acclimatisation of peripatetic London

day school boys into boarding school life in the wilds of the North West coast.

Back in London at SLESS, a new House system was adopted immediately as a way to group the new

pupil recruits. The Alleyn’s system of eight houses was used and these were given new names, after

Alleyn’s masters364

: a subtle way of branding SLESS under the Alleyn’s umbrella.

At Rossall, each of the eight houses had to suffer doubling-up with another and endure being re-

named at Rossall. Micky Stewart (T 1944-51) explained to our interviewers that ‘there were two

houses in each of the four buildings’ around Rossall’s main quadrangle which Alleyn’s used. Thus

Crescent House held Brading’s and Tulley’s, Rose House hosted Cribb’s and Roper’s, The Hall held

court to Brown’s and Dutton’s, and Spread Eagle (sometimes written as Spreadeagle) House

accommodated Spurgeon’s and Tyson’s. The Junior School boys went into James House.

In describing their new home in The Hall, the boys of Brown’s and Dutton’s proudly wrote:

There is something particular about ‘the Hall’: the very inclusion of a definite article raises us up

above those affiliated to mere heraldic symbols. We occupy a modern building, we live by the main

entrance drive to the school and we enjoy a very pleasant garden; but naturally there are drawbacks.

363

Barnes, p108 364

Allison, Bryant, Crewe, Evan, Fowler, McClymont, Rudd, Wright.

96

Instead of small studies we inhabit two large common rooms, but then the luxuries of big windows,

wide stairs and an efficient hot water system compensates greatly for that.365

The boys in Spread Eagle reported how they adapted to their new home and united a disparate body

of members:

January, 1941, found Spurgeon’s House combined with Tyson’s under the name of Spread Eagle and

firmly established as one body. Although one half of the boys in the House who had arrived from

Wales were complete strangers to the other half from Maidstone, a sensible spirit of co-operation

soon assured the smooth running of the House, and the unbounded enthusiasm of its younger

members was guided by its seniors into profitable channels and made itself apparent by the

unparalleled success of the House in the realms of physical activity.366

Other realms of activity were explored to build on each of the Houses’ spirit of co-operation. Spread

Eagle ‘revived the annual House supper, which was held in the lower dormitory… the House was glad

to welcome the Headmaster and Mrs Allison to their first House supper at Alleyn’s – the first House

supper,’ no less, ‘to which ladies have been admitted.’367

During the war, Housemasters attempted to keep their former members informed about House

matters but the difficulties of evacuation made this nigh on impossible. The Housemasters used the

magazine to announce that ‘they would therefore be very glad to hear from Old Boys of their

Houses, especially those in the services’ but very few reports from Old Boys followed; I suspect this

was largely due to the limits imposed by censorship. Certainly after the war there is a flurry of war-

time accounts from AOBs published in the magazine.

Spending Christmas away from their families must have been hard for the boys (and their parents):

often it was too dangerous for boys to return to London so they would have to stay in their

evacuated exile. Crescent House offered the magazine readers a chipper Christmas scene:

Christmas comes but once a year, and even the most fatigued of us suddenly discovered unknown

energy at the end of a wearying term. Lured on by a mental vision of a rumoured but elusive

Christmas pudding, Crescent prepared for its first House Supper. And after such a filling and hilarious

evening, we looked back more complacently on the term’s work.368

Spread Eagle, for its final House Supper at Rossall, had for its guests of honour no less a local

dignitary than the Mayor of Fleetwood and – and another lady – his Mayoress369

.

Some sixty years on, when our AOBs are asked to which House they belonged, many will still quote

their war-time House name, e.g. Spread Eagle, McClymont’s (as well as their Alleyn’s one).

After the war there is a sense that some efforts were being made to reconsolidate the original

identity of the Houses back on their home turf at Alleyn’s. It wasn’t easy. The writer of the

Spurgeon’s House report complained:

365

EAM, June 1941, p434 366

Ibid, June 1941, p436 367




97

One point is clear – that a very considerable improvement [in inter-House activities] is necessary. The

support of several members of the House has been outstanding but the majority have lagged behind.

Not until every member of Spurgeon’s pulls his weight shall we reach a better standard. We hope that

all members will take note of this and that next term will see much greater enthusiasm and effort. 370

Perhaps this disinclination to play for the House was a reflection of what was happening on the

wider national stage. After years of ‘pulling together’ behind the war-effort – be it fighting at the

Front or collecting milk bottle tops at home or obeying countless war-time regulations (which

continued long into the post-war period), the public was starting to assert the rights of the private

individual. In 1945 the writer and broadcaster JB Priestley put it succinctly:

There seems to be far less kind and neighbourly co-operation than there was a few years ago, during

the worst of the war years…. People are harder, more selfish, more intent upon looking after Number

One. They are more likely to snatch, grab, lose their temper.371

A year after the Spurgeon’s complaint, Cribb’s joined the lament too:

Success in the House is due always to complete co-operation between the prefects and the other

members of the House. This is not possible when we have a small minority who hatch up trivial

excuses to prevent their taking part in House activities. Let’s have fewer of these excuses and make

the running of the House an easier task. 372

In 1950 the inspectors commented that,

The House system is emphasised much more than is usually done in a day school and boys are

encouraged to spend as much of their leisure time as possible on the School premises.373

However, by the end of this decade, a ray of reform appears amongst the Alleyn’s authorities,

possibly as a reargard action against the disintegration of a sense of community: the parents’ ‘At

Home’. The magazine writers explained its format:

Each fortnight the Housemasters and House Tutors of two Houses have given jointly an ‘At Home’ to

the parents of the boys in those Houses. They have been extremely successful. The attendance of

parents has been good and the gathering has enabled the masters and prefects to meet parents more

easily than they would otherwise have done.374

The wags on the magazine had a field day in reporting it, almost as an anthropological exercise:

‘Townley School was in the throes of a social revolution. At long last it had been decided to let the

parents meet the masters, if the shock to the former would not be too great.’375

Parody aside, this was a new – if not radical – function at Alleyn’s. By inviting the parents to meet

their sons’ Housemaster (and House prefects), the School was heralding the collaboration between

school, pupil and parent that exists today. This initiative was light years away from the School

370

Ibid, June 1947, p344 371

JB Priestley in Letter to a Returning Soldier, quoted in Kynaston, p180. 372

EAM, November 1948, p469; the House Captain for this year was one of our AOB-interviewees, Peter

Reeve…. 373


EAM, May 1949, pp573-74 375

Ibid, p547

98

prospectus of the preceding decade: ‘The School has full claim on the time of the boys on all week-

days during term’376

. John Bate (T 1932-39) perceived that Henderson’s attitude was ‘that during the

term the boy belonged to the School and only went home to sleep, to be fed and watered, and to do

his homework.’377

By hosting these ‘At Homes’, Young noted how Alleyn’s was leading the field in terms of

collaboration with parents: ‘parents' meetings were one of the Alleyn's specialities long before they

became an item of educational policy…’378

He wrote,

After the war we had dozens of Parent's meetings, at which they could query what their sons were

being taught, and how….

Churlishly adding, ‘The only parents treated with decent respect were those who were OBs.’379

At

Speech Day in 1948, the Bishop of Bath and Wales expounded his views about education:

This cannot be done by the School alone - it means the active co-operation of the boys and their

parents. I cannot over-emphasise the importance of this last factor, a good home influence.

Nowadays it is all too common to find a home where there was an irregularity of some kind.380

Those inspectors looked approvingly on, perhaps even taking note:

Parents are encouraged to keep in close touch with him [the Housemaster], and he and his Tutors and

House Prefects are 'at home' to parents at informal gatherings in the School Buttery.381

It is interesting to see that Alleyn’s first tentative steps towards a more modern-day approach to

education was structured within the reassuring familiarity of its House system.

376

Referenced in the Board of Education’s Inspection Report on Alleyn’s, 1932, cited in ‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’,

p27. 377

Ibid 378

Young, p220. Today Alleyn’s hosts ‘Year 9 House at Home’ meetings for parents. 379

Ibid, p99 380


HMIs’ report, p20

99

Curriculum

‘The School sets out to develop latent tastes and to implant worthwhile tastes where none apparently

exists. There can be no doubt that the School provides every opportunity for the all-round growth and

development of the boys entrusted to its care.’ HMIs’ report, 1950, p20

The school day

Monday you had a full day. Tuesday and Thursday were half-days and other half-day was Friday. The

Corps took place on Friday afternoon after one afternoon period. Saturday morning was a normal

school day, it was in the afternoon that there was sport, but this was mainly school sport. Detention

took place on Saturday afternoon and was for one or two hours, depending on how many detentions

one had earned.382

In addition, Derek Smith (R 1947-53) clarified, Tuesday and Thursday afternoons were spent playing

sport. In this decade, the boys were divided into an ‘Arts Side’ and a ‘Science Side’. Roy Barnes (Bn

1942-49) explained the system:

The A (Arts) stream studied no science after the Fourth Form, but mathematics was kept since it was

a compulsory subject for School Certificate. The Science side of the school dropped most of the Arts

subjects except those necessary for the School Certificate, English and one foreign language.383

John Holt (S 1945-51) remembered being relieved at being able to drop physics and chemistry: ‘I did

not really like these subjects and was not much good at them, so I was pleased when, at the start of

the next school year, I was placed in the Arts stream, as opposed to the Science stream and I was

able to drop these two subjects.384

Let us hope that the dividing of the boys into each side wasn’t

quite as arbitrary as Mr Barnes’s experience of being selected to study either German or Greek:

Our Form Master, MJ Gallymore (no-one ever knew what those initials stood for)…. placed himself in

front of the class between the front desks of the two middle lines…. And from there he pointed his

arm straight along the gap, 'All on my right do German, all on my left do Greek', and that was that.385

The boys

All the boys at Alleyn's were exceedingly quick on the uptake…. I had map-reading in the Corps to do

with the 16 year olds for Certificate A, and they had mastered the whole technique of map and

compass in a couple of hours. After I went to OCTU386

in 1939 it took 12 hours with Officer Cadets to

cover the same ground, and when in 1941 I was doing the same with N.C.O. Cadres in the Essex

Regiment of Conscripts, it took them 28 hours! So I was blessed with clever pupils.387

Derek Smith remembered that in his ‘first year in the Junior School at Alleyn’s consisted of four

classes – 3A, B, C, D, each with about 30 pupils (my previous school had 35 or more). The boys were

put in classes of up to 30’. The inspectors of 1950 logged that

382

John Cleary (B 1945-51) 383

Barnes, pp98-99 384

King, p76 385

Barnes, p100 386

Officer Cadet Training Unit 387

Young, pp92-93

100

No boys are now admitted below the age of 11 and 247 boys aged 11-13+ grouped in eight classes

now constitute the Lower School and are in [the] charge of their own Head Master. The course

followed by these boys covers the first two years of what is normally regarded as the Grammar School

Course.388

Complying with changes imposed by the Ministry of Education, by the end of the decade, there had

been ‘an educational revolution. The old order of Third, Shell, Fourth, Remove and Fifth Forms has

been superseded by First, Second, Third, Fourth and Fifth Forms. Two new Remove Forms have been

introduced for those boys who need an extra year before entering the Fifth Form: Tempora

mutantur, et nos mutamur in illis’? 389

Robert Young showed an insight into the mind-set of schoolboys’ writing, ‘I really enjoyed the vitality

and enthusiasm of the boys… We indulged in what later years have in their wisdom, or lack of it,

described as “elitism”. Children naturally want to do better at everything than their

contemporaries.’390

However, the inspectors found that a ‘few of the Masters, either because of

inexperience or because of present incapacity to adjudge correctly the pace at which a Grammar

School boy may reasonably be expected to work, are not stretching the boys sufficiently.’391

As we have seen, both during the war and after it, the staff were hampered by what they could

achieve by shortages of equipment. Young baldly complained that ‘…there weren't enough copies of

the text books…’.392

It was a common complaint.

With too many pupils, too few books, too little equipment – some classes even had to share pencils –

teachers did heroic work, but, for the first time since education had become compulsory in 1870,

education standards dropped. By 1943 the LCC inspectors were finding that twice as many children

aged 13 to 14 could not manage a simple reading book as 20 years before, that the number of mis-

spellings in a simple composition had doubled, that performance in arithmetic, history and geography

was ‘appreciably lower’, and the children’s ability to express themselves in writing was ‘extremely

low’. Education, it was often said, was the first casualty of the war, and despite the 1944 Education

Act, the basis of post-war educational reform, an unfortunate minority bear the scars of wartime

conditions to this day.393

Nevertheless, the inspectors conceded that in Alleyn’s case, there was cause for hope:

The School appears wholly excellent in the social side of the education that it offers. On the

intellectual side, although in general a satisfactory standard is reached by the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh

years, the quality of many of the boys at present in the School suggests that, with surer foundations

laid in the first two years of the course and with a greater variety of courses designed to meet the

various capacities and abilities of the boys, the work might be touched with distinction.394

Mr Barnes’s experience does not quite tally with what the inspectors saw. He wrote that

388


EAM, November 1949, p588; ‘Times change, and we change with them.’ 390

Young, p198 391


Young, p210 393

Longmate, p192 394

HMIs’ report, 1950, p21

101

The pressure was on all of us to pass examinations, eventually win scholarships to the old universities

and bring honour to the school. Competition and achievement were the driving force and success at

exams was the route we had to take.395

Young echoed Mr Barnes’s observations of competitiveness, declaring:

There was none of the modern doctrine [at Alleyn's] that the over-achievement of some was bad for

the under-achievement of others. We make no apology for this. In a grammar school the top 15% of

the child population must be fully engaged. Attempts to abandon marks and orders may have some

importance in schools for the handicapped, but in a grammar school such ideas were most approved

of by naturally idle masters, and enthusiastically echoed by naturally idle boys. We heard little of it in

the immediate post-war years.396

Education in war

I do remember someone saying, before the war had ended and before the atomic bombs had

dropped on Japan, have you heard about how Hitler’s got one of these terrible bombs and the whole

of England is going to be blown up? It worried me stiff. There were several of my friends who

discussed this, I do remember it at the time, very worrying, I didn’t know what it was. It wasn’t called

an atomic bomb but it went through the school that Hitler had got this thing. And you know, I think

education then was secondary, you just wanted to get through your lives really and sport and running

and music and everything was a diversion away from getting down to things. That’s why, probably

many of us, not all, but many of us didn’t do particularly well at school – because we just had to get

through it.397

The examining boards were aware of the disruption to children’s education. In 1940, the Oxford and

Cambridge Schools Examination Board instructed that

to make allowance as far as possible for wartime difficulties, the Awarders of certificates will be

instructed to maintain approximately the normal percentages of passes… The Awarders will also have

before them examination results of each School in previous years and… the Board will be glad to

receive from Schools, before the examination begins, reports of their special difficulties and of the

conditions under which they have been working… Schools may also submit the opinions of the staff as

to the subjects in which a candidate would have been expected to pass, or pass with credit, had the

conditions been normal.398

Our AOBs recounted some truly frightening exam experiences. Bill Jones (R 1935-42) in an email told

us about Sir John Maitland’s [Dom’s] method of invigilating an exam: if it weren’t so awful it would

be pure comedy:

My main memory of Dom was of his invigilation of the 1940 General School Certificate Latin exam, in

the old Maidstone Girls Grammar school which Alleyn’s had taken over. His speech was quite clipped.

'The exam will last three hours'; 'There will be no extension of this time'; 'If the air raid siren sounds

you will carry on work'; ‘If danger is close I will say "DOWN" and you will get under your desks'; 'When

danger is passed I will say "UP" and you will get on with the exam'.

395

Barnes, p99 396

Young, p198 397

John Williams (R 1943-49) 398

Longmate, p195

102

After about half an hour the alert sounded, shortly there was sound of machine gun fire from high up

followed by a screaming power dive and "DOWN" and we all went below desks. The dive ended in a

huge crash and amazing silence.

‘Stop talking that boy at the back – UP’. We all emerged from under our desks, including Sir John and

resumed our exam. It was the only exam that I ever failed; I am not sure the air raid was to blame.

Gerald Moss (S 1938-47) who was at SLESS, remembered

sitting a Matriculation examination during an air-raid. We were expected to work through the din of

an anti-aircraft barrage and only when the whistle of one of the lookout boys was heard did the

master say, ‘All right boys, under your desks!’ Then, as soon as the bomb had exploded not too close

by, we had to resume working on the examination. It is a wonder that any of us passed.399

Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) told us that in 1945 all the boys ‘in the Upper Sixth science’ who took

Higher School Certificate failed. As Mr Reeve mused, ‘now, that takes some doing.’ By way of an

explanation, Mr Reeve proffered that the boys may have thought ‘why should I worry too much, I’m

going to be called up anyway?’. Certainly this rang true for Mr Howlett who ‘couldn’t wait to leave

here and go and play soldiers and do National Service.’

Perhaps these boys were in Brian Savory’s (Bn 1938-45) form up at Rossall? He recalled that

Our final term (summer 1945) was spent half at Rossall and half at Townley Road. All of us were

prefects and were deeply involved in the re-settlement in London, so much so that all but one in UVIS

failed Higher School Certificate. Thus came about the oft quoted remark of Mr PW Norris, our senior

mathematics teacher: ‘Oh dear, oh dear. I’ve taught you all I know and still you know nothing.’

Whilst there is no detail given of what the exam results were for 1945 – Allison at Speech Day simply

recorded that the ‘examination results had on the whole been satisfactory’. 400

A year later, the

magazine recorded that ‘13 boys passed the Oxford and Cambridge Higher School, and 13 the

London Higher School; 51 passed the London General School…. In the two Higher School Exams

there were 11 Distinctions.’401

For those not familiar with the exam system that existed in the 1940s,

Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) explained that, for General School Certificate,

you had fewer subjects than today. Someone had, say, seven subjects… and if you got five credits you

passed matriculation as well. And of course, if you were really academic, and wanted to go on to

university after Higher School Cert., it was Oxford or Cambridge, and if you didn’t go to Oxford or

Cambridge you didn’t go to university.

Both the General and Higher School Certificates were abolished in 1951 following the introduction of

O’levels and A’levels.

Alan Thomas (SLESS 1940-41) recounted that in ‘three years, I’d been to seven different schools and

taken correspondence courses. The social class, curricula, clothing, and the quality of teaching varied

enormously – a series of culture shocks. I failed every subject in Matric!’ Happily for Mr Thomas,

‘more postal courses ensured success.’

399




103

Library

The library at Alleyn’s was a place ‘where we could sit and read in breaks and after school, consult

reference books, do homework, write or do whatever intellectual thing suited us, so long as we

didn't make a noise.’402

After the war, Young noted that ‘Alleyn's had about a couple of 100 [books] –

the rest of the pre-war stock had either been lost during the evacuation and the rail journeys

between Maidstone, London and Rossall, or they had simply been pinched.’403

The inspectors agreed

(for once) with Young:

…the library ranks are thin and the School would profit very considerably if a special grant could be

made to the Library at this juncture. In almost every subject authoritative reference books are lacking

and the number of reference books suitable and likely to attract boys in the First, Second, Third and

Fourth years in the School is very small.404

Indeed, the inspectors credit Young with lending the boys history books: ‘The School owes much to

the generosity of the senior History Master who has placed his private collection of books freely at

the disposal of both Senior and Junior boys.’405

The curriculum in the post-war years

Indeed education is in the air, but what sort of education?406

The war was won, the Education Act of 1944 was in place and a bright new world order was

expected. It didn’t arrive. As we have seen, Britain descended into years of austerity, years which, at

times, tested the mettle of the British public more than the bombs of the Luftwaffe had.

After the reunion of the Rossall boys and SLESS boys at Townley Road, it took time for educational

standards to settle back to normality. At Speech Day, Hudson apologised for ‘the fewness of the

Higher School Certificates and University Scholarships,’ explaining that this, ‘was due in a great

measure to the fact that the numbers of boys at the top of the school were very small; this would

right itself in time.’407

The inspectors put it more bluntly:

The number of boys over the age of 16 years at the time of the Inspection was 147, of whom 82 were

in the Sixth Forms. This comparatively low figure is due to several causes, perhaps the most important

of which is the fact that all boys who were members of the Emergency School and who wished to

enter Alleyn's School were admitted without any entrance test five years ago.408

However, the inspectors duly reported that – in Modern Languages at least – there had been ‘some

encouraging success in examinations for Higher School Certificates and University Scholarships have

been achieved recently.’409

402

Barnes, p99 403

Young, p213 404


Ibid, 1950, p8 406

Smith, p24 407



Ibid, 1950, p10

104

Some of the masters did not like the educational reforms being made. Smith lamented, ‘There is no

doubt whatever that education for “getting on” is what most people are engaged in.’410

He deplored

the ‘growth of the examination bogey’ blaming it for restricting the timetable into 'snippets of this

and that, some essential and others unessential….'411

Looking ahead to the new O’levels, Young

complained

The Labour Party of Attlee had changed 'matric' into a new school certificate, and had insisted that no

pupil should take the exam until the age of 16. Because most of our hand-picked pupils could happily

pass the exam three years earlier, and then go on to more interesting work in the sixth form, it

became a great nuisance to have to keep 'O' level subjects on the boil for two or three years. It bored

the boys and cramped the teaching.412

One of the visiting dignatories to the School, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, at Speech Day in 1948

reiterated this view:

‘For education,' he explained, 'does not mean simply cramming as many possible facts into the one

particular mind in the hope that these facts can be produced in an examination paper in order to

acquire a particular certificate. That is not education.... Human nature is not only a brain. Human

nature has a soul, mind and body, and the process of education is the process of the whole man in a

balanced degree, so that the mind never takes possession of body and soul, nor body of mind and

soul.'413

There were some gems in the Common Room – Smith and Young undoubtedly being two of them –

who managed to break away from the tedium of the prescribed exam treadmill. In 1948, there is a

sweet report of Form IIIA’s efforts at making historical models: ‘In the last week of term they held an

exhibition of models of weapons of the Middle Ages… Some of the models were most beautifully

made and, what is more – they worked!’414

There is a report of a donation of ‘a Cromwellian helmet.

Such aids to the history lessons are always most acceptable’.415

I suspect Young and his charges

would have had a field-day dividing themselves into Roundheads and Cavaliers. Smith’s timetable

was ruled by the fact that ‘children are exceedingly curious and will be sure to ask for an explanation

of time and key as soon as they feel the need for it, and that is the proper time to give it.’416

Towards the end of this decade, Hudson declared his post-war educational philosophy:

There never was a period in history when a sense of proportion, a sense of values, a sense of poise

and balance were more necessary. This we endeavour to achieve at Alleyn's. We try to maintain a

balance between Science and Humanities, between work in the form-room and activities out of it,

between home and school: the whole knit together by corporate worship in Chapel and at Morning

Assembly, and by a true sense of community.417

410

Smith, p24 411

Ibid, p15 412

Young, p208 413




Smith, pp46-47 417

EAM, November 1948, p476-77

105

Drama

Michael Hajiantonis: Did many people turn out to watch the school plays?

Mr Reeve: They had to – it was compulsory.

Mr Stewart: Well, we did at Rossall, yes. What else did you do? Saturday nights by and large wasn’t it?

There used to be Saturday night productions. It was a major part of the school.

At Rossall, the Revd Canon Michael Swindlehurst (R, 1941-48) explained that

there was plenty of scope for drama, and we were conscious that our Founder had been an actor.

The Headmaster Mr Ralph Allison and his wife were both accomplished actors and produced Shaw’s

Arms and the Man and Barrie’s The Admirable Crichton as offerings from the combined Staff Rooms of

the two schools.418

SLESS too had its dramatics; in an overview of the drama productions at SLESS, ‘the all-important

work of dressing the shows in costumes, make-up, etc, was impressively done by Miss T Ratzer, our

Art Mistress, ably helped by Mrs DR Williams.’419

History master Robert Young in his book, Before I

Forget, described how the members of staff involved in drama came from all sections of the

Common Room – and beyond:

The succession of chief producers of the school play had music, classics, modern languages, history,

and English teachers among them, and there was a great team of electricians, artists, and make-up

experts from the science side and among the masters' wives. The one thing we lacked was a proper

stage, as the platform in the school hall had only two exits....420

(The challenge of the stage’s limitations wasn’t to be resolved until 2008 when the Michael Croft

Theatre was built. Michael Croft’s later theatrical success at Alleyn’s was built on firm foundations,

continuing the dramatic tradition built up by Allison at Rossall with ‘a core or cadre of theatrical

enthusiasts – WJ Smith, AS Jenkins, J Logan and RHD Young – who had contributed to many excellent

productions in the post-war, pre-Croft years.421

)

Allison was ‘an English specialist with a flair for drama’422

who took part in some of the school’s

dramatic productions. Both Ralph and Rita Allison took part in the 1941 production of The Mikado

the stage was graced by Mrs Allison as Yum Yum, the Headmaster as a sonorous and obese Pooh-Bah,

and Mr Smith gave an almost professional representation of the Mikado.423

I wonder how Puff Smith reacted to ‘almost professional representation’….?

At Rossall the Headmaster also revealed his flair as producer, with Twelfth Night, ‘performed on a

lovely summer evening in The Hall Garden on Founder’s Day 1942. The following year Alleyn’s

brought A Midsummer Night’s Dream to the garden at Dulwich Picture Gallery – “a setting that

Shakespeare might almost have had in mind when he wrote the play”. On Alleyn’s last Founder’s Day

418


EAM, March 1945, p150 420

Young, p221 421

DLM, p37 422

Ibid, p12 423


106

at Rossall, 17 June 1944, to commemorate the 325th anniversary of the Foundation, there was a

performance of The Merchant of Venice, jointly produced by the Headmaster and Edward

Upward’424

. The accompanying original music by Jack Lanchbery is reported to have enhanced

Shakespeare’s verse and ‘aroused the imagination of the audience to create for themselves the

illusions of night, without the effects of modern stage lighting.’425

The repertoire of the plays performed at Rossall is impressive: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The

Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, JM Barrie’s The Admirable Crichton and Elmer Rice’s Judgement

Day. This last play would have been, I would have thought, quite a controversial choice. Judgement

Day, written in 1934, was about the Reichstag fire trial (of 1933) and the magazine reviewer

conceded that ‘heads… had shaken so sceptically at the choice for the annual “50” Club play’ but

admitted that they ‘nodded sagely during its performance.’426

The year before, the reviewer of Thunder Rock acknowledged the grip of war in which the readers

found themselves:

In conclusion, the play proved two things: first, that there is no lack of acting ability in the school…

and second that there is no limit to what can be achieved when one’s whole mind is given to a task,

whatever obstacles might appear to impede its progress. The moral of the play, which may be

summed up as ‘face up to your difficulties’, applies equally to school dramatic associations, as to the

wider realm of international affairs.427

The SLESS boys were keen to point out that they too, like their evacuee-compatriots, could perform.

In March 1941 the magazine recorded a performance of The Importance of Being Earnest by the

members of the VIth form,

who suddenly felt the urge to ‘tread the boards’ and in three weeks learned and produced this far

from easy comedy… NV Lymbery, who played Cecily, will be able to tell the fellows at Rossall what

Carcas, Buysman, Beck, Nash, Cooper, Nolan and Child did with their different parts.428

The first major post-war production at Alleyn’s was George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan and it

received an enthusiastic review in the magazine. The music was again composed by Jack Lanchbery,

and a young Alan Mackesy (D 1943-50), at only 14, ‘played the difficult part of St Joan with

considerable confidence. The part took hold of him as the play progressed… in the trial scene his

fervent simplicity brought to an amazing intensity his belief in his mystical mission. So great was the

effect that hardened playgoers could get an appreciable sense of surprise when the curtain calls

transformed the maid into an embarrassed youth. We had been lifted out of a School Hall and out of

our period and we had been keyed to the atmosphere of divine mysticism by a skill that a

professional would envy’.429

Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) certainly enjoyed the music and drama at Alleyn’s but ‘didn’t take part in

a school play until almost my last year. I was in a couple of Gilbert and Sullivans and The Tempest, I

424

D&M, p48 425


Ibid, May 1943, p45 427

Ibid, May 1942, p549 428

Ibid, March 1941, p412; coincidentally, Allison chose this same play as the School’s parting gift to its hosts in

Kent, where you may recall he performed a specially written prologue (see p67). 429

D&M, pp40-42

107

was also in the orchestra in the percussion section, sometimes the only item I had to play was in the

national anthem. My symbol clash at the end was always pretty fortissimo!’

Young wrote that ‘School Drama was not in the hands of the English Department…. In fact, the Head

of Drama in 1946 was the Director of Music, and, so far as Opera was concerned, it continued so for

20 years.’430

Let us move to the concert hall, to see where drama and music played in harmony

under WJ Smith, the Director of Music, and to witness, in his words, his method of catching the ‘first

fine careless rapture’431

of the budding performer.

430

Young, p221 431

Smith, p66

108

Musical wonderland

‘Absolutely the greatest part of Alleyn’s life. At least three orchestras and great choral singing. Very

best thing about Rossall too.’ Sandy Alexander (B 1938-47)

The music at Alleyn’s was vividly remembered by all our AOBs. The breadth and quality of the music

performed for much of this decade was driven by WJ Smith, the Director of Music. He was called

'Puff' by the boys: 'a good nickname,’ explained Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49), ‘since he was a plump man

of average height with lovely St Bernard dog jowls that waggled as he moved and he gave the

appearance of being puffed up.’432

Mr Barnes continued his description of Smith:

He was a Somerset Maugham kind of character. He would spend most of his holidays on the French or

Italian Riviera either acting as a house-sitter for millionaire owners of luxurious villas along the

fashionable Mediterranean coasts or giving private concerts in the houses of the continental rich and

powerful.433

During the 1940s, his dedication to the boys and to the School seemed, at times, verging on the

reckless: to ensure that the chapel in Dulwich had a choir, ‘a skeleton choir came each Sunday from

Kent by car throughout the dreadful summer of 1940, while the Battle of Britain raged overhead.’434

When the boys were evacuated to Rossall, music played an important role in their lives.

Music there was one of the chief barriers against boredom, and a very heavy responsibility fell on his

[Smith’s] shoulders.435

The Revd Canon Michael Swindlehurst (R, 1941-48) described Smith’s magic:

When I first joined the school at Rossall, WJ Smith (‘WJ’ or ‘Puff’) had an ambitious musical

programme organised. … for a new boy like me it opened up a musical wonderland.436

WJ ‘Puff’ Smith

'How do you do it?' To which I reply quite shortly, 'I don't, the boys do it.' Much of what follows

amounts to an appeal to others to let them do so.’437

Smith wrote about his experiences teaching music at Alleyn’s in Music in Education in which he

described his experience as an experiment to herald a revolution in music-teaching.

With music as a bringer of joy I have hoped to show that a reform in actual teaching method is long

overdue in most schools. The didactic habits of the teacher and the inactive acquiescence of the

taught I have tried to exchange for an elimination as far as possible of the teacher, and a set of pupils

inspired with a crusading spirit who welcome him as their guide, philosopher, and friend for the

432

Barnes, p156 433

Ibid, p156 434

Smith, p20 435



Smith, p14

109

present.... With this I have tried to combine a communistic idea in my discipline based on the

comradeship born of mutual work in carrying forward a great project.438

The nub of Smith’s reform was to make the music pupil-centred and he encouraged the growth of

the ‘spirit of the atelier,’ whereby ‘all the coaching of young players was done by the senior boys.’439

The teaching technique so developed is one where the teacher eliminates himself in every possible

way…. He is constantly consulted, and coaches principal roles in the production of large works. His

advice is not necessarily followed, since there is complete honesty with one another, and the boys do

the following jobs: produce opera; rehearse the chorus; accompany at rehearsals; choose and

rehearse orchestral concerts; accompany all religious services with the organ; teach the beginners the

rudiments of all instruments available; organise and post the rehearsal times; provide the notes for

the magazine; design and execute scenery; design and execute programme covers; provide

photographs for the press; orchestrate works when necessary and duplicate band-parts.440

And, even if the boys were restricted by a lack of musical ability, they were still given a part to play:

Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41) remembered an indignity inflicted on him by Smith:

…I cannot sing and was dismayed immensely when WJ Smith pulled me from the chorus of Stabat

Mater and relegated me to pumping the organ.

Mr Barnes remembered that Smith tried his hardest to get him to play an instrument:

I simply believed I couldn't [play an instrument] so that when Puff one day, out of the blue… stopped

me as I was walking across the quad and asked me if I would like to learn the French horn, as he had a

vacancy for a horn player in the orchestra, I was dumbstruck, gob-smacked, taken aback; me! Play

the horn in the school orchestra? I couldn't believe it. Why had he asked me? I couldn't possibly

afford to buy a French horn. The school would supply me with one. I couldn't read music. No matter, I

could learn.... I made every excuse I could think of – and at last he took no for an answer.441

At Rossall, half the boys learned a musical instrument; Smith declared that

No-one is taught unless he craves for it. There are 'waiting lists' for all instruments. There is no

dodging, and the daily cry is for more time. Must we stop?

Plaintively adding, ‘Cannot such co-operation, such friendship, such joy, be carried over into the

class-room somehow?’ Frank Halford (R 1942-49) recalled how

The whole school sang. Puff Smith didn’t believe in people not being able to sing. There was no such

thing as groaners. We all sang, we all learnt. I mean, I can remember going up in ’42 and at the end of

the first term singing the Messiah. And by that time we’d learnt to read music. It was very good.

Excellent grounding for music. There was a lot of music – Requiem, Morning Heroes, it was all very

enjoyable.

438

Smith, pp113-14 439

Ibid, p19 440

Ibid, pp21-22 441

Barnes, p157

110

The magazine gives us a peek into the sounds and sights of the Junior School boys at their leisure: in

a report probably written by Albert Spring (who is one of the three people to whom Smith dedicated

his book Music in Education 442

)

It is always possible to gather what choral music is being rehearsed by listening to the ‘snatches’

heard in the playroom, the boot-room or elsewhere in the House… To gain acquaintance with these

musical masterpieces while one is young must form a sound foundation for the fuller education which

is to follow.443

The repertoire

Mr Halford added later that, in addition to the Messiah they performed ‘Rossini’s Stabat Mater,

Morning Heroes and Pastoral by Bliss, Handel’s Alexander’s Feast, Gounod’s Faust, Verdi’s Requiem,

Elgar’s Spirit of England, Holst’s Hymn of Jesus.’ Roy Dann (D 1937-42) commented that ‘what was

remarkable was that the whole School sang in parts – treble, alto, tenor and bass’. Sandy Alexander

(B 1938-47) said that during his time at Alleyn’s, ‘I went through the whole lot, from treble, alto,

tenor and bass.’ In Robert Young’s valete for Smith, he wrote:

WJ Smith’s choirs, both at Rossall and at Alleyn’s, sang with a fervour and accuracy we have not

witnessed since… not simply did all the boys of Alleyn’s sing in four-part harmony in assembly, but

many of the tunes for the hymns and the psalms in the books were composed by his pupils….’444

Michael Gilbert (T 1944-50) recalled that at Rossall, ‘Every Sunday after chapel there was a choir

practice taken by WJ Smith for the entire School, which lasted until lunchtime.’445

As Mr Halford

noted, the repertoire taken on by the boys under Smith’s direction was vast. Smith decreed that ‘No

longer was the notion allowed that a great work of art was necessarily too difficult….’446

At Rossall,

Full use was made of Rossall’s handsome Chapel to sing works by Tallis, Palestrina, Purcell, Dyson and

Handel, but Smith also introduced his young musicians to modern composers, such as Hugo Anson

(WJ’s predecessor as Director of Music), Delius, Vaughan Williams, Arthur Bliss and Armstrong Gibbs.

Sir Arthur Bliss, then BBC Director of Music, attended a performance of his Morning Heroes, written

as a tribute to his brother who was killed in the First World War.447

Mr Barnes commented that ‘the musicians of Alleyn's learnt much English, French and Italian music,

some of it by modern composers that was far more avant garde and exciting than could be heard

elsewhere in London.’448

David Green (D, 1943-48) admitted that ‘To this day, I only have to hear a

brief excerpt from either The Gondoliers or Orpheus and Eurydice and I am immediately transported

back to the Great Hall at Alleyn’s all those years ago.’449

There were limits to the school’s repertoire: Smith would not countenance anything German. Mr

Barnes relayed how Smith,

442

The other two are Headmasters Henderson and Allison. 443


D&M, p49 445

Ibid, p54 446

Smith, p19 447

D&M, p51 448

Barnes, p156 449

D&M, p61

111

was fluent in French and Italian and although he understood German, he would never speak it or sing

anything written in it. He would never conduct the Alleyn's choir or orchestra in any work by a

German composer, although he stretched a point for Mozart, being an Austrian. He must have been

deeply scarred by the First World War, but he never spoke of it. He saw in the work of Wagner and

Beethoven something of the frightening daemon of the German Geist, even in Brahms, the most

gentle of men, I would have said.450

Unusually, given the war, the boys were not made to sing patriotic songs. Brian Savory (Bn, 1938-45)

wrote that ‘instead of the usual motley selection of patriotic songs and recitations at the annual

concert, he produced and directed Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice – to the total astonishment and

consternation of the organisers! But the silver collection taken was double that of any previous year

and, as ever, Puff’s judgement was spot-on.’451

That said, the Memorial Service held in Rossall

Chapel on 6 August 1944 to remember AOBs who had been killed was one of the few occasions of

patriotic music being played.452

Nor would Smith suffer the boys performing, ‘bawling community songs and unison hymns.’ And

with his practical eye for musical detail, wrote that boys in the lower parts of the school must not

sing ‘folk-songs or national songs… because they are all set in baritone keys.'453

Audiences

As we have seen, WJ Smith’s music philosophy was to hand the baton – in more ways than one – to

the senior boys. One task delegated to the boys which surprised me in the setting of a school was

overseeing ‘the accommodation of the Press' at a performance.454

The Fleetwood Chronicle came to

review the Gondoliers in 1941 writing that G Bishop, who as Casilda ‘had all sorts of pretty tricks up

his capacious sleeve, tossing his powdered curls, like a debutante, and, to complete the picture,

having a charming soprano voice’.455

In addition, Mr Barnes remembered that ‘the serious national press music and drama critics

attended all our major performances and reviewed them,’456

which seems quite a coup for a school

to score. The BBC twice broadcast their performances:

Such was Alleyn’s reputation for music-making that pupils were twice invited to take part in BBC

broadcasts. On 8 February 1944, Peter Lyons was engaged to sing, and the following month, pupils

performed and conducted a concert for Children’s Hour…. The programme also included

Mendelssohn’s ‘Nocturne’ from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, two bourrées for harpsichord by

Purcell, and the ‘March’ from Things to Come by Arthur Bliss. ‘Little did I ever think’, wrote the

reviewer for the Edward Alleyn Magazine, ‘that I should hear an Alleyn’s School concert while sitting

in a small sitting-room in a little industrial town in Monmouthshire’.457

450

Barnes, p156 451

D&M, p53 452

Music included: Elgar’s march ‘Pomp and Circumstance’, Psalm 23, Byrd’s anthem, The Souls of the

Righteous, the Nunc Dimittis, and a SS Wesley hymn, ‘On the Resurrection Morning’. 453

Smith, p22 454

Ibid, p54 455


Barnes, p156 457

D&M, p50

112

This was an enormous achievement and the boys were rightly proud; after the second broadcast the

magazine writers reported: ‘It is a pity that the boys of the School who were broadcasting on March

24th

could not hear the encouraging cheers we gave them, as we sat on the floor in our

Housemaster’s room. We were very proud of them all – perhaps we shall be chosen to represent the

School in a broadcast one of these days.’458

Perhaps this public relations exercise formed part of the country’s overall campaign to keep up

morale during the war? Locally, the boys entertained the residents of Maidstone and Fleetwood and

raised money for charity and the war-effort. The magazine reported that ‘for many weeks the local

inhabitants [of Maidstone] willingly paid their shillings to the Red Cross for the pleasure of waltzing

around to the melodies of our haunting saxophone or of our trumpet with its sensational “wow-

wow” mute.’459

A performance of Gluck’s Orpheus at the Congregational Church at Cleveleys raised

over £20 for the Blackpool Victoria Hospital.460

Mr Savory recalled Peter Lyons singing the part of

Euridice:

Peter’s tender and expressive interpretation of this difficult role was so moving that many of the

audience were seen to be weeping.

By special arrangement with the British Council, the boys also entertained Polish airmen stationed

nearby with a Polish and English themed concert:

Polish music, costumes and songs were hired, and the airmen were able to see fine performances

both of English and of Polish traditional dances…. We are proud to record this concert as an artistic

contribution to the war-effort and as a tribute to the gallant people of Poland.’461

As well as raising the morale of the School, the local residents and serving airmen, WJ Smith may

have had an ulterior motive. In a stark statement in his book, Smith wrote ‘Never take the audience

into account. You must educate them, not have them try to educate you.’462

Smith was as equally missionary in his zeal to educate the boys in terms of musical taste:

If good music is not consistently put before schoolboys they will yield to the immediate crude appeal

of the bad. Left without musical guidance, their critical faculties will be bounded by the jazz-bands,

the crooner, and the cinema organ…. Instead of an orchestra, senior boys, if left to themselves tend

to form a 'jazz-combination', their heroes being the various dance-band leaders, drummers, and

'rhythm pianists'.463

You can almost hear him spitting out the phrase ‘rhythm pianists’. The boys were not to be so bound

and in 1943 they listened to a lecture on ‘The relative merits of jazz and the classics’

given by Mr B___e. The lecturer confined himself almost exclusively to jazz music and the many forms

thereof, and set his audience rhythmically tapping and rocking by playing gramophone records of

somewhat vivid examples of modern jazz. Never before has the Summer Library echoed to such a

cacophony of ‘hot riffs’, ‘bends’ and ‘glissandes’. The meeting broke up finally, having had more of a

458

EAM, May 1944, p100 459

Ibid, March 1941, p418 460


Ibid, March 1942, p541 462

Smith, p52 463

Ibid, p90

113

lowbrow entertainment, we fear, that having approached nearer to the ultimate issue of the age-old

‘jazz versus classics’ feud.464

Dance

Smith prescribed the following syllabus for teaching music:

The syllabus followed should be of the widest, and should include ballet, eurhythmics [sic], and

participation, as much as possible, in all kinds of ensembles such as chamber music, madrigal singing,

opera and oratorio.465

The inclusion of ballet was, I would have thought, a brave one for a boys’ school. Our AOBs did

indeed remember their dancing attempts. John Cleary (B 1945-51) recalled getting ‘roped into

various operas with Jack [Lanchbery] and it reminds me of being made to dance around like a stupid

fairy,’ and Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) recalled having ‘to do Greek dancing in these flimsy, filmy

things!’

Peter Rodway (C 42-50) told John Pretlove’s (C 1944-51) ‘story about bringing his wife on an early

date to a production at Alleyn’s of Iolanthe … and it came to the early stages of the first act, and

these clumping Fourth Form boys lumbered onto the stage and launched into [sings] ‘we are da-inty

li-ttle fa-ir-ies’. Mr Rodway, in Drama and Music, himself remembered the ballet of Orpheus

The director had conceived the idea of the blessed spirits daintily and elegantly passing tennis balls to

each other. Regrettably, the dancers turned out to be some of the worst fielders in the School, and I

recall to this day tennis balls frequently disappearing into the wings past desperately outstretched

hands! 466

Mr Barnes mentioned that prior to Alleyn’s ‘WJ’ 'had had a distinguished career as an opera singer,

and continued giving private performances well into his old age.’ Young recognised his colleague’s

acting skills:

WJ Smith was a considerable actor, as many schoolmasters and musicians need to be to succeed at

teaching anything. You could tell it when he conducted an orchestra, listening to the music of the

score rather than the notes which were actually emanating from the less skilful members of the

orchestra.467

According to Young, the policy of Smith was ‘to attempt as much as possible, and not to be too

particular about the end-result.’468

This was conceded by the Revd Canon Michael Swindlehurst (R,

1941-48) who said:

Puff…. believed in asking great things of boys, and that could be and was very inspiring, but he could

be very temperamental and quite outrageous.469

Roy Croft (R, 1945-51) drew a beautifully comic image of Smith:

464

EAM, May 1943, p44 465

Smith, p98 466

D&M, p58 467

Young p222 468

Ibid, p221 469

D&M, p55

114

He was inspirational and generally kind, but at times during rehearsals, and with 6” of white

underpant showing around his midriff, he would lose his cool, and woe betide the unfortunate horn

player or soloist who produced a wrong note.470

Visits and visitors

Thanks to Smith’s contacts, the boys were treated to visits by professional musicians and were also

given the opportunity to visit professional performances.

Mr Savory described an amazing opportunity given to some boys to learn at the feet of players of

the Hallé Orchestra; Smith ‘arranged for some competent members of the Orchestra to attend a

rehearsal of the Hallé Orchestra and actually sit alongside their respective instrumentalists. I hear

that Sir John Barbirolli was a very amusing host, and his “Band” made everyone welcome.’ In turn,

Smith was able to take his current pupils to witness his past Alleyn’s stars who had become

professional musicians and there is an account of a visit to watch AOB David Franklin singing the part

of the High Priest in the Magic Flute at Covent Garden. On the journey back to Townley Road

‘everyone was discussing the possibility of the “Magic Flute” being performed at this School, even to

the point of casting!... Everyone was strangely quiet, a spell had been miraculously cast over

them.’471

As this episode demonstrates, music brought excitement and magic to the boys. Music’s ‘great

importance,’ decreed Smith was,

as a bringer of joy. The business of those responsible for the young of a nation during their most

impressionable years is surely that of removing unhappiness and replacing it by joy.472

Writing in 1947, Smith commented on the emergence of a mass society in Britain and its effects on

its young people:

The attitude to life of these children is embittered at the outset, by enormous classes, hideous

surroundings, and the lack of an integrating force in their lives.473

Examinations

Smith saw little benefit of exams in his conception of how music should be taught, although he railed

about the absence of a test in the Common Entrance, Scholarship and Free-Place exams to assess a

boy’s musicality. Smith’s goal was rather loftier than an impressive set of exam results:

In no other way, indeed, can all the school be brought together to engage in a corporate act wherein

everyone, however humble, makes his contribution; not to give a performance or to entertain

anyone, but to the greater Glory of God and as a fulfilment of the composer's purpose when creating

the work.474

470

Ibid, p41 471

EAM, June 1948, p451 472

Smith, p14 473

Ibid, p15 474

Ibid, p47

115

In fact, in Music in Education he listed as one his (three) challenges when he started teaching at

Alleyn’s as to 'do all to no other purpose than the glory of God as part of His creation'.475

But even

here the boys thwarted his lofty goal, turning Sunday evening chapel into a competition; the Rt Hon

the Lord Higgins (D 1940-46) explained that:

One of the few joint events between the two schools was Sunday evening chapel, often a contest on

which could sing louder. Rossall cheated by singing unison!476

In Mr Dann’s perhaps understated words, ‘Rossall wasn’t a musical school at all.’ Professor Donald

Leinster-Mackay (D 1943-50), himself a boy at Rossall, wrote that ‘The reputation of Alleyn’s music

went not unnoticed by the Rossallians. That was one area of school activity where they had much to

learn from Alleyn’s School.’477

Sidney Giles (Bn 1933-42) recalled Alleyn’s

unloading of equipment from the railway lorries at the school; as the timpani were lifted off, the

watching Rossall sergeant major remarked: ‘Ee’s tha’s got a band’.478

In Derek Winterbottom’s history of Rossall School, The Tide Flows On, he said that the Rossall boys,

enjoyed attending the concerts put on by the Alleyn’s boys in Big School, including a full-scale

performance of The Gondoliers, not bad for a school of 200 boys without the leavening of any

masters’ wives or daughters.479

Alleyn’s musical output at Rossall was phenomenal – in addition to the opera, Gilbert and Sullivan,

oratorios and plays they performed, boys would put on a whole-school choral piece each term, as

well as weekly orchestral concerts held on Sunday evenings.

On Speech Day in 1942, the magazine writers reported the Headmaster’s annual review where

Allison gave as ‘an example of the activities that had been extended in scope during the year he

instanced the school music: three boys had won open choral scholarships to King’s College,

Cambridge – surely a record for any school – and one [Lanchbery] had gained a scholarship for

Composition at the Royal Academy of Music.480

Scholarships

We value [scholarships] enormously for the sole reason that for poor people they open the door to

the great universities and so to the finest educative possibilities this country has to offer.481

In his book, Smith listed the scholarships won by Alleyn’s pupils since he began his tenure at Alleyn’s

in 1926: 39.482

In Robert Young’s apt words, ‘Nobody in England was his rival.’

One of the scholars, as we have seen, was Jack Lanchbery.

475

Ibid, p18 476

D&M, p52 477

Ibid, p13 478

Ibid, p53 479



Smith, p106 482

Ibid, p32-33

116

Jack Lanchbery OBE

Of all the AOBs who I have discovered on this chase through Alleyn’s in the 1940s, if I could enter a

time-machine, it is the mischievous and talented Jack Lanchbery (R, 1934-42) who I would love to

meet and quiz. In the words of Sidney Giles ( Bn, 1933-42) he was,

an irreverent soul, technically capable of switching seamlessly from an improvisation on a baroque

theme during the concluding voluntary to an air from the current Gilbert and Sullivan show, and

switching smartly back with WJ doubled back to the organ loft to reprimand him.483

WJ and Lanchbery’s partnership is the stuff of legends. When Smith produced Molière’s Le Médecin

Malgré Lui Lanchbery conducted the orchestra.

The play was finished and the orchestra rounded off this enjoyable evening very suitably with a ‘Suite

dans le style ancient’ by JA Lanchbery. This work was written as an exercise for the Higher Certificate

of the Oxford and Cambridge Joint Board, and we hope for more delightful music from this very

capable pen.’484

More ‘delightful music’ did come from both Lanchbery’s pen and baton. The Rt Hon the Lord Higgins

explained:

He went on to become the most distinguished conductor of ballet of the time, and, perhaps, ever…

Music at Alleyn’s benefited immensely from Jack Lanchbery’s generosity in many ways. He donated

generously to the Appeal Fund that helped build the new Music School (opened in 1992) and the

largest rehearsal room is named after him; and he provided the money to buy a new Yamaha grand

piano in the Great Hall.

And as the greatest tribute to his ‘guide, philosopher, and friend’, ‘Puff’ Smith, Lanchbery

set up the WJ Smith Trust Fund in honour of his friend and mentor…. The Trust provides support

towards the musical expenses of talented pupils at Alleyn’s who might otherwise find it difficult to

afford them. On his death in 2003, he bequeathed the royalties on all his musical compositions to the

Trust….’485

Sandy Alexander told us that Lanchbery wrote a (sadly, lost) musical comically ‘called “The Princess

and the Golden Sausage”.’ Michael Gilbert (T 1944-50) gave a hilarious account of Verdi’s Requiem

performed on the boys’ return to Alleyn’s in 1945:

I well remember the performance, which was conducted very powerfully by Jack Lanchbery. When we

reached the ‘Dies irae’, what the audience could not hear was Jack shouting over the orchestra to the

choir, ‘Now sing you bastards, sing!’ And sing we did!486

After Lanchbery left Alleyn’s, he was not forgotten by his fellow AOBs or his school. AOB AS Jenkins

(R 1932-38)487

was commissioned by the Warden of St Anne’s, Soho ‘to write a modern version of

483

D&M, p41 484


D&M, p52 486

Ibid, p54

117

the Passion set to music. JA Lanchbery, AOB, accepted the task of composing the score, and the

performance of the work, “Hour of Darkness”, was given by the School Choir and Orchestra at St

Thomas’s, Regent Street, on Good Friday, and repeated there on June 3rd. 488

Gilbert and Sullivan

Gilbert and Sullivan was an Alleyn's speciality. People came from far and wide to hear the Alleyn's

Gilbert and Sullivan every year.489

Mr Rodway and his mother were two of those people who came to watch an Alleyn’s G&S

production:

It was in the summer of 1942, just before I became an Alleyn’s pupil, that my mother took me to see a

performance of Sidney Giles’s production of HMS Pinafore in Townley Road. The cast had travelled in

the best professional tradition from Rossall. I have never forgotten it. The performance was an

exceptionally fine one and the chorus excelled, with no fewer than five encores for ‘Never Mind the

Why and Wherefore’. 490

In Smith’s spirit of ‘not being too particular about the end-result’, the boys of Rossall and Alleyn’s

combined forces to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Arthur Sullivan. The magazine reviewers

wrote that they ‘produced together a two-hour collection of excerpts from the operas – scenes,

solos, trios, quartets…’ adding damningly, ‘it gave the performers at least a very merry evening.’491

Music at SLESS

A taste of what the music scene was like at SLESS is given in this report:

…we were able to produce a highly successful concert somewhat on the lines of the popular House-

Supper shows which used to fill the Hall years ago. AJ Vinter played the piano in expert fashion and

led the choruses with excellent results, GB Harley impressed us all and mystified some of his audience

with his conjuring tricks; Mr Calland surprised us with some Gilbert & Sullivan choruses courageously

undertaken by some fellows in the Fifths; Mr Wright gave us another of his amusing yarns about a

certain salty sailor. Mr Rudd’s choir-boys pleased everybody by the delightful way they sang some of

our well-known ballads and he himself found his audience very appreciative of his songs at the

piano…492

Whilst this gang-show doesn’t quite compare with the ambitious programme the boys at Rossall

attacked, it does demonstrate that music was played and fun was had. Pulling off such concerts was

an enormous achievement given the instability of the roll at SLESS, the bombing-raids, and changes

of staff.

Alan Mackesy (D 1943-50) remembered that ‘in 1945 [the] Alleyn’s Director of Music observed… that

because of “wartime” conditions we had not been taught any music whatsoever at SLESS.’ However,

487

Stephen Jenkins was to return to the School as a member of Alleyn’s staff in 1945 and stayed until his

retirement in 1982. He was Head of Drama from 1964-74, Housemaster of Brown’s from 1968-81, and CO of

the CCF from 1974-82. 488

EAM, June 1946, p246 489

Barnes, p157 490

D&M, p58 491



118

Mr Mackesy recalled the ‘music lessons’ delivered by Mr Rudd and accompanied (or abetted) by

Tyson. By putting on performances, Rudd and Tyson had ‘veritably boosted the morale and solidarity

of the (Emergency) School during London’s dangerous war-torn years.493

By such musical gatherings, SLESS was showing itself in line with Smith’s philosophy, that music was

an antidote to the war-time conditions raging outside on their doorsteps and they, like their Rossall

brothers, used music as a much needed ‘bringer of joy’.

The departure of ‘Puff’ Smith and those Inspectors….

There is a hint that Smith may have been slowing down in the opening sentence of the magazine’s

Music report in October 1947:

For many reasons it was found impossible to give more than three concerts during the term, but all

were well attended and up to our traditional standard. 494

Smith retired from Alleyn’s in 1948 and was replaced as Director of Music by one of his former

protégés, Frank Kennard (S 1924-30). Two years later the inspectors called and it is apparent that

Smith’s influence had not entirely disappeared. The HMIs were pleased with instrumental music:

of which there is a most heartening amount, owing largely to a tradition built up by the late Director

of Music.495

However, they had a dig, noting approvingly that ‘…the somewhat over-ambitious programmes of

the past have been modified.’496

Pleasingly, they liked what they saw in the present incumbent,

Kennard:

he is a fine musician and brings to the School an intense interest in and love of music. His personality

is attractive and kindly; he thoroughly understands boys, and has a good sense of standard, both of

performance and of musical taste.497

It seemed like music was in safe hands. Smith was wily enough to realise that much of his work as a

music teacher would not be reaped until many years later, writing:

In short the immense value of music to a boy in the education of his emotions which is, indeed the

main purpose of music in a school, is not examinable at all and may only be observable in the greater

sensitivity and serenity of his future life.498

Given the torrent of affectionate memories for ‘Puff’ uttered by our AOBs of the 1940s (and the

1930s) – Mr Halford’s comment of him being, ‘an unforgettable teacher and [he] inspired a lasting

love and appreciation of music’ being typical – I think it safe to say, some sixty years on, that Smith

could rest content with his job as music teacher at Alleyn’s well done.

493

Chandler, SLESS, pp20-21 494

EAM, October, 1947, p386 495


Ibid, 1950, p17 497

Ibid 498

Smith, pp104-05

119

Sport

‘The School holds a well-deserved reputation for its achievements in games and sports and the

present standard of play of its representative teams is in keeping with its enviable sporting tradition.’

HMIs’ report, 1950, p19

Sport and games was another aspect of school life enjoyed by many of our AOBs. As John Hughes (C

1945-51) said, ‘sport was your outlet; you didn’t have video games and similar distractions’. Ian

Smith (R 1942-49) admitted that ‘most of us… played too much sport.’ He felt that ‘being in the war,

it was important to make the most of sport.’ Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) explained what was on offer,

pointing out that ‘if you weren’t good at it, then you were pretty well left out, if you couldn’t even

get into a House team.’ However, if,

you were good in the House team, eventually you progressed to the 2nd

XI or if you were really good

as John [Williams] did, the 1st

XI. But there were far more House leagues and sports day of course in

the spring term, when there was very little football. That [football] was only in the Christmas term,

wasn’t it? Very little after Christmas because it was only cross-country running, leading to the school

steeplechase, and then you would have athletics heats for sports day. The sports finals day was the

last Saturday afternoon of the Lent term and it was quite a very well supported event because

parents and friends turned up.

For those boys who didn’t get picked ‘you had to do some work on the allotments,’ added Mr

Rodway. All our AOB guests remembered the sports timetable. Sports were held on Tuesday and

Thursday afternoons as well as on Saturday afternoon. Saturday was a ‘normal’ school day with

lessons taking place in the morning. Cricketing genius, Micky Stewart (T 1944-51) remembered the

Saturday sports afternoons, especially the fact that ‘the majority of Saturday cricket matches started

at 11.30am, I believe, so you missed out two periods on a Saturday.’ Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49), a

member of the football 1st

XI team, remembered that they ‘played against other public schools on a

Saturday afternoon. I used to like playing away, going on a private bus, seeing new places, having

lunches and teas in other schools.’499

John Cleary (B 1945-51) – with help from Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) – recited the seasonal timetable;

it was in ‘winter [there] was football and athletics and cross-country running. Summer was cricket

and athletics.’ Mr Jackson added, ‘And swimming, wasn’t it? In summer.’

Sport and games in this decade were played with varying levels of success. As in the classroom, the

boys’ performance suffered from a shortage of equipment throughout the 1940s. There are frequent

appeals in the magazine for the donations of old Houseshirts, Fives balls and gloves. The school was

inventive in getting around rationed items, and substituted sand for its paper chase at Rossall.500

Peter Wrench (C 1945-49) was taught table tennis by Micky Stewart ‘using Latin Primers – we could

not afford bats in those days!’ And a Fives revival was made possible,

by the unexpected purchase of some new balls and by the generous gift from the AOB Fives Club of a

quantity of partly-used balls. Although every economy in the use of both remains essential, it is no

499

Barnes, p110 500

EAM, March 1944, p7

120

longer necessary for them to be repaired with adhesive tape – nor for anyone to go without a game

for the lack of a ball.501

Sport in Kent

It is surprising that, given that the boys were billeted in villages all around Maidstone, any school

sport was played at all. For its first report from its Kentish billets, the footballers reported their

make-do-and-mend approach:

At the end of last term the prospects for the 1939-40 Football season, apart from political

considerations, appeared at least as bright as usual…. Unfortunately we have had to deal with much

more difficult conditions. With the boys spread in groups over a wide area, a very limited number of

pitches available, and the removal of the Fourth Forms to Walmer, it has only been possible… to

arrange friendly games in the groups themselves, on the nearest pitches, and some Big-side trials on

the Maidstone Grammar School pitch…. Many other candidates for 1st

XI colours have not returned,

but we still have the makings of a good team.502

Maidstone Grammar lent its Fives Courts enabling the boys ‘to continue our Fives almost as in

normal times’503

as well as its swimming pool. The magazine reassured its readers that,

In the present circumstances it must be the first consideration of the authorities to provide each boy

with as many games as possible, although in consequence School cricket may have to suffer. We have

therefore rented the County ground in Mote Park, on which we have the use of four pitches…. The

distance of the billets from the School and the cricket ground prevents us from playing on long school

days… School games have of necessity been drastically reduced: some will be played by a combined

Maidstone Grammar School and Alleyn’s teams, others by a complete Alleyn’s team.504

However, athletics was neglected and the ‘only signs of athletic activity were the occasional cross-

country runs which took place in the Boxley, Sandling and Weavering Street districts,’ in which, the

magazine reported, ‘certain lorries played an important and favourable part!’ The magazine

reporters continued in cheery tone and announced their North West-bound move:

as soon as we arrived at Rossall, we realised that we had ample opportunity of pulling matters into

shape once more.

They compared the Rossall steeplechase water-jump to Alleyn’s: ‘a veritable Jordan compared with

our home brooklet!’505

Rossall

After four years of bracing sea air [at Rossall], cold showers and the wartime diet, the senior pupils

were as tough and fit as one can get.506

Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45) wrote that at Rossall the ‘main playing field was 22 acres; enabling a

number of games to take place at the same time.’ Peter Reeve (C 1941-48) explained that ‘one thing

501




Ibid, June 1940, p353 505

Ibid, June 1941, p442 506

Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45)

121

you do get when you’re at a boarding school is plenty of sport…. if you’ve got a moment, an hour or

two and you don’t know what to do, you go and play.’

Those boys who survived the evacuation to Rossall came back with even more sporting prowess. Mr

Reeve proudly noted that,

when we went up to Rossall, Rossall played Alleyn’s at all sports, except rugby of course (they played

rugby, we played soccer) and every single match Rossall won. By the time we left in 1945, we beat

them in every sport except one. But anyway we turned the whole thing round, and that showed to

me, this is what boarding school does, you see.

It is true that our boys picked up new sporting skills when they were at Rossall. The magazine

claimed that ‘the number of Fives players has steadily increased until it has reached the stage to-day

when almost everyone in the School plays. Through so much practice, latent ability has been able to

make its appearance to the betterment of the School pairs.’507

Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) ‘tried to

keep Rugby Fives going in spite of the strange Rossall courts which had no back wall and a left-hand

buttress [Eton Fives]. We played two matches at Manchester against teams from the university…. I

partnered Peter Howard in the doubles and I was very sad to see that he was killed in the war – he

was a very fine all-round sportsman.’

Boxing was reinstigated as an Alleyn’s sport at Rossall – and this was one sport where there was

collaboration with their fellows at Rossall. In its final write-up of the School’s evacuation to Rossall, a

RSM Darrell is thanked for his unstinting ‘services, often under most trying conditions. He did a great

deal to keep Boxing alive in the School during our sojourn at Rossall, and largely through his efforts

on the eve of our return to Dulwich, we are ready to uphold the School’s Boxing tradition.’508

In addition to English sports, the Alleyn’s boys were introduced to Rossall hockey; Mr Savory

described it:

Hockey on the shore was an incredibly fast game. When the tide was out acres of golden sands were

exposed over which a hockey ball would travel at great speed. After the game we were required to

wade across the open-air swimming pool and run to our Houses to change for tea.

A move to the North West gave the boys new opponents to face. The names of Bolton School,

Merchant Taylors’ Crosby, Rossall, St Bees and Stonyhurst, Leeds University all started to appear on

the School’s fixtures lists. Another opponent was the RAF at Blackpool – whose football team had

several international players on their side: Stanley Matthews and J Stevenson (Ireland) and Paterson

(Scotland). This match is reported in more detail in the chapter ‘Distinguished boys and visitors’.

Rossall had an outdoor swimming pool, the memory of which made our AOBs (and your

correspondent) shudder. Frank Halford (R 1942-49) said that the swimming pool

was so cold, and I learned to swim in that swimming bath, Tom Bowen taught me, and I was so

thrilled at being able to swim. I swam and I swam and the next I knew I was waking up in the San

[sanatorium]. Someone picked me up out of the water, because I’d frozen, I must have been, I was

unconscious!

507

EAM, May 1943, p40 508

Ibid, July 1945, p180

122

Sports-keen Dr Philpott, was more sanguine, writing, ‘We made good use of the Rossall open-air

swimming pool, including some water-polo matches, in spite of its odd shape – one side was several

yards longer than the other!’ Mr Reeve remembered the night swimming raids:

We used to go in the middle of the night swimming, I always remember this, one of us in the dorm

would wake up at about two o’clock in the morning; we’d all get ready and creep across, down

through the house, across the quadrangle – there was a lot of shingle there, so it would make a lot of

noise, you had to be very careful – then across the other side of the quadrangle over to the swimming

pool. We’d then have a swim and come back…. We did get caught out, eventually we got caught, and

the Headmaster had to cane us. I don’t know why he had to, but he thought he needed to.

‘It warmed you up!’ suggested Mr Stewart.

Reading between the lines of the June 1941 magazine report about the swimming pool at Rossall,

you can sense an unease,

Last year we were initiated into the use of an open-air bath for school swimming, and having thus

started in a comparatively small way at Maidstone Grammar School we have now graduated to

Rossall’s larger, and perhaps colder, salt-water bath.

The exposed nature of the bath did not encourage much swimming last term, but one afternoon a

few brave (or should we say feckless) fanatics took the plunge into the murky water. The whole

venture should be termed a ‘dip’ rather than a ‘swim’.

Since then the bath has undergone a course of cleaning and sun-ray treatment and is now more

inviting. The invitation has not been generally accepted yet but we feel that it will be when it is

extended with greater warmth.509

Something referenced in the magazine – but not our AOBs – was the ‘standard test’.

One further activity must not go unmentioned – the Standard Test. Throughout the term the senior

part of the School has been running, sprinting, walking and climbing in an effort to reach the required

standard of physical attainment laid down by some remote and unfeeling authority. The percentage

of those who passed in the four age groups was most encouraging and it is hoped that the sight of so

many daintily decorated lapels this term will be a spur to greater efforts those cheated of this coveted

distinction.510

I wonder which authority (school or governmental) developed this test?

South London Emergency Secondary School (SLESS)

As we have seen in the chapter examining SLESS, with the playing fields given over to barrage

balloons and allotments, as well as the sudden onslaught of air-raids, there was not much emphasis

placed on games and sport at SLESS. The SLESS report commented that ‘Many of the boys had never

before played cricket, but some of them shaped well and it was refreshing to see how keen they

were to hit the ball really hard.’511

509

Ibid, June 1941, p448 510



123

Mr Reeve noted that when the Rossall boys returned to Dulwich, even though SLESS numbered

‘about 450 boys at SLESS, about 200 or whatever it was from Alleyn’s,’ it was remarkable that ‘only

one of the SLESS boys got into the First XI, the other ten came from Rossall…. Within two years it had

sorted itself out.’

Pre-war glory days

Once everyone came back to Dulwich, there was an inevitable harking back to life before the war,

and this was especially true in the realms of sport. The athletes remembered the School’s ‘strong

running tradition, especially in Cross-Country, where the school has won many coveted trophies.’512

However, even with the advantage (or disadvantage) of Rossall’s sea water swimming pool, it was

noted that ‘we return to London to find that the general standards of swimming had suffered during

the war. House Captains found that only 50% of their Houses could swim.’ By 1947 swimming was

getting better and the ‘standard of swimming now shows signs of improvement, and with a good

nucleus… we hope we shall soon reach our pre-war level.’513

The Ministry of Education’s inspectors

in 1950 estimated ‘that approximately 61% of the boys in the School can swim.’514

The cricketers started their review of their first serious post-war season with

The question in everybody’s mind is: How does the cricket of 1946 compare with that of 1939?

They concluded that ‘Generally speaking the pre-war standard has been maintained and could even

be improved on,’515

which wasn’t bad when you consider that the cricketers returned to Dulwich the

year before to ‘a ground like a long field’516

In 1949, the cricketers had much to be proud about – two of its side were selected to represent the

Public Schools Cricket at Lords. ‘MJ Stewart played for Southern Schools v. the Rest, and also was

awarded the Public Schools Cap for playing for the Public Schools against the Combined Services.’517

John Pretlove (C 1944-51) joined Mr Stewart in the Amateurs of Surrey team.518

Mr Pretlove was also instrumental in improving the standard of Fives play at the School. In 1948, the

magazine’s Fives reporters wrote that the ‘steady improvement observed throughout 1947-48 has

been maintained and the results of the 25 matches played this season show clearly that the standard

of play must now be approaching that of the very good years before the war.’519

Mr Hughes lists ‘John Pretlove, Roy Birmingham, Bob Smith,’ as ‘excellent players and were National

Champions whilst at school and as Old Boys, both at singles and doubles. Sidney Batrick (b 1943-47)

and Pretlove became UK doubles champions.’ Mr Hughes told us that ‘Mr Batrick played a lot of

512


Ibid , October 1947, p388 514

HMIs report, 1950, p18 515

EAM, November1946, p284 516





124

Fives and also coached the school boys after his retirement from work.’520

As we will see in the

chapter ‘Distinguished boys and visitors’, other AOBs came to help Alleyn’s with its athletic activities

– the Rt Hon Lord Higgins and Dr Harold Moody. This was recognised by the inspectors, ‘…it is

pleasing to record the valuable help given by one or two Old Boys who live in the locality, and who

have attained distinction as athletes of national standing.’521

Robert Young, who was the master in charge of athletics, credits the input of these two for the

School’s improvement on the athletics field.

[The Governors] and the Headmaster were stingy in the extreme. They never came up with enough

financial help, and the only reason that Alleyn's kept coming up with international standard athletes

was the dedication of a few members of the staff, the unstinted support of Terry Higgins AOB who ran

the 440 yards for England, and Harold Moody AOB a doctor in Peckham, who did his training as shot-

putter for the English team on our grounds, and coached our young hopefuls in the field events.

Meanwhile I gradually introduced some matches into the summer term. [Athletics] had been

outlawed before the war by the demands of cricket under Henderson.522

Continuing our pre-glory days of Alleyn’s theme, the magazine thanked Young for ‘for his enthusiasm

and energy during the past season in guiding the School back to the pre-war tradition of athletics at

Alleyn’s.’523

Colours

Young was a dedicated athletics coach; yet another dispute he clashed swords with Hudson over was

the issue of colours.

Mr Hudson refused in his headmastership to give colours to younger boys. He still regarded such an

action as likely to make them swollen-headed.

As we have seen in the chapter on DiscipIine, Young had wanted to give full colours to the 16-year-

old David Fournel [S 53-57], for breaking the school long-jump record, but ‘Hudson dug his feet in

and absolutely refused to allow such an award to one so young’.524

Mr Williams remembered the honour bestowed on you if you were awarded colours.

If you were selected to play in a school sports side you were listed as Williams JA, for example, if you

hadn’t got your colours; but as JA Williams on receipt of them. Almost like Amateur and Professional!

You were listed higher if you had received your colours.

There were critics of the prominence of sport at Alleyn’s, with Puff Smith – who else – spluttering,

‘The games fetish throughout the secondary schools has been a far greater menace to an education

520

Later, Sidney Batrick opened the School’s refurbished Fives courts as they were going to be named after

him. Mr Hughes told us that Mr Batrick ‘was so pleased when they named them after him’. 521


Young, p229 523

EAM, June 1946, p253 524

Young, p231

125

designed to produce a sensitivity and awareness.’525

Young, admittedly an ally of Smith’s, outlined

one of Puff’s limitations as Roper’s Housemaster.

There is no doubt the School owed a debt of gratitude to Smith for all the work he, as a dedicated

bachelor and musician, put into the School, but as one of the eight Housemasters he was often the

odd man out, disliking compulsory games, and leaving his House teams to a voluntary turn-out - most

frustrating to the other seven Houses with full turn-outs. 526

For Smith – as we have seen – his goal was loftier than sport:

…quite often [the boys] are placed in the position, quite unnecessarily, of choosing whether they shall

represent the House at football, or rehearse for the greater glory of God.527

The more earth-bound inspectors pronounced that at Alleyn’s ‘Physical Education is recognised as an

important part of the boys' education.’528

Despite this, they were critical of the gymnasium which ‘is

an old building, and many of its features, both of design and structure, fail to conform with modern

planning… the lack of a changing room and shower annexe.’529

Surprisingly, this lack of changing

facilities had been a criticism of the Ministry of Education’s predecessors when they came to call

some 18 years before, in 1932: ‘It is desirable on hygienic grounds and in order to secure complete

freedom of movement that the boys should change for the gymnastic lessons….'.530

Certainly from the post-war period on, the reports in the magazine are crammed with detail and

analysis of all the sports the boys – and Old Boys – played. The School was back to its former glory –

even though its players may not have been as fragrant as the inspectors might have wished.

525

Smith, p29 526

Young, p222 527

Smith, p29 528


Ibid, 1950, p18 530

Board of Education Report, 1932, p22

126

The cadet forces and the Home Guard�

�‘Like all public schools, Alleyn's had a full-scale Army Cadet Force. For more than a century young men

had been trained in public schools to administer the Empire and military training was an automatic

part of their education.’ Roy Barnes, Twenty-Five Years On: One Boy’s Growing Up, p97

Membership of the cadet force at Alleyn’s was compulsory, unless, in John Williams’s (R 1943-49)

words ‘you were medically unfit, or your parents were conscientious objectors.’ There were few of

those and those who were, remembered Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) ‘went to first aid’. John Holt (S

1945-51) wrote that ‘Maj SR Hudson, the Headmaster, was very keen on pupils having Army or RAF

training and most of the younger masters were officers.’ The inspectors reported that,

Tradition at Alleyn's expects all boys after they enter the Middle School to belong to the combined

Cadet Force unless prevented by physical infirmity or on religious grounds. The average strength of

the Combined Cadet Force is 490-500 boys. It is the second largest in London and is only exceeded by

such Public Schools as Charterhouse, Eton and Oundle.531

During this decade the cadet force at Alleyn’s changed its name three times. It started out as the

Officers Training Corps (OTC) and, during the war, was democratically re-named the Junior Training

Corps (JTC) – and in 1942 an Air Training Corps (ATC) was added; then in 1948 the two sections

became the Combined Cadet Force (CCF).

Last term the JTC and ATC amalgamated into the Combined Cadet Force to form a single training unit.

This unit consists of three parts: a Basic Training Unit, in which training is done up to the standard of

Cert ‘A’, Part I; RAF Unit and Army Unit. Both these do more advanced specialist training. The CCF at

present is nearly 500 strong, and looks a fine spectacle on Battalion Parade.532

Preparation for war

There is an increased keenness to join the JTC and a great desire on all sides to do everything to

support the nation's war-effort. 533

For Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) there ‘was one part of School life on which I was very keen. That was the

School cadet corps, or as it was properly known, the Officer Training Corps. The title gives an

indication of the intentions of the School. We were being trained to be officers, not mere

privates.’534

Robert Young, however, was sceptical:

The actual training done by the school OTC… was hopeless as a preparation for any war much after

the Crimean; but it did at least give you practice in taking stupid orders as well as intelligent ones, and

obeying without question.535

As the war continued, there is more of a sense of urgency about preparing the boys to fight in the

war compared to the previous decade. On Speech Day in 1942, the Headmaster commented that

531



SLESS report in EAM, March 1942, p510 534


Young, p101

127

Physical education today was necessarily closely connected with military training. The high

percentage of successful candidates in the recent Cert A examinations, and our Home Guard training,

were evidence that we were playing our part in the preparation for the Forces.536

By 1944 this intensifying of the military training was being openly admitted: ‘More and more as the

war goes on the routine of instruction and training (much changed and more ambitious than the pre-

war syllabus) resembles a well-ordered machine.’537

The boys had instruction from serving soldiers;

up at Rossall,

‘A’ Coy received assistance from the Royal Corps of Signals, who sent down a sergeant every week.

This meant that a full programme of wireless procedure was done; this was often combined with

tactical exercises…538

And they were getting new equipment,

‘A’ Coy acquired considerable new equipment and was hard at work technically learning to master it.

Its appearance on field day was most impressive and the bulkiness of the signalling gear demanded

the use of transport – a new departure in JTC field days, pointing to the modern ideas of war.539

Activities

Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) remembered that, ‘once a week [the OTC ] assembled. The day before, in

the morning we were there polishing all the brass and cleaning boots and generally making

ourselves ready for parade.’ Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-48) ‘quite enjoyed the Friday afternoon parades,

learning to march and shoulder the old Lee Enfield rifle, and to shoot it with live ammunition in the

school's own rifle range.’540

Sandy Alexander (B 1938-47) remembered that they ‘didn’t have proper

uniform as it was being issued to the troops. We had these trousers, sort of plus fours, with puttees

to fill the gap (puttees like khaki bandages).’ Roy Dann (D 1937-42) remembered the puttees too:

‘we worried about them falling down.’

When Alleyn’s was evacuated to Kent, the OTC went with it. The magazine – needlessly I feel –

apologised for the OTC’s ‘late start’ owing to ‘the transference of the School to Maidstone and the

difficulties of assembling there’. The OTC despatch in the magazine reported that ‘Cert “A” work… is

considered by the War Office to be increasingly important now, began immediately.’541

The OTC

536

EAM, October 1942, p573; Frank Halford (R 1942-49) kindly explained what ‘Cert A’ was, as well as its value

to him in his subsequent National Service: ‘We learnt how to march, to give commands and march others, to

read maps, to fire the .22 rifle in the School Range, to handle the 303, to dismantle and re-assemble a Bren

gun in a certain time, to blanco and polish and various other things which I have forgotten. If one passed the

first lot of tests, one was awarded Certificate A Part 1, then after successfully passing more, one gained Cert A

Part 2. It was only later that I realised how useful this would be. I joined up – National Service – in December

1949 and reported to the Welch Regiment at Brecon in company with about 60 other 18- year-olds. After two

weeks of drill – square bashing – we were asked who had Cert A? Some 16 of us, perhaps not as many, were

then treated differently. While the others carried on with more drill and route marches, we spent a lot of time

on the firing range with the 303 Lee Enfield rifle and LMG [Light Machine Gun] otherwise known as the Bren

Gun, and throwing hand grenades and firing mortar shells on the Brecon Beacons. I know many men hated

their initial 12 weeks Basic Army Training, but thanks to Cert A, I quite enjoyed it.’ 537


Ibid, May 1944, p103 539


Barnes, p113 541


128

quickly found places to practise in Kent, using Mote Park for field work and Maidstone Grammar

School’s range for shooting.542

However, as the Battle of Britain raged over head, changes had to be

made:

Parades were held at Albion Place instead of Maidstone Grammar School, owing to increased air

activity: accordingly not a little of the work had to be done in shelters, or in the quadrangle, under the

watchful eye of a ‘spotter’.543

The OTC – now the JTC – then loaded up the railway cars with its kit for the journey to Rossall in

1941.

The JTC, together with the rest of the School, was transported from Maidstone to Rossall. This

entailed a considerable removal of books, papers and furniture. The first few weeks were busily spent

in building and then furnishing and preparing an orderly room. The JTC once more had an opportunity

of appearing as normal with three companies…

The despatch added ominously, ‘As a whole the tempo of training has accelerated rapidly’; perhaps

in recognition of the increase in war activity?

Rossall School was one of the first public schools to have a Rifle Corps which was founded on 1

February 1860, several months before those of Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Marlborough and

Winchester.544

At Rossall the schools’ joined forces to form an ATC unit under a Rossall teacher, Mr

White (a WW1 Royal Flying Corps observer). Bill Jones (R 1935-42), who was the first sergeant

appointed to the unit, described in a letter the first-ever flight of the Alleyn's/Rossall ATC:

We travelled to Squires Gate Coastal Command Training Station by tram and were divided into two

parties and taken up in Avro Ansons by two Polish pilots who flew to the middle of Blackpool and

chased each other round the tower at surprisingly low level; I think we were all sick....

All our AOBs remembered the JTC Field Days. There is an amusing account of one Field Day in Mote

Park where, ‘amongst the more entertaining and instructive of which was the sight of two

reconnaissance patrols in dark glasses which transformed sunshine into darkness, stealthily

attempting to discover each other.’545

At Rossall, the highlight of the Field Days was tea at Listers’

Café. After enduring a Field Day at Knott End where ‘the corps had a very strenuous day,’ which was

made, ‘all the more enjoyable since there was a gargantuan tea at Listers’ Café.’546

A year later,

The field days are becoming an institution which is as valuable as it is enjoyable. Battles (directed with

considerable tactical skill) rage across the well known country. The country admirably suits sub-unit

training, and a high standard of field-craft is being engendered throughout the Corps. Then there is

the great moment of relaxation – tea at Listers’ Café.547

Clearly, Lister’s Café was becoming part of that institution. In the same summer, during the holidays,

the ‘NCOs and cadets visited an RAF Station. During very warm weather a full course of instruction

542


Ibid, March 1941, p419 544

DLM, p12 545


Ibid, May 1943, p41 547


129

was undertaken and several cadets were able to fly. Last term we visited another RAF Station and 15

cadets had an opportunity of seeing Rossall from the air.’548

The institution of Field Day continued – as it still does today – after the war. Mr Barnes recalled,

Once a term we went on Field Day, during which we pretended to be real soldiers and conducted

manoeuvres on Epsom Downs. We had a marvellous time playing a slightly more involved game of

Cowboys and Indians, one big, enjoyable laugh.549

In 1946 there is an account of possibly one of the wettest Field Days in the magazine:

On May 31st a field day was held at Kingswood. This took place in the worst weather that ever beset a

field day. After noon there was no break in the torrential rain, but despite the weather much valuable

training was done: ‘Cover’ took on an entirely new and non-text book significance.550

Mr Holt explained that ‘Field Day was held on the Friday before half-term, all Field Days, except two,

being held on Epsom Downs.’

We would catch a train from North Dulwich railway station to Epsom Downs station, but for some

reason, we used to return from Tattenham Corner station. One Field Day was spent at Knole Park,

Sevenoaks and the most vivid memory that I have of that particular Field Day was seeing the RSM

carrying an anti-tank weapon on his shoulder, up the steep and long Tubs Hill, from Sevenoaks

Railways Station – he was certainly a strong chap!... On Field Days we used to participate in

manoeuvres and practise our map-reading skills.551

For Mr Barnes, Field Day allowed him to fly, something which he had always wanted to do,

While the army cadets went off cavorting on Epsom Downs, we aristocrats of the ATC, as we saw

ourselves, went off to Biggin Hill, the most famous fighter station of the second world war. On the

first occasion we were taken up in Percival Proctors, two-seater training aircraft, where the learner

sat next to the instructor… We had to wear old-style, Biggles-like leather helmets with headphones

inside so that we could hear the instructor above the noise of the propeller engine just in front of us

and the roar of the wind.

The pilots who took us up on that first-ever flight for me were Polish Battle of Britain veterans, whose

English was almost impossible to understand once we were inside the plane… We were not allowed

to touch the joystick, but it moved as the pilot adjusted the ailerons, and, chocks away, sped down

the runway, a tremendous feeling of excitement as the nose turned up to the sky and the pressure of

the climb pushed the chest back….

My pilot sang Polish songs at the top of his voice as he put the plane into a steep climb towards the

sun.552

Peter Wrench (C 1945-49) might have been another of these Polish airmen’s victims. He told the

tale:

548


Barnes, p113 550


King, p89 552

Barnes, p115

130

I remember on one occasion… we had some mad Polish airforce guys take us up. Seeing what was

going on, I let all the others go up and thought we’d maybe pack up and I wouldn’t have to do all this

looping. But ultimately, it came to my time and I remember the first loop the loop, I was crouching

down to say my last prayers with houses flying overhead and clouds over there – I was terrified. But

having done the first one, the pilot said ‘how was that?’ and I said, ‘well, let’s do it again.’ Then I

asked him to fly over Woking as my uncle lived there and in about five seconds we seemed to be over

there!

Unfortunately, on that trip, Mr Wrench was in charge of ‘about half the lads and Meaty Le Feuvre,

our history master, was the honorary flight lieutenant for the purposes of being with us, he was in

charge of the other half of the lads. I forgot to change at Clapham Junction so I was given a complete

dressing down by him when we finally got back.’

Annual Inspection

Another institution for the School’s cadet force was the Annual Inspection, although none of our

AOBs mentioned it directly.

In 1940, the magazine starkly reported that ‘the annual inspection was cancelled by the War

Office.’553

The contingent wasn’t inspected until two years later, by Col EL Musson, DSO, MC,

Commanding the Preston Area, who ‘complimented the Corps on its keenness and efficiency.’554

At

the JTC’s last inspection at Rossall, the inspecting officer declared that they were, ‘A good unit, well

commanded. In spite of the difficulties of being evacuated, the contingent has reached a high

standard of training and is to be congratulated on the results obtained.’555

The inspecting officer of 1948 clearly knew how to get the boys on his side: Maj Gen Sir Arthur AB

Dowler, KBE, CB: ‘in his address to the contingent congratulated it on its steadiness on parade, its

enthusiasm and efficiency. He asked the Headmaster for a JTC half-holiday, which was granted.’556

Home Guard

The older boys and the staff joined the Local Defence Volunteer Patrol (later named the Home

Guard557

), both in Kent and at Fleetwood. The magazine announced that:

Last term saw the inauguration of the Local Defence Volunteer Patrols, and every Wednesday night

since, a number of masters and boys have sacrificed five hours sleep to safeguard the life and liberty

of the population of Boxley. From half past nine every Wednesday night to half past four every

Thursday morning the sundry fauna of the Pilgrims’ Way have been disturbed by ungainly khaki-clad

forms, their shoulders weighed down by .303s, hunched (as far as a constricting webbing belt and its

dependent cape would allow) over their two-wheeled transports, and making their ponderous way

along the road that was formerly graced by the light-hearted but equally slow-moving Canterbury

Pilgrims.558

553


Ibid, March 1942, p514 555

Ibid, July 1945, p177 556


The name was changed because the initials of Local Defence Volunteers, LDV, quickly became short for

‘Look, Duck, Vanish’. 558

EAM, November 1940, pp393-4

131

The employment of masters in the Home Guard made for some amusing descriptions:

…Though the first sight of the masters in battle-dress irresistibly suggested a party of benevolent

share-pushers who had been granted a night’s parole from Maidstone Gaol, even this phenomenon is

now taken for granted, and we boys (now, by a War Office order compelled, to our not considerable

chagrin, to wear ‘civvies’) are eagerly awaiting our own ‘genuine West-end misfits’.

Boys are coming to learn more of their masters than has hitherto been possible, for in the course of

half nightly conversations under the sun (or rather under the moon) certain hitherto reserved

members of the Staff have evinced palpable signs of (shall it be said?) a sense of humour.

Finally, let us assure the citizens of Maidstone and its environs that, on Wednesday nights at least,

they may rest easy in their beds, confident in the knowledge that the traffic on the ______ Road is still

being stopped and searched, reckless of personal risk, for enemy aliens, Chinese stowaways, and

Burmese castaways, and that small but determined squads of boys continue to foil every attempt by

enemy sympathisers to deposit putrifying flesh in the waters of that Indispensable Public Utility, the

_______ Pumping Station.559

Mr Henry Tilley (R 1935-40) remembered how the role of master and pupil were reversed when he

and Henderson served alongside each other in the LDV at Maidstone. 'In my last term at Maidstone,

we senior boys were formed into the LDV to combat the threat of German invasion after Dunkirk

and I had to patrol the Pilgrims' Way in case of parachute attack.... My companion over several

nights was none other than RB Henderson. Well, I was a duffer, the laughing stock of the OTC, but

compared with Henderson, I was a warrior!'560

Mr Thain recalled ‘going on to the seafront to watch our home guard teachers tackling an assault

course through the sand – real ‘Dad’s Army’! Once the army brought some vehicle – I think it was a

tank which got stuck in the very loose sand and had to be left overnight.’

And with ‘ingenious devices’ as recommended by ‘Mr B-S’ in the following Fifty Club report, it is

hardly surprising the Home Guard was such a good source of comedy for so many years:

Mr B-S discoursed at length on modern Home Guard methods, and recommended numbers of

ingenious devices for outwitting the Boche, should an invasion ever occur. It was learnt that tanks

could be stopped by the judicious use of such innocent things as blankets; the common hatpin, the

scissor-blade, were seen to possess extraordinary lethal properties, when diverted from their original

purpose. The Secretary [JE Silvester] will never look a cheese-wire in the face again.561

There are more incidents to underline the ‘Carry on’ nature of the Home Guard platoon and their

associates:

A local Warship Week gave a few people the chance of marching to a band again, but it was distinctly

unsettling when two bands started in opposition and the whole column began an undecided hop skip

and jump movement. Recent night operations have added to the interest, and sinister silent figures

559


‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, p37 561


132

creep around the school looking like minstrels, occasionally frightening members of the domestic

staff.562

In 1942, ‘the present efficiency of our Home Guard was well shown by the mistake of a NAAFI mobile

canteen who mistook us for a platoon of regulars when we were on exercises one afternoon. They

stopped and offered us liberal refreshment. Our enthusiasm for outdoor exercises has now

noticeably increased.’563

Comedy aside, the volunteers in the Home Guard realised they played an important role in

defending the country.‘D-day brought us an expectant Stand-to, but Hitler did not accept the

challenge. So it was with mingled feelings that we took off our khaki and once again moved freely in

and out of School.’564

A year later the magazine announced ‘the “Stand-down” of the Home Guard is

noted’565

and it gave a review of the Alleyn’s platoon’s war-time activities, which I think is worth

quoting in full:

After 4 ½ years of service the Home Guard stood down on Sunday, December 2nd

. Although we

breathed a sigh of relief that the national emergency was over, we nevertheless felt certain tinges of

regret that Home Guard days were ended. Though the times of parades are now things of the past,

we still cherish vivid memories of what was done.

First formed in the hectic days of 1940 at Maidstone, when the cold and murky nights were spent in

frightening innocent people on the Pilgrims’ Way, the Alleyn’s platoon of the Home Guard became

one of the main functions of the senior part of the school. When it came to Rossall in January 1941,

the Home Guard undertook its task to patrol the sea wall ‘without selfishness and without fear’ on

even colder and murkier nights, often with a typical Rossall gale blowing. For this many of our juniors

of those days will testify, by being fearsomely challenged on their way to the Cinderella Home566

by

desperate-looking personages in battle-dress. What sleeping there was, was done on uncomfortable

palliasses in the woodwork building and as a special temptation the Home Guard was offered sardine

sandwiches for a nightcap! Some energetic members gave up their beauty sleep to go, black-faced, on

night schemes, and their week-ends to endure battle courses at Moss Side, where once the jealous

School learnt that the Home Guard had been given ice-cream!

The remainder of the School will never forget the assault course when eminent members of the staff

were seen gingerly picking their way through barbed wire and jumping gracefully over pits. Just as

memorable, especially to gaping juniors, was the sight of school-boy NCOs giving orders to masters,

and having these orders obeyed with the greatest possible alacrity. Fiercely-armed pedants crawling

on their copious stomachs and rushing desperately from cover to cover, were scenes never to be

forgotten. Sloping arms with Sten guns and wearing field-service caps back to front produced loud

guffaws from the seasoned veterans of the JTC, but Alleyn’s Home Guard was an efficient and

effective fighting unit, if ever the need had arisen.

562

Ibid, May 1942, p552 563

Ibid, May 1943, p42 564


Ibid, March 1945, p143 566

The Cinderella House, a holiday home for poor children half a mile down the seashore, was where 37 of the

boys were temporarily housed to alleviate pressure on dormitory space at Rossall in 1941.

133

There was no parade or march-past when the Alleyn’s platoon stood down – there was no ceremony

whatever, but the members recall with smiles and grimaces the days when they were the gallant

band of people who ‘also serve that stand and wait.’567

SLESS

Mr Robert Howlett (B 1944-50) lived in Martell Road and he remembered that the factory there,

Telephone Manufacturing Co, ‘had its own Home Guard. When they had exercises in Chancellor

Grove, which was all bombed out houses, my friends and I “helped” by pointing out the “defenders”

to the “attackers”.’

As we have seen, the boys at SLESS, as well as ‘helping’ the local Home Guard, had ‘a great desire to

do everything to support the nation’s war-effort’.568

The SLESS boys were also practising drill and

going on Field Days. In 1940, the magazine announced that at ‘the beginning of the Trinity Term OTC

training began at Dulwich for those cadets at present at the South London Emergency Secondary

School.’569

Two years later the ‘The JTC is going strong, with a Cert A squad parading at all sorts of

odd times and places, and many of our boys have joined ATC units and Home Guard Cadets.’570

By

1944, the numbers of boys in the OTC at SLESS were over 60. There was almost a nostalgic reverie in

the magazine’s report of SLESS’s JTC’s Field Day which ‘saw the whole contingent roaming over

Epsom Downs during the holidays, much in the style of pre-war days.’571

Post-war cadet forces

Back at Dulwich, the JTC resumed its activities and, as with academic and sporting achievements,

tried to reassure its readers that the ‘Corps is gradually reverting to a pre-war normality in its

appearance,’ adding,

The only loss to efficiency this term was occasioned by lack of sufficient battle dress for all members

of ‘A’, ‘B’ and ‘C’ Coys…. it was not a gain to smartness of turnout or efficiency on Bn. Parade that so

many senior cadets should have to wear plain clothes. At the present moment there is every chance

that new uniforms will be ready for next term…572

Another way the JTC measured its return to ‘its normal pre-war appearance’ was,

the return of Captains FA Meerendonk, LAR Shackleton and RHD Young. May we state how very glad

we are to see them on parade.573

For Young, it took time to readjust to being back amongst school boys:

We all wore khaki on Friday afternoons, and it was surprising how difficult it was to avoid using

soldier language when dressed like a soldier and to avoid the lingo which everybody in the services

will recognise as unsuitable when addressing children!574

567

EAM, March 1945, pp153-54 568

Ibid, March 1942, p510 569

Ibid, June 1940, p357 570


Ibid, May 1944, p101 572

Ibid, June 1946, p256 573

Ibid, February 1946, p230

134

Alongside shortages and returning staff, the JTC had to contend with the harshness of the 1947

winter: ‘There were many days when snow lay deep on the quadrangle and the school buildings

were chill and inhospitable. The need was felt for an indoor parade ground.’575

Air Training Corps

In 1947 the ATC unit proudly reported that it ‘is bigger than it has ever been since the return of the

School from Rossall.’ Mr Wrench was already a member of the Brixton Air Cadets before joining

Alleyn’s at the age of 14. He ‘was very reluctant to join the school contingent as the Brixton one had

a lovely band that I was very proud to march behind on Sundays. I was made aware of Soapy

Hudson’s attitude that unless I joined the school contingent I’d be really up the creek without a

paddle. So I did so then ultimately became senior NCO of the flight contingent.’

Mr Williams was also a member of the ATC; he recounted that he ‘was pleased to get Cert A in the

CCF, so that I could “skive” a bit by going into the ATC – less drilling under the Guards’ control and

more class work, observing silhouettes of aircraft, morse code and studying cloud-formations.’ Mr

Barnes enjoyed

learning Morse Code and how to send Morse signals - da, di, da, dit. This had the immense attraction

of a secret code that we could da-dit to one another in the classroom when we wanted to send secret

messages, but it took so long to do and was almost impossible to decipher that it was hardly worth

bothering with, but it made us look big, giving us a feeling of being members of some superior, secret

brotherhood.

Mr Barnes added that ‘we also learnt the theory of flight, the fascinating, hardly believable physics

of lift and drag.’576

The boys in the ATC managed to experience for themselves the unbelievable

physics of lift and drag by flying. Derek Smith recalled visiting ‘RAF Kenley for a day where we had a

flight in a war-time Anson transport ‘plane.’

Mr Barnes reminisced about a week’s camp at Thorney Island RAF station. It was ‘under canvas,

during which we messed with the airmen and got to know what it was like to be in the Air Forces.

We drilled and attended lectures and had the run of the camp, could shop at the NAAFI and feel we

were grown up.’577

There he flew a Dakota, ‘the ubiquitous American transport plane, that

dependable, but oh so uncomfortable, war horse of the second world war. It was a bit like flying in a

beer crate, slow and bumpy,’ and in so doing, ended his ATC career by bursting his eardrum on his

first flight in one. 578

As we have seen, Mr Wrench, like Mr Barnes, also managed to fly, but not without some wheeler-

dealer-ing with his friend, the late Dr Clive Chapman:

He used to copy my homework and steal my JAGS girlfriends. In return he lent me his father’s bike

and wrote parents’ permission letters for me to fly with the ATC (my nervous mother never forgave

him).

574

Young, p228 575

EAM, June 1947, p356 576

Barnes, p114 577

Ibid, pp117-16 578


135

Staff

The staff who oversaw the JTC in the post-war years were Maj LAR Shackleton, the CO, and Maj RHD

Young, his deputy. Prior to that, Maj Sidney Hudson had held the command since 1936. On his

promotion to Headmaster in 1947, he stood down as CO. The magazine published its thanks:

The debt owed to Major Hudson by the Corps, and no less by the School, is more than can ever be

repaid. It may be said that his aims have always been to raise the efficiency and status of the

contingent, and he has attained marked success in both these aims. This is proved by the excellent

record of passes in the cert ‘A’ exams and in other courses, the reports of Inspecting Officers and the

hi position held by the Corps among JTCs.

It must be a great satisfaction to Maj Hudson to hand over to his successor the contingent in such fine

condition, and we are glad to know that, as Headmaster, he will still give it his support, while no

longer taking any active part in its work.579

At this same time, Hudson appointed a new member of staff: Sgt Maj Eric Randall of the Grenadier

Guards. He had been demobbed the year before and was to be the contingent RSM to Alleyn’s

School JTC. At the time Randall ‘thought that he might take the job for a few months until he had

settled into civilian life. The few months became 46 years,’ and in those years, he was to oversee

6,000 pupils.580

There is a bust of him in the School’s entrance hall which has as its inscription, ‘In

grateful appreciation of loyal and devoted service to the School from 1948-1993 the longest period

by any individual in the history of Alleyn’s College of God’s Gift’.

579


Chandler, p137

136

Privilege at Alleyn’s

‘The boys were also a motley collection ranging from pure public school (mostly at Rossall) to LCC

warehouse sweepings like myself.’ Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48)

Derek Smith (R 1947-53) remembered that the boys at Alleyn’s came from, ‘all sorts of backgrounds.

A pal of mine and his father were working in the market down in Peckham, but when we all got

together we didn’t talk about family, you just wanted friends because up to then you didn’t really

have friends, whilst you were evacuated, you were all split up and they sent you everywhere. [It

was] Very lonely during the war.’

Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) was ‘very pleased to come here when I passed my intermediate LCC

scholarship which could have taken me to Dulwich College, or a variety of other schools. My father

was a police constable, and the old headmaster said to him, “you’re only a constable; we do not

suggest you send your son to Dulwich College”. There was a lot of social division at that time. He

suggested that my father sent me here… and now it highlights that a constable wasn’t quite in that

same strata.’ Mr Cox thought that ‘if [Dad] had been a police inspector or even a sergeant, it would

have been all right’.

Conversely, John Hughes (C 1945-51) felt that the boys’ ‘background didn’t make much difference. In

those days you took the 11+ county exam. If you passed you had a choice of schools.’ Ted Robinson

(Tn 1938-41) remembered that after being awarded a scholarship, it

qualified me for consideration by several prominent schools including Dulwich, Eltham, Alleyn’s,

Westminster (warned that intake was limited and favouring nepotism from fathers in Parliament and

the civil service), Christ’s Hospital (no way – with ginger stockings and skirts!), Mill Hill (North

London!).

It was really ‘no contest’. I had overheard my Head and another visiting Head comparing the merits of

Dulwich and Alleyn’s for their sons. Their comments favoured Alleyn’s; my mind and hopes were

settled.

In deciding which of the five schools to apply to, Derek Smith remembered putting ‘Alleyn’s first,

Dulwich College second, St Dunstan’s third, and they looked at it and laughed at it, and said, “if you

don’t get to Alleyn’s you certainly won’t get to Dulwich College”, because I’d put it second.’

Roy Dann (D 1937-42), who won a Junior County Scholarship, remembered that, ‘some of my friends

at my previous school referred to Alleyn’s as a ‘posh’ school.’ Alan Thomas, who was at SLESS,

confessed to feeling privileged at Alleyn’s:

the buildings, curriculum, staff, image, although not the full normal Alleyn’s or Wilson’s [to which he'd

won a scholarship] – it was inevitably a great advance on the LCC school I’d attended from five to 11.

Gordon Feeley (1941-50), another SLESS boy, reflected that, ‘now, I can see that it was a privilege.

I’m not sure I would have used that word then, I was certainly pleased. I’d known the school all my

life, but I never believed I could have got into it.’ For Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49), Alleyn’s represented a

‘relief from the misery’ he’d endured after moving to a new home in suburban London from

countryside. He wrote

137

I hadn't yet been admitted, but my Uncle George had told me it was a good place and… [it] was on the

list of approved secondary schools for which the London County Council would pay the fees if I was

accepted.581

He was. Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48) also received a scholarship from the London County

Council and commented that ‘the LCC was a generous authority; they paid bus fares, a uniform

allowance and the school fees.’ John Williams (R 1943-49) passed ‘an entrance exam for here and

Dulwich, and, given the choice by my father, chose Alleyn’s.’

In the 1940s, Dulwich College was deemed to be ‘on a slightly higher plane than Alleyn’s,’ according

to Mr Hughes. Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) put the difference more strongly: ‘you almost weren’t

talking about it in the same breath, the College was the College, Alleyn’s was Alleyn’s, and ne’er the

twain should meet.’

Among our AOB-guests, there was a mix of scholarship boys and fee-payers. ‘Out of his £300-odd a

year salary,’ Mr Williams’s father ‘paid seven guineas a term for me plus about 12 & 6d for the train

fares from Petts Wood, via Bromley South, to Herne Hill. Very often we’d save a penny on the bus

fare and walk to school from Herne Hill.’ Another AOB remembered his father paying ‘£22 a year in

tuition fees.’

Admissions interviews

As you have seen, Dr Wetherick wrote that after the start of war,

In 1940-41 schools re-opened after a fashion and the LCC Junior County Scholarship exams were held

which I passed (one question was ‘Describe how to make a deckchair without using diagrams’).

Derek Smith’s admissions interview was with ‘the austere Mr (Col) Shackleton and [I] was accepted

at Alleyn’s. I remember a feeling of great relief and excitement at the prospect of going to such a

great school with all the facilities for education and sport which I had never experienced before.’

The reasons why our AOBs chose Alleyn’s varied (but not much). For Mr Barnes it was clear-cut:

I had known immediately I passed through the school gates that I wanted to join this school, and I was

overjoyed to be accepted. The size of the buildings and grounds was overwhelming, acres and acres of

playing fields, a cinder running track, Fives courts, main building, parade ground, science block, gym,

shooting range, music room and on and on.582

Alan Eaglen (Tn 1939-44) was swayed by Alleyn’s reputation but, possibly of more relevance to an

11-year old, he chose Alleyn’s because he wanted ‘to play football and cricket. I didn’t want to play

rugby; I’d played football since I was six.’ Mr Coleman chose Alleyn’s over St Dunstan's and Dulwich

College because it was ‘the soccer school.’583

Ron Smale (B 1940-46), who had had a chequered

educational history because of the war,

entered what was then the emergency school in September 1940, having returned from evacuation

with Rathfern Road Junior School to Liskeard, Cornwall, on passing my scholarship. Although offered a

place at Liskeard Grammar, I chose to return to war-torn London to pursue my education in Dulwich.

581

Barnes, p96 582

Barnes, p97 583


138

The reason was sound as it was simple in my logic – Alleyn’s played football and in my sport-crazed

mind that was the number one priority….

Another AOB who had a disrupted education because of the war was Alan Jackson (C 1945-51). He

explained:

the loss of our house and the move to another address necessitated me changing schools at a

supposedly critical stage just in the final year before the commencement of secondary education.

Gaining a place at Alleyn’s as the result of a scholarship gave me a wonderful opportunity to benefit

from the discipline and a variety of tutors for a different extended range of subjects.

Most boys based lived in fairly close proximity to the School. The HMIs noted that ‘Forty-one out-

county boys attend the School but the majority are drawn from the 14 districts in London, much the

largest number coming from the Boroughs of Camberwell, Lambeth and Lewisham.’584

Eric Buisson (C 1941-49) lived in Honor Oak Park and came to school by bicycle. Mr Barnes too came

to school by bike – but not after a struggle to persuade his mother. They lived in a flat in Thurlow

Park Road and,

As the crow flies, the school was just over a mile from where we lived, but to get there by bus was a

long, complicated journey with two changes of bus, and though the train journey from Tulse Hill to

North Dulwich was quick, there was a long walk with a satchel full of books at the other end. It took a

little time to convince my mother that I was a competent enough cyclist to avoid being killed by the

mass of traffic... So one Saturday afternoon... she took me up to Norwood Road to Day's cycle shop

and there we purchased a fine red, racing-style, real grown-up new bicycle for £5, complete with

saddle-bag, pump and puncture outfit, going half each in the purchase price, my share coming from

my Post Office account, into which my LCC grant was paid. Boy was I proud.585

The main thrust behind RA Butler’s Education Act of 1944 had been to provide universal secondary

education for all. Whilst we are looking at the notion of class and privilege at Alleyn’s at this time, it

is worth briefing looking at the findings of a pioneering survey – albeit the survey post-dates this

decade (just). In 1951 Hilde Himmelweit, a German social psychologist, looked into how the Act was

playing out in socio-economic practice. Her sample included more than 700 13- to 14-year-old boys

at grammar and secondary-modern schools in four different districts of Greater London.

In the four grammars, she found that whereas ‘the number of children from upper working-class

homes’ had ‘increased considerably’ since 1944, ‘children from lower working-class homes, despite

their numerical superiority in the population as a whole, continued to be seriously under-

represented’ – constituting ‘only 15 per cent of the grammar school as against 42 per cent of the

modern school sample.’ In those grammars, the middle class as a whole took on average 48 per cent

of the places and the working class as a whole 52 per cent (more than two-thirds by the upper

working-class)….

Whilst the middle class were taking proportionately (in terms of the country’s overall population)

more than its fair share of places at grammar schools, Himmelweit found that the middle class boys

also ‘consistently outperformed the working-class boys academically.’ Her survey showed too that

584


Barnes, pp97-98

139

In the teacher’s view, the middle-class boy, taken all round, proves a more satisfactory and rewarding

pupil. He appears to be better mannered, more industrious, more mature and even more popular

with the other boys than his working class co-pupil.586

Before we descend too far into a parody of the Cleese/Barker/Corbett class-sketch from The Frost

Report, it is a relief to find that Himmelweit sensibly didn’t draw any major conclusions with a survey

which – amongst other things, gauged boys’ ‘popularity’. However, it was clear that much work still

needed to be done to achieve the utopian view of a class-less education.

Mr Barnes, who described himself as ‘a poor child at a posh school’, gave an interesting insight into

the social manoeuvrings going on at Townley Road; at Alleyn’s he instinctively felt

a desire to improve and develop not only our minds, but our beings. We needed to talk posh, to act

posh, to become superior like the Sir Johns [Maitlands] of this world. We had, in short, to pretend to

be what we were not, middle-class and fairly well-off... Social-climbing, they called it, to become one

of the leaders, not the led.... in the middle of the last century, it was grimly serious. You would not get

on unless you had a BBC accent and could dress the part.587

Mr Barnes recalled, in spite of the post-war New World Order being built at the time, part of the

School still clung to the old style Empire-building glory days of pre-war years at Alleyn’s.

At speech days, the visiting dignitaries giving out prizes never failed to tell us that we had great

responsibilities as we were the future leaders of the nation. The ethos of Dr Thomas Arnold's Rugby

School was still strong in all public schools; their purpose was to produce upstanding Christian

gentlemen for whom serving King and country was the mainspring of their lives; they fought hard but

fair; they were compassionate in victory and steadfast in defeat, honest decent men.588

This is apparent even as late as 1947 when the Bishop of Southwark, acknowledging that ‘the School

was entering into the swing of this vast new scheme for the whole country,’ said that Alleyn’s carried

the classical and academic tradition, into a new world, [the Bishop of Southwark] would like to

emphasise the importance of two great principles, continuity and community. Everything changed

and had changed, yet it was still the same school as Edward Alleyn founded over 300 years ago for his

twelve poor scholars... He thought the continuing reality was the community – this fellowship of

people living and working together. A school was one of the finest types of community which could

exist, for it possessed the three things he considered essential to the good community: an object

outside its own existence, something which transcended the community life itself; a hierarchy of

definite grades where there is room for continual lifting, something to look up to, a just and kindly

discipline, and opportunities for the development of leadership and initiative; and, thirdly, the

safeguarding of the right values for the human race.

As if steadying his charger at the Battle of Agincourt, the bishop went on:

'There is nothing' continued the Bishop, 'of greater importance for the future of the human race than

the values which the average Englishmen is bearing in his soul at the present moment. One

justification for the old school tie is that it stands for the long existence of a community which has

been faithfully maintaining values which we can acquire better in that community life than anywhere

586

Kynaston, pp575-76 587


Ibid, p97

140

else.... With the greatest sincerity I think you have every reason to be grateful for a school which has

carried on all this time, and is able to meet the changes of this modern world. Carry to that world

whatever is best in the values which this community has maintained until now.589

Arnold’s days at Alleyn’s were numbered.

589


141

Post-war Alleyn’s: let us face the future

‘…defeating the Germans remained the major source of pride of the whole nation in the difficult days

that followed the war, which saw us lose our Empire and decline as a great world industrial and

commercial nation.’ Roy Barnes, Twenty-Five Years On: One Boy’s Growing Up, p103

Change in the days after the war was inevitable on all fronts. The two groups of Alleyn’s pupils were

reunited in March 1945 and, after VE Day, began the process of reacclimatising to peacetime and

reconstructing for a new world order. History master Robert Young, returning from the Forces

wrote:

It was a tremendous relief still to be alive, and to be able to extend one's planning beyond the next

half-hour, and to begin to make one's own decisions about how to spend time, or, indeed, what to

wear!590

Surprisingly little was said specifically by our guests about the victory in Europe or Japan. However,

Ian Smith (R 1942-49) showed me his school journal where he had proudly blocked out 6 May as VE

Day, marking it – and the day after – as a holiday. For VJ Day, 15 August, 1945, the magazine

recorded the boys celebrations on a Harvest Camp in Frant:

The high spot of our stay came during the V-J Holidays (on which we worked). On the first night the

school livened up a local bonfire, singing to the inspired accompaniment of Mr Jack Lanchbery on the

piano. The second evening the camp was invited to take part in the celebrations at Frant.591

Young painted a gloomy and shabby picture of post-war London:

....the like of which could scarcely be recognised now – bombed buildings, cobbled streets furrowed

with tram lines, peeling shopfronts, the all-pervading stink of deep-fat frying of fish and chips, the

moan of electric trams grinding to a halt on Champion Hill and Lordship Lane.592

The boys – and some of the staff – sensed the change ahead. Dr Norman Wetherick (B, 1941-48)

wrote that:

Among the senior boys there was much heated political argument, particularly after the end of the

war (1945), the General Election (also 1945) and the foundation of the United Nations (1946). With

hindsight it is difficult to credit how widely it was held that the war had been between more and less

acceptable versions of capitalism and that the future lay with socialism – with the USSR being in the

vanguard.

Roy Barnes (Bn 1942-49) described the attitudes of the staff to the post-war world.

All these older masters, many of whom had seen military service in the First World War and at least

one of them in the Boer War, were born in the previous century, had grown up at the height of

Victoria's reign, believed Britain was the greatest, the fairest, the best-governed and strongest

country the world had ever seen, all of this achieved by hard work and iron discipline. We didn't

realise we were at the very end of an epoch which had begun to fade at the turn of the century and

was now, after the Second World War, crumbling fast. In 1945 we were bankrupt and within a few

590

Young, p193 591


Young, p205

142

short years the Empire would be gone. There were teachers on the staff who knew the old England

was finished and some who even welcomed it.593

Economic hardship

In the Inspectors’ report of May 1950, an appendix notes that £5,474 had been spent on repairs to

war damage 'so far'594

. Money was tight; Young explained that

the Edward Alleyn Estate, although it owned 900 acres of south London, had lost much to middle

men, and then to war damage. Derelict houses, a bombed picture gallery, alms houses, Dulwich

College and Alleyn's School were all expenses, and Alleyn's came very low on the list…. Whether it

was in heating, or in supply of books, or in games equipment, the same problems cropped up – we

were existing on a shoe-string!’595

Hudson, the Acting Headmaster following Allison’s move to Brentwood School, ‘could get no money

out of the governors’596

. John Cleary (B 1945-51) remembered,

it was very much a period of austerity after the war because rationing existed in part up until ’53…. As

regards to the School after the war, some of our textbooks were stuck together with bits and pieces

and very often you’d get half-way through the text book and say ‘Sir, I have got pages missing, sir’.

Rationing and shortages

Even though war ended, rationing continued to ensure there was enough food to feed a war-torn

Europe. Dr Wetherick wrote about rationing:

As for food, 1946-48 was the period when rationing was at its most severe (worse than during the

war, bread was never rationed then). Lease-lend stopped on the day the war ended (1945) and

America ceased to worry about feeding us until 1948 (the Marshall Plan…).

The peacetime-rationing of bread was imposed on 27 June 1946 and was to become a symbolic sore

for British citizens ground down by years of war-time suffering. With victory there came no fruits of

bounty. Christopher Isherwood, close friend to English master Edward Upward, wrote at the time

The rationing cards and coupons that still had to be presented for almost everything from eggs to

minute pieces of scraggy Argentine meat, from petrol to bed-linen and ‘economy’ suits, seemed far

more squalid and unjust than during the war.

Closer to home, the Alleyn Old Boy Club was deprived of reuniting its war-flung members at its

Annual Dinner – an event which had been suspended during the war – announcing its decision in

block capitals:

IN VIEW OF THE FOOD SITUATION IT HAS BEEN DECIDED NOT TO HOLD THE ANNUAL DINNER IN

1946.597

Mr Cleary explained the effect of rationing:

593

Barnes, p107 594


Young, p210 596

Ibid, p213 597


143

It was very difficult because you had ration books with coupons for various things. Most

manufactured items, such as clothes, furniture, etc, bore a utility mark which was C…. You could not

do what is normal now, they were in many ways hard times.

In 1950 the inspectors noted ‘There also appears to be some restriction in the use of exercise books

owing to difficulties of supply’598

. Clothes and sports kit were still being donated by Old Boys years

after the war ended and thank-you notes for these donations appear regularly in the magazine –

‘…[Fives] Balls and gloves will again unfortunately be very scarce. Several pairs of gloves have been

forwarded by OBs and Parents – we are most grateful – and we wish to renew our appeal to those

who have ceased playing to let us have their gloves.’ To this, the writer briskly added: ‘All players are

asked to be most careful and economical in the use of balls, for lost balls are almost impossible to

replace.’599

Derek Smith (R 1947-53) described the communal approach to PE: ‘I remember how in

the gym they had a stack of plimsolls and you just put on two plimsolls that fit your feet.’

Fuel too was rationed. John Williams (R 1943-49) shivered at the memory of the ‘Tin-Tab’ in winter:

‘it could be cold in this building and fires were only allowed on very cold days, because of coal

rationing.’ The combination of rationing, shortages and a lack of money meant, in Robert Young’s

words,

The whole School was being run economically. For instance, the main buildings were still heated by

coal fires… Lit at 8.30 in the morning, they could not be stoked up after 11.30, as the fires had to be

out by 3.30, or the cleaners would go on strike, and as Hudson was keen on explaining, it was easy

enough to get new teachers, but impossible to get new cleaners! When I pointed out to him that the

temperature in one class-room was 36 degrees fahrenheit only two rows from the fire, he suggested

we did physical jerks! We were already doing those. When I asked what he thought our local MP

would say if he knew, he replied 'Don't let him know, or they will close the School down!'600

Winter of 1947

I dread to think what the Tin Tab was like during the winter of 1947: the winter which, more than

the German V1s and V2s, almost brought the country to its knees. John Holt (S 1945-51), writing as

Michael King, described the winter in Dulwich:

January 23rd 1947 saw the start of the worst winter of the century, a thaw not setting in until March

15th. We were often late for School, because the tram tracks and points would freeze up and we had

to walk to school from Forest Hill in the bitter weather. We would arrive at School so frozen that Miss

Wiggs would allow us to stand round the large coke-burning stove in the classroom, until we were

sufficiently thawed-out to commence work.601

The magazine reported that there ‘were many days when snow lay deep on the quadrangle and the

School buildings were chill and inhospitable’602

. The Roper’s House report said

598



Young, p198 601

King, p75 602


144

The noble pastime of snowballing was the only form of exercise indulged in by the House during the

early part of term…. Owing to the severity of the weather there was little running in preparation for

the steeplechase – a calamity which evoked few tears from many members of the House.603

In the magazine’s review of Terence Rattingan’s ‘While the Sun Shines’, you sense even the ever-

upbeat editors’ default-cheeriness ebbing, remarking ‘To transport an audience chilled and dispirited

by fuel cuts and a blizzard to the comfort… of “Chambers in the Albany on a fine day in June” was a

task to daunt even tried professional actors…’604

The bad weather meant that transport ground to a halt and coal supplies couldn’t reach the power

stations. And so, to make a miserable situation even worse, power cuts were enforced. You can

almost hear Robert Young’s despairing at the memory of how, at Alleyn’s

We were keeping the pre-war timetable of six days a week but in the austerity winter of 1947, when

Shinwell as Minister of Power was tackling the backlog of repairs to pre-war power stations against

the background of the coldest winter since 1929, we had power-cuts to cope with, and even had to do

a dress rehearsal by candle-light.605

War damage

As well as trying to keep the buildings, if not warm, at least bearable under several layers of utility

clothes, Hudson had to repair and maintain the fabric of the School site. In 1949, the magazine

reported – as if with fingers crossed behind their backs – on the progress of the repair to the Fives

courts: ‘War damage repairs to all the Courts are now well under way, and it is hoped that further

deterioration due to weathering will not occur’606

. The inspectors in 1950 tersely decreed that ‘The

buildings are generally in need of redecoration…’607

and said, probably reasonably, of the

laboratories that ‘after 50 years of use, and some damage during the war, the laboratories are in

urgent need of redecoration and some repairs.’608

Hudson’s problem wasn’t just a lack of money to finance these repairs. Building materials were

scarce. After the bombs had rained over Britain during the war, there was an immediate need for

one million homes to be built609

. As well as obliterating people’s homes, the bombs made many

homes structurally unsafe. South London suffered disproportionately and many masters returning

from fighting were unable to find anywhere to live and there are reports of masters abandoning

their posts for want of digs. On Speech Day in 1948, Hudson said that ‘The difficulties of housing

603

Ibid, June 1947, p343 604

Ibid, June 1947, p356 605

Young, p199 606



Ibid, p15 609

In its July 1945 issue, the EAM proudly reported that John Scott Galbraith, ‘who left the School in

December, 1905, has recently been elected President of the London Master Builders’ Association for the

current year. Mr Galbraith… comes to this important position at a time when the eyes of almost the entire

country are focused upon the industry he represents and when it is faced with problems of unprecedented

gravity. During his year of office much of the spade work will have to be done in planning the colossal task of

rebuilding London, and it is a matter, not only of interest, but of honour to the School, that at such a time this

important position should be held by one of our own boys.’ (pp187-88)

145

have robbed us of some of our most valuable masters…’610

. One master, Mr TA Ratcliffe, ‘was forced

by the housing situation to find a post elsewhere.’611

Young ranted:

George Hudson and the Governors seemed to have no inkling of their obligation to see their assistant

masters reasonably housed. He was singularly unhelpful for eight out of the nine years [when he was

in unsatisfactory digs], and when I inquired if I could camp out in the clothing store at school, he failed

to take the hint... 'Don't do that, it would alter the rateable value of the school!'. This was no way for

the head of a good public school to behave. He might have been a Head 'Teacher!' By not tackling the

problem of accommodation for staff the governors and headmaster lost an ex-naval lieutenant, who

was a wizard at maths and bowled in cricket up to county standard, simply because he could find

nowhere to live.612

A lack of staff was also a challenge to Hudson, a situation which reflected the country’s dire

manpower shortage. Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) recalled: ‘I don’t think we realized the difficulties that

the staff faced. Many of them were returning from the services, and there seemed to be some

difficulty for the head attracting the right staff’. This was backed up by a comment in the magazine:

It has been impossible, owing to superior conditions offered in industry and elsewhere, to find a

Science Master to replace Mr Meerendonk permanently.613

Memorial

In addition to holding various memorial services throughout this decade, after the war had ended

Alleyn’s wished to make a permanent memorial for those 130 AOBs who had died in service. Alleyn’s

did this in two ways: by adding panels to the war memorial installed after the First World War, and

by building a Garden of Remembrance on the triangle of ground at the junction of Townley Road and

Calton Avenue where the RAF Barrage Balloon site had been during the war.

In 1947 a War Memorial Fund was set up to raise money for these. Donors’ names were recorded in

the magazine. The panels – with 124 names inscribed – were unveiled on Founder’s Day, 18 June

1949.

Chandler wrote that

The garden was designed and created by Mr VK ‘Daddy’ Haslam, a master from 1927 until 1955.

Gardening and weeding had been Mr Haslam’s holiday and spare time occupation for himself and

boys while at Rossall but now he was able to devote a life’s experience into turning a rough, useless

corner of the Townley Field into a beautiful and inspiring Memorial to the Old Boys as well as a

pleasant sight to all who pass by.614

The magazine also recorded that RGD Vernon, MBE, ARIBA, AOB, future architect-surveyor to the

Dulwich Estate and benefactor to the School

has agreed to supervise the work on the Memorial Garden and has very kindly requested that any

fees be returned to the credit of the Fund. The abnormally dry Autumn prevented the planting of

610


Ibid, p462 612

Young, p201 613


Chandler, p87

146

shrubs and this will now have to wait until later. Mr Vernon is in touch with contractors for the paving

of the paths and the Garden Sub-Committee is arranging the purchase and planting of shrubs and

flowers.615

Let us face the future

From the safety of Townley Road, our boys observed the post-war world around them, and looked

forwards. The Labour Party had trounced Churchill’s party at the polls with utopian promises

outlined in its election manifesto, Let us face the future. In it, the Labour Party

demanded a decisive action by the state to ensure full employment, the nationalisation of several key

industries, an urgent housing programme, the creation of a new national health service and (in a nod

to Beveridge) ‘social provision against rainy days’.616

The electorate agreed and so began a great burst of post-war legislation: the National Health Service

Act, the Family Allowance Act, the National Insurance Act, the National Assistance Act, the

nationalisation of the Bank of England, civil aviation, the railways, the coal, gas, electricity, iron and

steel industries: all by 1949.

Visitors came to give lectures at the school, the boys went on visits and attended conferences. In

1947, a party of masters and boys visited Parliament, perceptively noting ‘the central lobby, where…

the Government really governs.’617

A year later our intrepid pupils visited Betteshanger Colliery in

Kent where they descend 2,160 feet into the mine in a cage and see ‘a great black glistening seam of

[coal].’

The heat was uncomfortable to say the least, and… one marvels at the amount of coal miners do

produce in such energy-dissipating conditions…. The pneumatic drills the men use to cut the coal

weigh 45lbs. No wonder after all their heavy work the miners have special rations.618

For Frank Halford (R 1942-49) this outing to Betteshanger Collier was his only school trip; he

remembered going ‘2,400 feet down to reach the coal-workings.’ The Fifty Club heard a Mr Douglas

Turner give a lecture on China:

Mr Turner gave us a vivid picture of his work with the Friends’ Ambulance Unit succouring the victims

of flood, famine and cholera. He was bombarded with questions on the political situation and we

gathered from his answers that the so-called Communists of China were the only party which held out

any hope for the peasant. He considered the Nationalist Party to be the refuge of the old evils of

Chinese feudalism.619

There is a series of ‘most interesting talks in the Upper Sixth Current Affairs periods’ given by AOBs

in 1948. Mr AJ Brunt, ‘a member of the staff of the Foreign Secretary… spoke to us on his recent

experiences in Moscow…. It was refreshing to hear revealing facts from an eye witness rather than

unsubstantiated theories from a propagandist.’ Major Bromfield, ‘a former Governor of Haifa Jail,

615

EAM, February 1950, p2; there may have been an ulterior motive – albeit secondary to Alleyn’s very real

wish to remember its war dead; Robert Young described a battle the School had with the LCC to requisition

some of Alleyn’s land in order to build a new school – see p154 for details. 616

Kynaston, p21 617



Ibid, February 1948, p417

147

gave an illuminating analysis of the Palestine Problem. He explained the situation in terms of the

past insincerity of Power Politics and the desperate emotionalism of the present protagonists.’ And

finally Colonel Taylor, ‘a member of the Control Commission, gave us a well illustrated, graphic and

first hand account of the administrative difficulties of dealing with our German ex-enemies and what

might be termed the psychological ones of co-operating with our Russian ex-allies.’620

Mr Barnes remembered one boy’s (ultimately) futile attempt in 1947 at setting up a German

penfriends’ exchange using his father’s contacts in Germany.

Five of us accepted, but the Daily Express got wind of this idea. Was it right for our boys to be writing

to these people? Wasn't the youth of Germany all imbued with the principles and morality of the

Hitler Youth? The Headmaster had to explain, publicly, that it was not an official school arrangement,

but to avoid scandal he forbade us to proceed with the idea. 621

One pupil-led initiative that was approved was the School’s membership to the rather wordily titled

South East London Inter-Schools Discussion Group. The purpose of the group was ‘to promote

intelligent interest in current affairs’ – although I much prefer the then chair of the group Brian

Goddard’s (Bn 1943-48) description: ‘it provides an enormous clothes’ line for the hanging out to air

of everyone’s pet theories, prejudices and grudges’. The group was formed by a dozen boys’ and

girls’ schools, public, secondary, county and grammar (with the bold proposal to invite ‘certain

Modern Schools of the SE London area’). The group was affiliated to the Council for Education in

World Citizenship622

(whose holiday conferences the pupils attended in 1949). It is interesting to see

that, in addition to ‘airing out pet theories’, two other purposes are admitted:

social contact with boys and girls of different education and outlook, not only broadens one’s

sympathies; it can do much to eradicate that bookish awkwardness which too often characterises

youths of more academic upbringing; and last but not least, by giving us a sense of proportion, it

instils in us a more understanding and hence more real veneration for our own system of education at

Alleyn’s. 623

As we will see, this was a very uncertain time for Alleyn’s; its very survival was under threat (see

chapter ‘Education crisis at Alleyn’s’). At Speech Day in 1946 Hudson refers to the casualties of war

and rhetorically asks his audience: ‘How can we repay our debt to these men?’

The answer is, I think, by making certain that the ideals for which they died are achieved. These are,

to make decent men and women, and to make it possible for them to live in safety and freedom.

Good men are made by good food, exercise and fresh air, good homes and good schools. To achieve

this we need a system of education which exercises, trains and develops the whole nature of man. I

believe that the English public school system, including that side of it which has evolved into the great

day grammar schools of the country, can do this, provided the schools keep abreast of the times.624

[My italics] Henderson’s baton of Alleyn’s as public school has been passed on through his

successors but here the baton is slightly trimmed. In this speech Hudson acknowledged the value of

‘good homes’ for making good men and women – quite contrary to Henderson’s view that all waking

620

Ibid, June 1948, pp432-33 621

Barnes, p103 622

CEWC founded in 1939 623

EAM, June 1948, pp451-53 624


148

hours of boys belong to the School – and is fitting with Hudson’s introduction in 1949 of Parents’ At

Home evenings where parents could meet their sons’ Housemaster to discuss their sons’ progress.

Here Hudson also demonstrated that he was conscious of a changing wind and that schools would

have to tack and glide according to its direction.

Bit by bit, flashes of the old order returned. The Annual Dinner returned on the AOBC’s social

calendar for the first time since 1938 and a correspondence started amongst Old Boys debating a

change to the Club’s colours (they weren’t)625

.

But there was another battle ahead: parents, staff and Old Boys joined forces against the combined

might of the School’s governors and the London County Council to save Alleyn’s School. It wasn’t to

be settled until 1957.

625

Ibid, June 1947, p359 and October 1947, p395

149

Education crisis at Alleyn’s

‘Not only were we very lucky to come to the School, but we were very lucky it was still there as there

was talk at the time that due to the Education Act of ’44 it would be sold to the LCC or demolished.

And it wasn’t until the late ‘40s/early ‘50s that they eventually made up their minds to keep it.’ John

Cleary (B 1945-51). 626

An Alleyn’s education

In his first assembly back at Alleyn’s after returning with the School from Rossall, Headmaster CR

Allison spelt out what he saw as an Alleyn’s education. The Alleyn’s tradition:

1) Aims at educating the whole boy to be the balanced and useful man.

2) Seeks to let him grow up as a member of a community.627

He elaborated further in a write-up of a meeting held on 6 June 1945 between parents and Old Boys

to discuss the educational crisis before them. Allison declared that Alleyn’s provided a

a. Liberal education with pupils drawn from all classes thus bringing the best of each together

to their mutual advantage.

b. The special attention paid to character, tradition and additional cultural subjects.

Education Act, 1944

A bill which is at one and the same time a masterpiece of compromise and an inspiring embodiment

of educational advance.628

The landslide victory for Labour in the 1945 election brought in a raft of drastic social and economic

reforms which swept away the old order and promised to create a New Britain. Winterbottom

commented that

Where the public schools were to stand in the post-war world was not at all clear, and elation at

victory…. was mingled with no little apprehension among many of the British middle classes that

summer.629

Educational reform had already been sealed with the passing of RA Butler’s Education Act in 1944.

The act provided universal secondary education to all and instituted the 11+ exam and the tripartite

division of children into grammar, technical schools and secondary modern schools. It made

secondary education free to all pupils.

In the same issue which announced the European victory, the editors blithely added in their

introduction:

626

Professor Donald Leinster-Mckay (D, 1943-50) has written an excellent and detailed account of the crisis

which faced Alleyn’s in his monograph Alleyn’s and Rossall Schools: The Second World War, Experience and

Status. I can admit only to adding a few further brush-strokes from other quarters which I have found in my

research for this report. What follows is, I hope, a broadbrush account of events for readers who may not be

familiar with the sword of Damocles which hung over Alleyn’s for almost 15 years. 627

CR Allison, papers concerned with the return to Dulwich, these are taken from the notes he made for the

school’s Opening Assembly, on 30 April 1945 628

The Times, 17 December 1943, p5 629

Winterbottom, p118

150

We are just at the beginning of a new era in education, with the coming into force of the Education

Act of 1945 [sic]. For the first time there are no fees at Alleyn’s School, otherwise we are hoping that

there will be very little change in the working and administration of the School. The Governors

decided not to apply for ‘Direct Grant’ status, so we shall probably remain an Aided School, with the

financial support of the London County Council behind us.630

Proposals to change Alleyn’s

Allison was aware of the educational changes to come and warned his audience at his Speech Day

address in 1943631

. The Norwood Report of 1943 (looking into curriculum and examinations in

secondary schools) and the Fleming Report of 1944 (which considered ‘means whereby the

association between the Public Schools ... and the general education system of the country could be

developed and extended’) were two signs showing that the education rule book was being revised in

consideration of what a post-world order might look like. At this time, the Times Educational

Supplement claimed that the government accepted two key principles in educational reform:

That there shall be equality of opportunity, and diversity of provision without impairment of the social

unity.632

Warrior-like Allison declared ‘the School to be in the mood to welcome fearlessly most of the

changes foreshadowed in recent education proposals.’633

In an annotation to his papers about this

time Allison wrote:

I spent my last term as Headmaster fighting the Governors for the continuing independence of

Alleyn’s as a member of the College of God’s Gift. Fortunately the AOBs and parents strongly

supported the status quo.

Suspiciously – at least to my eyes – at about this time

It was brought to our notice that much of the school grounds were not plotted on the Borough

Surveyor’s Map… We therefore consented to put this right. We started with admirable intentions, but

soon the delights and adaptability of the plane table deterred us from our original object…. The dense

undergrowth behind the stables brought forth mysteries of the jungle comparable only to twopenny

‘bloods’ and fourpenny thrillers.

When last seen, the surveying party was split in two, the first half endeavouring to produce some

results, the other taking photos, with a plane table, of a noble explorer crossing a single trunk over a

raging torrent, in reality a nettle-bed.

630

EAM, July 1945, p166 631

It is possible that the Dulwich Foundation Schools were tipped off even earlier – or at least kept usefully

informed – about the forthcoming education reform by one of their chairman of governors, Herwald

Ramsbotham (later Lord Soulbury) who was President of the Board of Education from 1940-41. ‘In October

1940 Ramsbotham met with senior officers of the Board at its temporary office in the Branksome Dene Hotel

at Bournemouth. Interrupted by the occasional air raid, they discussed the educational measures which would

be needed to achieve the prime minister's ideal of “establishing a state of society where the advantages and

privileges which hitherto have been enjoyed only by the few, shall be far more widely shared by the men and

youth of the nation as a whole”.’ (Education in England: a brief history, Derek Gillard:

www.educationengland.org.uk/history). 632

Harold Dent, TES, quoted in Kynaston, p28 633

EAM, November 1943, p60; here Allison was referring to the White Paper on Education and the Norwood

Report. Lord Soulbury was presiding at this Speech Day having been made a governor in 1942.

151

In spite of the many hazards, some of the party returned, their files and drawing boards lavishly

decorated with data and detail of every description. Soon we hope to see the results of these

pioneers. Their success falls into the hands of the excellent cartographers. We await the results.634

I wonder if this has anything to do with the LCC’s plans, either in the short-term or longer term, for

acquiring the Alleyn’s site?

Returning to the gauntlet-shaking Allison: his staff, the Old Boys and parents stood behind him and

fought the threat. At the meeting on 9 June 1945 to discuss the crisis a ballot was taken:

• In favour of a Direct Grant School 105

• In favour of a Direct Grant School or alternatively of an

Aided School 43

• In favour of an Aided School 151

• In favour of a County School 5

• Total 304

The gauntlets and cudgels were raised. At this same meeting, the Headmaster of the Lower School,

Albert Spring made an impassioned speech. It was breathlessly reported in the magazine:

….he expressed the extreme anger he felt. He had been a member of the School staff for 36 years and

had had a long association with the Old Boys’ Club and to see the fine traditions of the School that

had been built up during the 60 years of its separate existence and during which it had attained Public

School status shattered in this summary fashion was unbelievable.

No consideration or courtesy, he continued, had been shown by the Governors to the Headmaster

and the staff or to the Old Boys’ Club in coming to this grave decision. He urged that the strongest

possible measures should be taken to force the Governors into the open and state their reasons for

coming to this decision…635

Robert Young described how former Headmaster RB Henderson was aghast at the situation writing

that ‘[RBH] regarded the Governors as assassins intent on murdering his child!’636

One AOB, Mr FA

Mayne (who had left the School in 1879 and was a past President of the AOBC) wrote:

Under the New Act, the Governors propose to throw the School, to which we owe so much,

practically into the arms of the LCC as an ordinary secondary school.

It is, as I am sure you will agree, Sir, time that Dulwich and the lovers of Alleyn’s bounty, once again

aroused themselves to fight for their rights.

Where is the ‘equal opportunity’ so much belauded, when the College for the well-to-do is reaping all

the benefits accruing from the pious Foundation of Edward Alleyn, while the School for the less well-

to-do is deprived of those benefits, and is now to be reduced in status, as must indubitably happen if

the proposed course is followed.

At present, a poor boy can enter Alleyn’s from an elementary school, and from Alleyn’s proceed direct

to a University. What more can be desired?637

634


Ibid, July 1945, p187 636

Young, p195

152

In an act of utter recklessness – on, it has to be said, all sides – the key players on the platform on

Speech Day in 1945 were Allison, the governors, and, as the School’s principal guest, the Rt Hon the

Chairman of the LCC, Charles Robertson. The atmosphere must have been electric. None of the

warriors let slip this opportunity to put forward their case. In a memorable phrase, Professor

Leinster-Mackay wrote of Allison’s speech that ‘The Admirable Crichton came to the fore’. Allison

ended his speech with the request that

I may receive an invitation to the Alleyn’s School Speech Day in 1955. I hope and believe that I shall

find it still an integral part of the Foundation, working in harmony with, not under, the LCC, in its great

educational enterprise for this city, and continuing to fulfil the true intent of its Founder, as it has

done now for three hundred and twenty-six years.638

Inevitably, the ‘Headmaster’s Report was received with loud and prolonged applause.’

This was to be Allison’s swansong as Headmaster; he had accepted the position of Headmaster at

Brentwood School. The Chairman of the London County Council then took to the podium piously

urging ‘that good sense and calm judgment would maintain the same happy relations that had

existed since 1902.’ He was blunt about the LCC’s problem:

The new Act of 1944 imposes on the Local Education Authority a tremendous job in the provision of

buildings and staff, in order to provide secondary education for all.

He continued in a diplomatic vein, holding out a loaded olive branch to the assembled audience,

although perhaps deliberately ignoring the School’s Founder’s original philanthropic intent:

Alleyn’s has a great record and a noble tradition. It has done its work well along the years. Is it not

perhaps the business of the School to see that these opportunities are shared by all young people? In

a wider sphere, we look to the older Secondary Schools for much good will towards the new-comers

to their ranks.

Mr Robertson reminded his audience of the changing world and Britain’s diminishing role in it:

This calls for the greatest possible co-operation between nations, and one of the functions of a

secondary school to-day is to train boys so that they can play their part worthily in that great work.

As a parting shot over the barricade, he described how he had just returned from Paris, ‘as [one of]

the honoured guests’ of the Conseil Municipal de Paris and the Conseil Général de la Seine, to attend

the celebration of ‘the 14 juillet, the first celebration of their national festival since the German

occupation five years ago’. Pulling down his Phrygrian cap and tightening his (sans-) culottes, he

menacingly explained:

I mention this just to emphasise the importance of co-operation and understanding. That co-

operation must be continuous if our civilisation is to grow and flourish, otherwise we shall fail

ignominiously and YOUR culture will go down in ruins with the rest.’639

Sidney Hudson was appointed Acting Headmaster and he ably took up Allison’s gauntlet (or 18th

-

century musket) in the fight for Alleyn’s survival. A reign of terror was avoided and a year later

637

EAM, July 1945, p187 638


Ibid, p205

153

Hudson was able to announce at Speech Day that ‘I welcome the decision not to change our

voluntary status. We are to remain Alleyn’s School, a part of the great foundation of the College of

God’s Gift, founded by Edward Alleyn more than three hundred years ago.’640

In 1947 Hudson, now firmly in place as Headmaster, used Speech Day to defend the grammar school

against the accusation that ‘it is too much out of touch with real life’.

Alleyn’s is a Grammar School in the new meaning of the word. Our entry is selective, and depends

only on the ability of the child to benefit by our type of schooling. Our job is to train the

administrators, the scientists, men for the professions and commerce – in fact leaders.

As an aside, it is interesting that there is no mention of universities here. But we digress:

…We put work first, but we are not only a teaching shop, the other things matter also, in fact we try

to give the boy the best of both worlds.

Sounding like Henderson, Hudson explained:

He has his games, his clubs, his music, his training corps and a very strong House tradition…

and here not sounding like Henderson at all:

he also has his home…. We hope, therefore, that we shall continue to turn out men who know how to

work and at the same time keep in touch with the rapidly changing conditions of the modern world:

men who by their balanced lives and by their service to God and their fellow men will prove that we

still fulfil the good intent of our Founder.641

An interim status

Alleyn’s was not included on the 1945 Direct Grant List and so entered a period of limbo for several

years. Professor Leinster-Mackay explained:

Its specific designation was ‘Transitionally Assisted School’ which was defined by Truman and

Knightly, one of the annually published vademecums of the independent school world, as

‘schools administered by a Governing Body whose final status, under the Education Act,

1944, has not yet been determined by the Minister of Education and are in receipt of

assistance from a Local Education Authority for the time being. No tuition fees are payable…’

It was in fact the one and only school in this category in 1957.642

During this limbo, Alleyn’s came under attack for what was seen to be wilful stubbornness in the

face of the educational reforms of the time – not least by the HMIs.

The reputation of the School has long been deservedly high and it is but natural that the Head Master

and the Staff should have set themselves the task of rebuilding as quickly as possible the School as it

had existed before the outbreak of the war. Admirable as this aim was and is, however, the Head

Master and Staff must take cognisance of certain changes in the nature of the School and of the new

640



DLM, p36

154

opportunities for educational development created by the conditions governing the award of the

General Certificate of Education.643

And it seems that the LCC wouldn’t let go of its ambition to acquire part of the Alleyn’s site on which

to build a state school. Chandler recorded that ‘the wits of the day had already named it “Townley

Road Secondary”.’644

The magazine reported that ‘it was no secret that the LCC was in favour of

Multilateral [comprehensive] Schools of up to 2,000 boys’645

and it was still on the look-out for a

suitable site. Young described an apparent near-miss for Alleyn’s – and perhaps another reason for

siting the Memorial Garden where it is today: the LCC

having been prevented from buying Alleyn's, prepared a scheme to build a school on our grounds to

deal with those boys not able to handle a grammar school course - roughly described as ‘secondary

modern’. The policy of the LCC infuriated us all. We were sweating our guts out to see that every boy

in the school got plenty of exercise every day, and the LCC was ruling that no school in their authority

should have any playing fields, but that all the children should be transported once a week out to

Grove Park in buses. Nor were these schools ever to work on Saturdays. Now they were going to try

and force us into the pattern. We struggled like hell. We were a Naboth's Vineyard to the Ahab of the

LCC! We dug a War-Memorial Garden and got it dedicated by a Bishop. This was on the corner of

Townley Road and Calton Avenue, exactly where the LCC planned their school after compulsory

purchase. Our Governors then offered another site, down Green Lane. The resulting school was

named 'William Penn' school646

.... It was a vastly different doctrine of education that was being

practised almost on our doorstep, and a narrow escape for us. Our playing field was saved, and boys

lucky enough to gain admission to Alleyn's might not have much money spent on them, but would at

least have plenty of time.647

In 1957, some 13 years after Butler’s Education Act, the Direct Grant List was re-opened and Alleyn’s

was one of 14 (out of 44) schools which applied for, and was granted, ‘direct grant’ status. Hudson’s

valete some twenty years on from this decade concluded that,

Perhaps the greatest achievement of the school under Mr Hudson was the award of Direct Grant

Status. There had been dark days in 1944 and 1945 when it had seemed that Alleyn’s might belong to

the Foundation in nothing more than name, and the school was indeed fortunate to be one of the few

schools to be selected when the Direct Grant List re-opened.648

643


Chandler, p96 645

EAM, July 1945, p186 646

The William Penn Secondary School for Boys was formed in 1947; its buildings opened in 1958. 647

Young, pp209-10; I have not been able to date this event but think it safe to assume that it occurred at this

same time. 648


155

Distinguished boys and visitors

‘I never made the mistake one of the senior masters, 'Polly' Hutt, made. Whenever a distinguished

Old Boy revisited the school he used to button-hole them and remind them who had got them

through Maths in Matric. I knew that much that was produced by the School was in spite of the

masters, rather than because of them!’ Robert Young, Before I Forget, pp93-94

The post-School progress of Alleyn Old Boys had been recorded in the Edward Alleyn Magazine for

years. However, during the war-time paper shortages, much of which was reported in the magazine

was distilled to the bare minimum. Only a dribble of news about AOB-career achievements

percolates through – such as Lt Col AH Pollock, MC, of the Indian Army who was awarded an OBE

‘for services in campaign in Libya’ and Harold Bishop (B 13-16) who was awarded a CBE and was the

Assistant Chief Engineer to the BBC as well as Chairman of the Wireless Section of the Institution of

Wireless Engineers649

. In 1944 the magazine reported that Lt BGH Rowley served on the staff of the

British Admiralty Delegation at Washington DC, USA.650

The stories these three Alleyn’s men alone

could have told would provide a valuable insight into what was going on behind the scenes in these

war years.

We asked our AOB guests about who they remember from Alleyn’s who went on to greater things.

There was quite a roll call; the artists, actors and musicians: Jack Lanchbery (R 1934-42), David

Palastanga, Alan Younger (Bn 1943-51); the sportsmen: Sir Henry Cotton (B 1918-23), Vic Elford (B

1946-53), the Rt Hon Lord Terence Higgins (D 1941-46), Dr Harold Moody (T 1928-34)– not to

mention our own AOB-guest, cricketing legend Micky Stewart (T 1944-51).

As well as relying on our AOBs for their memories of famous men, the magazine reveals a number of

gems, some of which may have been forgotten in the passage of time.

Alleyn Old Boys

Robert Young recalled a hat-trick of Alleyn’s bishops. He wrote:

Godliness cannot be measured. We did collect three bishops among our old boys – Bishop Simpson of

Southwark, Bishop Bradley of Bath and Wells, and Archbishop Blanch of York; but how far any of the

three can be claimed as credits for the School is seriously to be doubted. Archbishop Blanch

announced that he had left Alleyn's an agnostic!651

Alleyn’s too produced a clutch of politicians who served both locally and nationally. WG Boys (1899-

1905) was the MP for Brixton and Leader of the Labour Party at Westminster City Council. In 1947 he

was appointed a member of the Town Planning Committee of the LCC and a member of the National

Council and National Executive Committee of the Town and Country Planning Association.652

JF

Cullingham (T 1917-22) was re-elected to Camberwell Borough Council.653

Let’s hope he fought

Alleyn’s side in the battle to acquire Alleyn’s status as a direct grant school.

649

EAM, March 1942, pp500-01 650


Young, p206 652

EAM, June 1947, p339 653


156

Sporting giants

The Rt Hon Lord Higgins was frequently mentioned by our AOBs – though more for his fame as a

middle-distance runner rather than as an MP and government minister. Dr Norman Wetherick (B,

1941-48) wrote: ‘There were eminent sportsmen among us. Terence Langley-Higgins was a 49-

second quarter-miler (later an MP)’. Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) listed Lord Higgins’s Olympic

appearances:

He ran in the ‘48 and ’52 Olympics and was eventually a Conservative MP for Worthing. I think he had

one of the largest majorities in the country…

Mr Jackson added, with barely concealed hurt, ‘he confiscated my tennis ball and I never got it back.’

Lord Higgins came to School to coach the boys in running. Another eminent AOB-sportsman who

coached the boys was Dr Harold Moody (T 1928-34). In 1948 Dr Moody ‘represented Britain in

Putting the Weight at the Olympic Games’.654

John Holt (S 1945-51) remembered him:

He always wore a track suit with the words ‘Great Britain’ on the back. He was a massive man, who I

think must have weighed about 20-stone. I noticed that he never took his tracksuit off and I think he

must have lived abroad for a lot of the time, because I read in one of the national newspapers that he

had said that he even kept his tracksuit on when he was competing in Great Britain as it was, in his

view, never warm enough in this country to take it off.655

Gerry Goodrich (D 1944-49), another Alleyn’s athletic giant, said he owed his success to Dr Moody:

‘Personally, I do not think I could have aspired to international status in the long jump, without the

influence of the good doctor.’ He sent me a detailed letter with his memories of Dr Moody.

In the spring of 1948, the master at Alleyn’s responsible for athletics, Bob Young, considered that two

of his most promising field events athletes, namely Cedric Taylor (Brown’s, 1943-50) and myself,

would benefit from superior coaching. He contacted Dr Harold EA Moody, a former pupil at Alleyn’s in

pre-war days…. He was now a respected international athlete and an expert in shot putting and later

in the mysteries of the discus. Harold was only too pleased to assist the two aspiring youngsters.

About this time, both Cedric and I were self-taught and Cedric could reach about 37 feet (11.28m)

whilst I had recorded about 34 feet (10.36m) bearing in mind that I weighed a shade over 10 stones.

Within a relatively short period, Harold had enabled his pupils to improve to 42 feet (12.8m) and 39

feet (11.89m) respectively. It was then that Harold introduced us to the intricacies of the discus and

we became quite adept in that event too….

In the summer of 1949, with Harold’s continued expertise in the throwing events, he had produced

two of the best junior discus throwers in the country. The London-based Evening News reported, prior

to the Public Schools Athletics’ Championships, that two pupils from Alleyn’s School had thrown the

discus in excess of the Public Schools’ Championship record. I cannot remember how Cedric

performed in the shot, but he gained the silver medal in the discus after a Titanic struggle with Mark

Pharoah of Manchester Grammar School, who later became the senior record holder and an Olympic

finalist. Cedric also set new records for Alleyn’s in both shot and discus. By this time I realised that at

10 stones I was too light for the throwing events. At the same Public School sports, I gained three

qualifying medals for the shot, discus and… the long jump. I had improved to 44 feet (13.54m) in the

shot and 140 feet (43.89m) in the discus whereas Cedric’s figures were 47 feet (14.34m) and 160 feet

654


King, p85

157

(48.77m) respectively. I recall that Harold advised me to drop the throwing events in favour of the

long jump. As they say, ‘the rest is history’.

As well as coaching the boys in shot and discus, it seemed that Dr Moody also threw his weight

behind getting tickets for the London Olympics. Dr Wetherick reported:

We were coached by HEA Moody who had been a shot putter but gave it up because of a back injury.

He could however still throw a discus and was determined to get into the New Zealand Olympic team.

Through him, I think, those of us who wanted [to] (including me) got tickets for the 1948 Olympics.

Mr Jackson told us that Dr Moody ‘competed in the 1948 Olympics but did not get beyond the

qualifying stages. However, he gained a silver medal at the British Empire Games in 1950. During the

late ‘40s he was often at the school coaching budding athletes with an interest in field events.’ Derek

Smith (R 1947-53) remembered being coached by Dr Moody ‘when [I was] training as a young

“grasshopper”, [I] couldn’t lift the weight [put] on to my shoulder, let alone throw the damn thing!’

There was one aspect of Dr Moody’s life which was hardly mentioned by our AOBs: the fact that his

family was key in campaigning for equal rights for black people in Britain. Dr Moody’s father, Harold

Arundel Moody, a GP in Peckham, founded the League of Coloured People in 1930, which aimed to

fight discrimination and seek better opportunities and conditions for students and workers from

Africa and the West Indies in Britain. During the war, Dr Moody Snr successfully lobbied against

racial prejudice in the armed forces. Three of his six children came to Alleyn’s – Harold, Charles (T

1929-34) and Garth (T 1934-40). Both Charles and Garth went on to receive military commissions, a

permanent right (rather than temporary as proposed by the government) for black people which

their father had campaigned for.

The other sporting AOB mentioned by our AOBS was Sir Henry Cotton (B 1918-23). One of the

greatest golf players of his generation, Cotton won the British Open in 1934, 1937 and 1948. John

Williams (R 1943-49) reckoned that Cotton

was probably the world’s greatest, first professional golfer…. And do you know how he came about

[playing golf]? In the early ‘20s, he was playing cricket for the 1st XI against Brentwood School in

Essex, and in those days, there was a school cricket bag, and two boys were delegated to carrying it

and on the way back he refused! So the Headmaster called him into the study the next day and said,

‘Cotton, for doing that, and refusing to carry the cricket bag, you’re banned for the rest of the season

playing cricket’… so he never ever played cricket again and he took up golf, and that’s what happened

– he was one of the most famous golfers this school’s ever had.

Young reported that Henderson thought the game of golf ‘useless because it failed to inculcate the

team spirit, and furthermore wasn't worth playing because you were unlikely to risk death playing

it!’656

.

Mr Jackson remembered Sir Henry visiting Alleyn’s. He ‘arrived in a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce

marking the success of a former rebel at Alleyn’s! He gave an interesting presentation of his success

as a golfer together with a film showing him winning the Open Golf Championship. Following the

film, he sought out a prefect to carry his golf bag out onto the playing fields and displayed his skills

656

Young, p91

158

with many remarkable shots.’ At our reunion Mr Jackson reminisced with John Hughes (C 1945-51)

about Sir Henry’s visit:

Mr Hughes: He gave a golf demonstration.

Mr Jackson: Oh yes, then he asked for the cricket captain and he wouldn’t let [leading school

cricketer] John Pretlove use his clubs because he was left-handed. So he hit golf

balls across Big Side, showing us how to cut and draw round a site screen nearly 200

yards distance.

Mr Hughes: He hit the ball as far left handed as he did with both hands! This illustrated how

good he was.

From within the cohort of 1940s’ AOBs who went on to greater sporting triumphs, our AOBs

mentioned long jumper Reg Waller (S 1938-46), the aforementioned athlete Gerry Goodrich, and

cross-country runner Mike Maynard (R 1943-49). Mr Jackson remembered that Reg Waller ‘won the

Public Schools long jump event which I believe was at the Motspur Park Athletics Stadium in 1946

when Lord Higgins was the winner of the 440 yards event.’ Micky Stewart regaled our AOB-guests

and pupil-interviewers with:

A story about this guy [Reg Waller]. He was also leader of the school orchestra, wasn’t he? I

remember the first year back, whatever the production was, and it was going to be rehearsal time,

just when Puff Smith used to have his rehearsals…. And Reg was not there, and there were two

rehearsals: there was going to be an important performance. Anyway, I was there, I was a soprano….

and Puff Smith said to [Reg], ‘Where were you?’ [Reg] said, ‘football training’ – I think we were going

to play Brentwood or something, a big game. He said ‘Football training?’Reg says, ‘Yes, there’s extra

football training,’ but, Smith said, ‘It’s rehearsal for music’, but Reg said, ‘It’s my choice’. Puff Smith

said, ‘Do you mean to say, that you would prefer kicking a piece of senseless cowhide over a bit of

green grass?’ And Reg said, ‘I prefer that to drawing horse hair over cat gut, yes’. That was his reply!

Peter Wrench (C 1945-49) said that,

we had another excellent sportsman who was a contemporary of ours too – Gerry Goodrich. He

represented England at athletics five times I think. He was a contemporary of Roger Bannister and

Terry/Pongo the Lord Higgins. Gerry’s father famously worked with Logie Baird657

on the development

of television and later with the French on the development of RADAR.

Mr Goodrich and Lord Higgins met up in later life. Mr Reeve told the story:

Gerry was working for Lloyds Registrars who recorded all share dealings. It is now managed by an

outfit called Capita, down in Worthing, but Gerry was a section head down there and Terry, as the

local MP, came to visit and look around the premises. Anyway, Higgins’s nickname was Pongo. Gerry

looked up from his desk and yelled ‘Pongo!’ Gerry got very and truly reprimanded by the registrar

who was down there who said, ‘how dare you address the Lord Higgins like that?’ You know [Gerry]

said ’we were in athletics together and running mates in more than one sense.’

One sporting giant who has already been mentioned by Mr Jackson was the left-handed John

Pretlove (C 1944-51). Mr Pretlove was a skilled cricketer and Fives player; Dr Wetherick admiringly

657

John Logie Baird, inventor and pioneer of television, lived and worked at 3 Crescent Wood Road SE26 for 12

years, from 1934-46.

159

wrote that ‘…watching [John Pretlove play Fives] was an aesthetic experience, he made it look so

easy.’

The young face that frequently appears alongside Mr Pretlove’s (equally young) face in group photos

of the 1st

XI cricket team was that of Micky Stewart OBE, former England cricketer and coach. His skill

was noted approvingly by the magazine cricket reporters. He was ‘a Captain who, himself an

outstanding boy batsman, has a very sound knowledge of the game for his age; a successful left-arm

bowler; and a really adequate wicket-keeper.’658

The reporter ‘GRC’ got down to details:

Playing for his third season in the team and his first season as Captain, he quickly showed not only

that his own cricket was improving fast, but that he had a very sound practical knowledge of

captaincy. He successfully transmitted his own keenness and initiative to the rest of his side and was

soon rewarded by their determined support. His batting against Brentwood, the Jesters and Eltham

College was brilliant and was never less than good. The side had no keener or better fielder. He

thoroughly deserves his selection for the Young Amateurs of Surrey for the second year.659

Mr Jackson also listed Vic Elford as a leading AOB-sportsman. He was a ‘former sportscar racing,

rallying and Formula One driver. He participated in 13 World Championship F1 Grands Prix, débuting

on 7 July 1968’.

One sporting achievement of this decade which went uncommented on by our AOBs – but which

was clocked by the magazine was ‘Captain BG Carr, DFC (Bn 1923-32), the pilot of the BOAC

speedbird, “Balmoral”, which on March 16th, crossed the North Atlantic in the fast time of 8hrs. 36

mins. Leaving Montreal at 3.30am, he overflew Gander (Newfoundland) and flew direct to Prestwick,

where he landed at 12,60pm [sic]’.660

Artists

Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45) remembered a young Leslie [‘Ben’] Fyson playing ‘Guiseppe Palmieri in

the Gondoliers, singing “Take a pair of sparkling eyes”. Ben was leading tenor in all our choral works

and gained a choral scholarship to Cambridge. He went on to a professional career in singing and

opera. The other leading light musically of this time was the irrepressible Jack Lanchbery. Mr Savory

wrote that:

There were so many talented musicians in the School at that time. Best known, of course, was John

(‘Jack’) Lanchbery. Composer, arranger and conductor as well as instrumentalist, especially as a viola

player. He was incredibly versatile and also very kind and considerate to incompetent players like me.

On one memorable Sunday evening he conducted the first performance of ‘Before Daybreak’ by

Armstrong Gibbs in the presence of the composer. It received a rare standing ovation.

Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) mentioned ‘the other more informal stage productions at Rossall, in

particular, the extremely irreverent shows put together by Jack Lanchbery, each one more

outrageous than the one before until finally, one called “Allison’s Angels” was seriously censored by

CRA [Allison] before it was allowed to take the stage – as “Allison’s Fallen Angels!”.’ Mr Savory

remembered that

658


Ibid, p610 660

Ibid, June 1948 p432

160

Jack Lanchbery, [was] always so kind and patient with keen, but hopeless musicians like me. At an

upper School Easter holiday in Ambleside, Jack and Ben [Fyson] took Peter Lyons and myself on a

‘walk’. We trudged to Keswick and, on the way back, climbed Helvellyn and negotiated Striding Edge –

a total of 34 miles in pouring rain. Jack continually kept our spirits up with a fund of jokes and stories

and making us sing songs… backwards!661

Mr Jackson wrote that

As a child [Lanchbery] studied the violin and began composing at eight. In 1942 he was awarded the

Henry Smart Composition Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music (where he studied under Sir

Henry Wood), although the following year his studies were interrupted by war and he served in the

Royal Armoured Corps until 1945. After the war Lanchbery spent two more years at the Royal

Academy before returning to Alleyn’s, where he took a post as the second music master. He was

hoping to be offered the position of head of music, but the job did not materialise, so he left to work

for a music publisher. It was while he was there that he heard, by chance, that the Metropolitan Ballet

was looking for a new conductor. In 1948, having, as he later admitted, only ever conducted a school

orchestra, he took on his first professional conducting post….

And finally this wry anecdote about Lanchbery from Mr Jackson :

In London during the 1970s [Jack] ran into an old school friend who had been appointed Obituaries

Editor of the Daily Telegraph. ‘Don’t worry, Jack,’ his friend told him, ‘you’ll definitely be getting one.’

‘I’d much rather write a short requiem for you,’ came Lanchbery’s reply.

To read more about Lanchbery, please see the chapter on music.

Ken Napper (D 1945-50) was another Alleyn’s music star. He was a highly regarded musician at

school and then made a name for himself in the jazz world as well as succeeding as a composer and

arranger. Mr Jackson kindly found out some more information about Napper and told me that after

Napper’s demobilization he

worked with Jack Parnell, after which he freelanced extensively through the 1950s with the top

names of British modern jazz including Ronnie Scott, Don Rendell, Alan Clare, Stan Tracey, Tubby

Hayes, Tony Kinsey and Tony Crombie. From March 1960 to January 1962 he was with the Ronnie

Scott - Jimmy Deuchar Quintet. Susequently with Johnny Dankworth and Ted Heath in 1965. After this

he again worked with Dankworth (1967) and Stan Tracey (1966). Through the 1960s he also worked

successfully as arranger and composer writing for films, television and radio. In the early 1970s he

worked in Germany and Holland as composer and arranger.

This decade pre-dates the advent of the National Youth Theatre and its crop of young actors. David

Palastanga went ‘on to have quite a reasonable career in film and television industries,’ said Mr

Hughes. ‘He married Hildegard Neff [a German actress], who was quite a big film star in her day.’

With the stage name David Cameron, he appeared in films alongside Elizabeth Taylor and

Montgomery Clift.

Medics and scientists

One of our AOBs helped cure Winston Churchill’s pneumonia. You can sense the pride bursting in

the magazine reporter’s account:

661

Edward Alleyn Club Magazine, May 2004, p16

161

The recent illness of the PM has drawn universal attention to the wonderful results obtained from the

drug sulphapyridine in the treatment of pneumonia. It must be a source of pride to us that the

discoverer of this drug is Dr Ewens, FRS, an Old Boy of the School. Dr Ewens, working on derivatives of

sulphanilamide, a drug which, although it cured some bacteriological diseaseas, failed in many others,

discovered this new drug which proved successful, not only in the cases where the first drug had

succeeded, but also in many of those in which it failed. Pneumonia, which up to then had a mortality

of 30 per cent, lost nearly all its terror. The experiment was Dr Ewens 693rd and was made in May

and Baker’s Laboratory. He labelled it therefore ‘M&B 693’, the name by which it is best known to the

public. It was on the account of this discovery that Dr Ewens received the great honour of election to

the Royal Society.662

Ewens had been one of the first Junior County Scholars to receive a London County Council

scholarship back in September 1894.

FG Young (B 16-26) MA, DSc, PhD, FRIC, a biochemist noted for his work on diabetes, was also

elected to the Royal Society. In 1949 he was appointed to the Sir William Dunn Professor of

Biochemistry663

at the University of Cambridge. The magazine reported that he had also been

appointed a ‘consultant to the USA Army Surgeon-General, 1949 & 1950’664

. He was knighted for his

services to biochemistry in 1976.

War honours

After the war, in addition to news of AOBs career successes in the far-reaches of the world, there

was a catch-up session on what our AOBs had been doing for the past six years.

They had been busy. Here are a few:

AAM Durrant, MI Tech E (R 1908-16) was the Director of Tank Design, Ministry of Supply. Durrant

went on to lead the design group behind the London Routemaster bus (1947-56) – adopting several

design features of the tanks that he’d developed during the war.

VE Groom, CB, OBE, DFC and bar (Bn 1910-13)m a ‘flying ace of the First World War’, was awarded a

CB and promoted to Air Vice-Marshal (becoming an Air Marshal in 1952); he had been a significant

player in air-operations to support Operation Overlord665

.

Details of RV Jones’s (D 1922-29) awards were fed to the magazine bit by bit. First a CBE in the New

Year’s Honours list of 1942; and a CB in New Year Honours of 1946 for ‘Distinguished Service as

Assistant Director of Intelligence, Air Ministry. It is worth quoting part of Arthur Chandler’s obituary

for Professor Jones – some 52 years after these awards – to discover just how vital one AOB’s role

was in securing the Allies’ victory.

662

EAM, March 1944, pp75-76 663

The Sir William Dunn Professorship of Biochemistry is the senior professorship in biochemistry at the

University of Cambridge. The position was established in 1914 by the trustees of the will of Sir William Dunn,

banker, merchant and philanthropist. 664


Operation Overlord was the Allies re-invasion of German-occupied France during the Second World War.

The operation commenced on 6 June 1944 with the Normandy landings (D-Day). A 12,000-plane airborne

assault preceded an amphibious assault involving almost 7,000 vessels. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the

English Channel on 6 June; more than 3 million troops were in France by the end of August.

162

…Mr Coates, then Senior Master, wrote on Jones’s last report ‘Erratic and mercurial. Seems unable to

get down to solid work. Has ability.’ The last short sentence was an understatement. He won the

Smith’s prize for Physics in 1929 and a Natural Science Exhibition to Wadham College, Oxford. In 1946

he became Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen where he still held court at

the time of his death.

Winston Churchill said that RV Jones was ‘the man who bent the bloody beams’ but his part in the

winning of the last war was not really known until 35 years after his efforts had been effective.666

His

invention threw the German bombers off their course by bending their directional beam – bombs

meant for the City of London, Westminster and St Paul’s were dropped on South East London which

mean that the Blitz caused less damage than had been intended by the enemy. He also managed to

decode German messages through the Enigma machine at Bletchley Park using the first computer in

the world.667

Bill Jones (R 1935-42) told me that Professor Jones, in his book Most Secret War, pays credit to

physics master Sidney Incledon ‘for guiding him and helping towards an Open Exhibition at Wadham

College in 1929 leading to his graduation in 1932 and doctorate in 1934.’668

Governors

Founder’s Day and especially Speech Day were occasions when Alleyn’s showcased its eminent

visitors. At this time, the School’s governors were responsible not just for Alleyn’s but for all three

Schools in the Foundation, as well as the alms houses, the Chapel of God’s Gift, and the picture

gallery. The lords leap on to the podium for Speech Days. They were interesting men.

One of the first to appear on the podium in this decade is Lord Soulbury, Herwald Ramsbotham. As

Professor Leinster-Mackay rightly observed:

It is a matter of great irony that Herwald Ramsbotham who as President of the Board of Education

(1940-1) prepared the Green Book ‘Education After the War’, which preceded the White Paper, which

in turn preceded the [1944] Act, and the beginnings of Alleyn’s post-war problems, should later

become Lord Soulbury, Chairman of Alleyn’s governors.

He was succeeded at the Board of Education by RA Butler in July 1941. Lord Soulbury was appointed

a co-optative governor (in place of Lord Loch) at a Special Meeting of the College Governors on 28

September 1942 and elected Chairman of the Board of Governors at the same meeting. It seems a

speedy promotion….

In 1944 the magazine reports that ‘Mr CG Ammon, MP, a Governor of the School, has been raised to

the peerage under the title of Lord Ammon of Camberwell.’669

Lord Ammon670

was a Labour MP and

666

This delay was because of the Official Secrets Act. 667

Obituary in EAC Magazine, May 1998, pp10-11 668

See also chapter, ‘After Alleyn’s. 669

EAM, May 1944, p95 670

Lord Ammon worked with the Post Office for 24 years. He was Secretary of the Union of Post Office

Workers from 1920 to 1928, the first General Secretary of the National Union of Docks, Wharves and Shipping

Staffs, and the Organising Secretary of the Civil Service Union. Ammon was London County Councillor for North

Camberwell from 1919-1925 and 1934-1946, and Chairman of London County Council in 1941-1942. He was an

Alderman on Camberwell Borough Council from 1934-1953 and Mayor of Camberwell, 1950-1951. Ammon

was (MP) for Camberwell North from 1922-1931 and 1935-1944, unsuccessfully contesting the seat in 1918

163

had been educated at Public Elementary schools. It would be intriguing to know where he stood on

the education crisis Alleyn’s faced in the mid-1940s.

Lord Soulbury’s tenure as chairman of the governors came to an end in 1949 (when he was made

Governor-General of Ceylon) and he was replaced by Lord Gorell. Ronald Gorell Barnes, the 3rd

Baron Gorell, was a British peer, Liberal politician and newspaper editor. He was said to be a model

for Lord Peter Wimsey in the books by Dorothy L. Sayers, who referred to him as 'Lord Sheep'671

.

Visitors

Throughout the decade, visitors came to all branches of Alleyn’s. In 1941, SLESS rather pitifully

reported:

Our roll of visitors is constantly growing and it is very gratifying to see how interested in our doings

are the fellows with the Forces – Army, Navy and Air-Force, Masters and boys, we welcome all and

with reluctance see them go.672

One surprising visitor to Alleyn’s during the war was Lord Grigg. At the time he was Secretary of

State for War and he was the School’s guest of honour on Speech Day in 1942. I have already

queried the wisdom of a Secretary of State for War attending such an event at a time [June 1942]

when the war-time show downs at Sevastapol and El-Alamein were brewing. Grigg held the position

of Secretary of State for War for the rest of the war, holding it also in Churchill's 1945 ‘Caretaker

Government’. He was a casualty in the 1945 general election and lost his seat.

Lords aside, the visitor our AOBs at Rossall all remembered was the footballing legend Stanley

Matthews. Mr Savory explained:

The RAF had a Physical Training Unit at Blackpool and one day their football team paid us a visit to

play a ‘friendly’ against our 1st XI. The visitors were captained by their PTI [Physical Training

Instructor] Sgt Stanley Matthews! The crowd around the pitch was virtually a roll-call of everyone at

Rossall and no-one was upset that the visitors won.

Mr Reeve told our interviewers that the match was set up by Mr Lefevre, ‘who was in charge of the

RAF section at school, he knew the CO in Blackpool. Of course, because Blackpool and that part of

the world was full of RAF, there were aerodromes everywhere, and they got this team come down,

and we had Stanley Matthews.’

and 1931. He was Labour Party whip in 1923 and a member of the National Executive Committee of the Labour

Party, 1921-1926. He served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Admiralty in 1924 and again in 1929-1931 and

was a member of the West African Mission of 1938-1939 and of the Select Committee on National

Expenditure, 1939-1944. He was temporary Chairman of Committees in 1943 and the same year served as

Chairman of a Parliamentary Commission to investigate the future of the dominion of Newfoundland. He was

raised to the peerage as Baron Ammon, of Camberwell in the County of Surrey, in 1944 and appointed a Privy

Counsellor in 1945. In the House of Lords he was Captain of the Gentlemen-at-Arms (Chief Whip) from 1945-

1949, and a Deputy Speaker of the House from 1945-1958. In 1947 he was Chairman of a Parliamentary

Mission to China. He was first Chairman of the National Dock Labour Board from 1944-1950. His political

career was effectively ended when he clashed with the government over the 1949 London dock strike. 671

He became co-president of the Detection Club with Agatha Christie from 1956 to 1963. 672


164

Gerry Thain (Tn 1938-44) enjoyed the memory: ‘I well remember that game – I watched it – quite a

crowd. When they heard Stanley Matthews was going to be there the crowd increased. Normally not

many went to watch. Stanley just wanted to play so he could train, so he could get back into it. We

lost something like 6-1 but our centre forward Holdstock scored soon after kick-off.’

Dr Philpott put pen to paper about this ‘most notable football match,’ when ‘the great Stanley

Matthews turned out for one of the many RAF teams we played from Blackpool (a major primary

training centre in the war). Since I was the left full-back I had a very busy and frustrating time trying

to cope with his wizardry!’

In addition to Stanley Matthews there was another famous footballer called Stevenson, of Everton,

who also played for Ireland, on the RAF Blackpool team. Mr Reeve still remembered the action

Dicky Lonsdale, a little chap – he was even smaller than me – had to mark Stanley Matthews…. And on

goes the match, and Stanley Matthews goes running down the wing, because he was a wonderful

dribbler, you know, he could go around anybody, and he would jink round – round poor old Dicky, put

the ball across the front of the penalty area, and in would come this guy, Stevenson from Everton and

Ireland, bang! As if luck would have it, the captain of football was a very good goalkeeper, and

unfortunately, he was either sick or got injured the week before, or whatever, so he was sitting on the

touchline watching the game, while the Second XI goalkeeper was keeping goal, and the Second XI

goalkeeper wasn’t anything like as good as the First one, and the ball hit this goalkeeper in the

stomach. And, of course, in those days the balls were so heavy and made of leather, and, well, I’ve

still got my mark from a leather lace, it carried him over the goal and into the net.

I wonder if the first goalkeeper might have been Roy Dann (D 1937-42), who bitterly told us

I’d been tripped by someone in one of those awful Houses like Brading’s or Cribb’s and broken my

wrist. So I had to sit and watch! It was my big regret at school.

165

After Alleyn’s

Unlike today, few of our AOBs went from Alleyn’s to university. Alan Jackson (C 1945-51) admitted

that the ‘the opportunity of going to university in the ‘40s and early ‘50s was fairly limited and a

pretty small percentage achieved such further education.’ In 1950, the HMIs reported ‘most of [the

boys] are going straight from School to work’673

although they totted up that ‘in the last three

complete school years’,

The majority of leavers enter business but in the same period 29 boys have gone to Universities, two

to Training Colleges and 17 have continued their education in various types of institutes. In the same

period two Open Scholarships have been won to Oxford, two to Cambridge, one Foundation

Scholarship to the Royal College of Music, and four State Scholarships.674

Peter Philpott (B 1934-43) was

awarded the Thomas Wall Scholarship to Brasenose College, Oxford and then had to struggle to re-

learn enough French and Latin to get through the Oxford Responsions675

exams. By this time, I

discovered I would not be allowed to read chemistry as I had intended but would have to read

physics, because of the wartime need for physicists. I therefore delayed taking up my scholarship until

after the war (in October 1946).

In the 1940s, most of our AOBs joined the Forces on leaving school – or, for our AOBs who left

Alleyn’s later in the decade they did National Service. Although the war ended in 1945, conscription

continued after the war.676

In lieu of conscription or National Service, from 1943 around 100,000 young men were directed into

the British coal mining industry to become 'Bevin Boys'. From December 1943 until 1948, a ballot

picked out 17-year-olds to serve the country down the mines, rather than in the Forces, causing

great resentment. In the end only 21,000 boys actually served in that manner.677

Gerry Thain (Tn

1938-44) was one of 21,000.

Bevin Boys

A brilliant languages student, Mr Thain wanted to be an interpreter when he left School but ‘I was

balloted to go in the coal mines’. Mr Thain notified the authorities that he had already been

accepted for a Services Japanese language course for interpreters. Ted Robinson (Tn 1938-41)

explained that this course was ‘much needed for the continuing Pacific theatre of war – and that,

even so, the one-in-seven ballot took precedence and he was so wastefully deployed digging out

coal!’ Mr Thain remembered that ‘four boys from my year were balloted [into the mines]…. Few

people can remember the title Bevin Boy! But I went anyway for three years.’ One of Mr Thain’s

673


Ibid, 1950, p2 675

In effect an entrance exam for Oxford University, taken shortly after the students had matriculated. 676

National Service as peacetime conscription was formalised by the National Service Act 1948. From 1 January

1949, healthy males 17 to 21 years old were expected to serve in the Armed Forces for 18 months, and remain

on the reserve list for four years. 677

Marr, Making of Modern Britain, pp417-18

166

classmates, Stan Straw, went on the Services Japanese language course and, whilst Mr Thain678

‘was

down a pit in Wales,’ Mr Straw went to Japan and ‘organised a visit from Emperor Hirohito!’ Mr

Thain ‘found the miners very friendly and helpful…. The working underground was hard – I was sorry

for the poor pit ponies which only came up to the surface for a break if the summer weather was

good.’

The Forces

Many of our AOBs embarked on a career only to have to leave it to join up. It made for a disjointed

life. Eric Farley (Bn 1940-45) wrote in a letter,

One lost contact too after leaving School as we all had to join the Forces for several years and on

demob had to catch up those years with university and careers.

Bill Jones (R 1935-42) went ‘from school to Leicester on a Radio Physics Bursary and was

then 'called up' into the Ministry of Aircraft Production at TRE (later called the Royal Radar

Establishment) developing and test flying listening and radar jamming equipment.’ Mr Jones

remembered that his physics master, Sidney ‘Inky’ Incledon, asked him a lot of questions about his

work and that he seemed very knowledgeable.

It was only later that I found, from his book [Most Secret War], that [Prof] RV Jones679

lived in Dulwich

during the war years and I suspect that Inky had re-established contact with him and thus knew

enough to ask me the questions he did. Inky asked me if I could come to the school to talk on war-

time radar but, having signed the Official Secrets Act, I was bound by the 30-year rule so no talk took

place. The delay in publishing RV Jones’s book until 1978 was due to the same rule.

Alan Eaglen’s (Tn 1939-44) ‘skills in maths got me a job in the bank for a while, until I had to join the

army.’ Mr Eaglen had been helped in finding work by an AOB, Mr Collier, who was manager of

Midland Bank in East Dulwich. He had been ‘looking for a junior, so he asked Mr Rudd.’ He was

called up to join the army in June 1946 and Mr Eaglen became a lance corporal five days after

training as he was classified on entry as ‘potential officer’ material and had risen to the rank of

lieutenant in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps by July 1948. Alleyn’s being the small world it is, Mr

Eaglen bumped into AOBs Jack Hutchens and Roy Nash, who were both in his army unit.

AOBs clearly stuck together. Peter Wrench (C 1945-49) recounts that he and John Coleman (R 1944-

49)

joined the army together and I was obliged to salute him on Villach Station in Austria when I was then

still a sergeant but he a subaltern (he never forgets!)

Mr Wrench had an exciting time during his National Service: ‘I served in the Intelligence Corps in

Vienna (behind the Russian Iron Curtain) 1950-51 where I liaised with US intelligence and MI6

(running agents in and out of Czechoslavakia and Hungary).’ Others weren’t so lucky. For his National

Service, Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) spent ‘two years at Oswestry, which didn’t do me a bit of good. It

was a waste of two years.’ Derek Smith (R 1947-53), having served in Cyprus, then ended up (by

mistake) in Kenya towards the end of the Mau Mau troubles. He explained:

678

Mr Thain was later awarded an MBE for managing England’s swimming teams in at least three Olympics.

679 See chapter ‘Distinguished boys and visitors’

167

I volunteered to go to Kenya. You see they said it was RAF Eastleigh who wanted two volunteers. I

thought, well, that’s Southampton, I’m going home. But no, it was RAF, Eastleigh, Kenya.

Memories of National Service

John Hughes (C 1945-51) found that National Service

was a culture shock as much as anything. I don’t know how the others felt but certainly for me having

been quite senior within the school, you went more or less straight into square-bashing where you

were just a non-entity. It was a shock. It was quite hard. There was a strict discipline in square-bashing

which covered an eight-week period until you ‘passed out’ and were given a trade. You had to make

your bed up in a certain way with blankets and sheets in a square. It really was a great shock.

Derek Smith felt the ‘advantage of having been in the CCF. That way you knew how to keep your

uniform in order; keep your brasses clean, etc and the other lads in the billets didn’t have that

background. And some of them would end up in tears because the corporal would come in saying

“do this” or whatever.’ Mr Wrench remembered how ‘the others all marched with a right arm and a

right leg forward and the corporals would all be shouting “come on Daisy” at them.’

Mr Hughes remembered the food too.

There was a six foot tray full of fried eggs and the kitchen staff would need to cut it all up because it

was rock solid and all congealed! Outside there would be a trough with warm water for about 500

airmen where they washed their ‘irons’ (knife, fork, spoon and mug). No health and safety in those

days. It was just horrible. But I must say it’s the fittest I’ve ever been in my life after my eight weeks of

square-bashing.

Three AOBs died whilst on National Service: Roy Draper (C 1939-47), Geoffrey Carpenter (Tn 1939-

46) and Derek Coleman (Spurgeon’s).

Mr Williams claimed that ‘there’s no doubt the National Service matured us quickly, after two years

we were different people.’

Careers advice at Alleyn’s

Before the war, a panel of OBs was formed to advise boys leaving the School, on the choice of a

career. The Headmaster has suggested that the revival of this panel would be welcomed. Would OBs

who are willing to offer their services in regard to their own profession or occupation, please

communicate with VH Frank…. It should be mentioned that this panel is advisory only. No one will be

asked to offer employment, or to assist in obtaining employment for boys from Alleyn’s.680

None of our AOBs mention this panel specifically, but several remembered the chemistry master

Monty Crewe, who was also the careers master at Alleyn’s. Mr Rodway was not overly impressed

with the careers advice he received at Monty Crewe’s hand. ‘I had an idea that I wanted to be a

teacher but then my parents rather put me off because I wasn’t good enough to go to Oxford or

Cambridge,’ so went to visit Monty Crewe for some guidance.

He said, ‘well, Rodway, you’re planning to be a teacher?’ And I said ‘well, no, I’ve had second

thoughts,’ and that was the end of the story. He never thought ‘what is Rodway good at? Had I known

680


168

at the time, I would have loved to be an archivist – which I ended up doing for no money at all at

Alleyn’s School, some 50 years later: I did it for love. But I think I’d have made quite a good archivist

because it wasn’t computerized then – I’m hopeless on a computer. I’m sure I’d have enjoyed it.

Mr Jackson said ‘I had hardly encountered [Monty Crewe] during my time at Alleyn’s until my father

had correctly decided that pursuing further studies would be unwise!’ Mr Jackson and his cricketing

friend, John Hughes ‘were summoned for interviews with Monty Crewe’. They had been told by

fellow students about what to expect at the interview and

we had wrongly anticipated being handed literature from banks, Unilever, Shell and a few insurance

companies. To our surprise we learnt that Lloyd’s Register had enquired about employing two pupils

who were leaving school with some cricketing ability. John Hughes and I were duly interviewed by the

top person in Lloyd’s Register and the Hon Secretary of the cricket club and appointment offers were

made. We soon discovered that Lloyd’s Register had been employing pupils from Alleyn’s since 1883

and we were the latest part of the continuation of a long-standing policy interrupted since 1939.681

Poor Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) was advised by his teacher not to take his exams. ‘My teacher was

straight with me, saying that it was better to not sit an exam than to sit it and fail, which was what

he said I would do. So I joined the Ordnance Survey when I was 16, drawing up maps for the Army’s

advance across Europe.’ After leaving the Ordnance Survey Mr Cox then ‘joined the LCC and worked

there for a while, until,’ defying his teacher, ‘I passed my exam for the Institution of Engineers. From

then on I have worked across all of London.’

In 1949, details of the Public Schools’ Employment Bureau were given in the Alleyn Old Boy Club’s

pages of the magazine.682

This was

an independent organisation supported by the leading schools of the country. There are at present on

its books many more good business appointments vacant both at home and abroad, than there are

candidates to offer for them.

National Service was taken into account with positions being available to men aged between 20 to

22, ‘i.e. immediately on completion of National Service’. For those who may not have been

successful in exams, the listing reassuringly stated that, ‘a School Certificate or higher examination

success, though an advantage, is not insisted upon.’

681

Mr Jackson later furnished me with some other Lloyds Register/Alleyn’s gems: ‘the first appointment was

either CF Redman or FA Mayne in 1883 and from records it would seem that when John Davis (Tn 1948-53)

retired from Lloyd’s Register in 1995 it brought to an end this unusual record.’ No fewer than four former

employees of Lloyd’s Register have filled the position as President of the Alleyn Old Boys’ Club five times: FA

Mayne, 1901 & 1908; CF Redman, 1902; SA Hill, 1914; and JW Somerville, 1975. 682

EAM, May 1949, p585

169

Impressions of Alleyn’s today

‘I think the development of the School over the years is breath-taking. It has been 20 years plus since I

saw Alleyn’s…. What has been achieved is outstanding. The school governors over the past decades

deserve enormous credit for what they have achieved.’ John Hughes (C 1945-51)

Many of our AOB-visitors were amazed by how much had altered at Townley Road. That said, Alan

Thomas (SLESS, 1940-41) admitted that ‘it’s nice to be back and triggering memories, no matter how

much has changed’. Mr Thomas remembered what, ‘my form room looked like – it’s still there, I

recall where I sat: at the back.’ Our AOBs noted the ‘loss of the “Tin-Tab” and rifle range. How can

they take that away? The kids won’t be able to shoot a gun!’683

In a school of 1,200 pupils, that’s

probably no bad thing these days….

Derek Smith (R, 1947-53) explained what the ‘Tin-Tab’ was: ‘”Tab” being short for taberna – Latin for

“shed”. This building stood at the lower end of the playground, between the [present day] Edward

Alleyn Building and the old Fives courts. It was made of wood panelling with an outer covering of

corrugated iron on the walls and roof. It was heated by coke-fired stoves in each of the two

classrooms – Shell “C” and “D”. In the winter it was wise to have a desk close to the stove. The coke

compound was under the Great Hall at the top of the playground.’ It was finally removed in the mid-

1960s to make way for a new swimming pool and gymnasium.

John Cleary (B, 1945-51) described the 1940s’ layout of buildings:

After the Library and what was the Dining Room, there was the Junior School building for the Third

Form, then the armoury and orderly rooms, then immediately beyond that was the firing range. At

the backend of the firing range was a back-wall and behind that [where the current Junior School is]

was Jones & Higgins’ warehouse.684

Alan Eaglen (Tn 1939-44) concurred ‘the buildings have changed dramatically. There seems to be

more facilities, and of better quality.’ When pressed to find out how much Alleyn’s has changed,

Micky Stewart (T 1944-51) replied:

I just think generally, what is the term nowadays they use? Awesome. By comparison to what is here,

and meeting you and the way you come across, I have to admit, the way you deliver whatever you

want to deliver, I think it’s tremendous, I would say, on that score, it is far in advance of what it was in

my day. As far as the general education, developing people as people early on – [for example,] how

they are going to mingle, and be in general society as far as their future careers, now [it] is much

better.

Peter Rodway (C 1942-50) commented on the apparent changing nature of the pupils:

One, two, three, four, the four of you, who’ve taken us round the school and you seem to have so

much confidence. Now if I’d been asked with a group to take somebody around the school in 1949 it

683

Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) 684 John Hughes told us that Jones & Higgins was a large store in Peckham Rye.

170

would have been a disaster, I wouldn’t have known what to say, what to ask, you have far more

confidence and personality.

Mr Rodway also felt that pupils today ‘probably get a lot more guidance and you get far greater

opportunity because – as I think I said earlier – if you were academically good in the 1940s you went

to Oxford or Cambridge. Now there are so many universities that it covers two pages of Scriblerus

for Year 13 saying where they’ve gone. If it’s not Oxford or Cambridge, then it’s Birmingham or

Leeds, or wherever there’s a university.’

For Eric Buisson (C 1941-49), what impressed him ‘were the opportunities for extra-curricular

activities now.’ Gordon Feely (SLESS,1941-50) added ‘so much has changed, and it seems as though

it is easier to learn now.’ Frank Halford (R 1942-49) too was impressed:

You ask what we think about the school, I must say, I am proud of it, it’s very good, very good indeed.

It is quite fantastic. You are incredibly lucky to be here, I just hope you work jolly hard!

Bruce Cox (Tn 1941-44) commented on how ‘there seems to be a much more relaxed atmosphere

compared to when I was here. When the Headmaster was coming you would run and hide! Now, the

pupils greet and wave to him. It’s friendlier.’ But not all of Alleyn’s had improved according to our

AOB-visitors. Mr Stewart had a complaint:

I have one big moan that you only have 1½ hours of games, a week, and 1½ hours of PE in the total

time, and I think that is diabolical. Now, I am not talking just because my life was in sport, even if

somebody isn’t interested in it, it is so important in developing people, sport is tremendous in

developing a character, how you win, how you lose, how you compete, how you come back after

losing, and that is applied to life in General; so 1½ hours a week I think is rubbish!685

We asked what our AOBs remember most about their time at Alleyn’s. Mr Hughes replied, ‘I think

the friendship… I enjoyed sport a great deal. Of course we received a very good education. We were

fortunate it was a grammar school.’

One of our interviewers, Joseph Baker, asked a leading question: what advice would you give

yourself at our age? After initial silence and laughter from the group, Mr Hirst began, ‘you’ve got

great facilities here, and you’ve been here quite a few years now and I’m sure you’ve benefited from

all the help and facilities that you’ve got, and make the most of those facilities.’ Mr Rodway

counselled, ‘know what you want to do and go for it’.

After the reunion, Mr Hughes wrote in with some further thoughts which, I think, sum up perfectly

the feelings of his fellow AOBs about their Alleyn’s and the Alleyn’s of today:

Overall the Alleyn’s of 2011 has nearly everything, including a first-rate teaching and administrative

staff, together with students from reasonably financially secure backgrounds. A cocktail that produces

685

Sport at Alleyn’s is still taken very seriously today for the same benefits which Mr Stewart outlines. In actual

fact, the amount of sport played by pupils is two hours of compulsory PE (i.e. all sports) per pupil in the Lower

and Middle Schools. In addition to this, approximately two-thirds of each year group are involved in some form

of representative sport which adds a further 1 ½ hours to their weekly sporting activities. Alleyn’s also offers a

huge variety of non-sports activities, for example, the Duke of Edinburgh Award, CCF, dance clubs, gymnastics

clubs, which also contribute to team-building and the developing of character.

171

the fine school and happy environment I was happy to visit a few weeks ago and proud to be

associated with.

I think it is fair to say that the majority of those of us who attended the excellent reunion, despite the

many disadvantages of life in the late 1940s, had a happy time at school; the basis of a very good

education which stood us well in our careers.

172

Reflections on time spent at Alleyn’s

‘The ethos of the school also not only gave me a good education but provided me with the

opportunity to establish many long-standing friendships with pupils from all walks of life and for this I

am and always will be truly thankful.’ Derek Smith (R 1947-53)

Robert Young gave a vivid description of the boys in his care at Alleyn’s:

The continuous company of schoolboys of the ages 11 to 19 gave me insight into their mass

behaviour. They admired physical courage and energy, but objected to any self-valuation higher than

the facts suggested. They disliked hypocrisy or any form of showing off, and they expected other

boys, if endowed with brains, not to parade them. 'Oh, 'im, 'e's a big-'ead!' or '''e's a big Marf!' were

common judgements. Boys they bullied were boys who shrank from physical contacts, and didn't like

wrestling or punch-ups. Boys they teased were boys who affected to despise their contemporaries.686

John Merrill (R 1942-48) and Micky Stewart (T 1944-51) were both philosophical about their time at

Alleyn’s. Mr Merrill admitted,

I think if I was going to be a student now, I would have taken it seriously and I would have been an

academic. But as it was I was a waste of space. But I got round it, I got there in the end, because I

think I did have a good education at Alleyn’s, never mind that I didn’t pass anything.

Mr Stewart agreed: ‘I would say the same thing. I think that if I hadn’t come to Alleyn’s, I might not,

perhaps, have gone into the same field, but I would have developed into a different person,

especially with people.’ Rossall evacuee Brian Savory (Bn 1938-45) confessed ‘I was a mediocre

student, a poor sportsman and an inadequate musician but being a Rossalleynian was an immense

privilege which could not have happened except for evacuation and it has held me in good stead

ever since.’

Given that Mr Robinson was only at Alleyn’s for a short while, he was generous in his praise:

‘Although my time at Alleyn’s was cut short, due to extenuating circumstances of war and parents

moving home, I have remained grateful for the entire experience afforded me: it has stood me in

great stead throughout my career and wellbeing in life generally.’ Mr Derek Smith (R 1947-53)

explained that whilst ‘I did not attend Alleyn’s during the war years, my education there was

essential as it enabled me to “catch up” with other pupils who perhaps had not had such an erratic

education during the war.’ Jim French (R 1941-46) highlighted the teachers at Alleyn’s, writing, ‘I

retain a great affection for all my teachers. Our three children followed me to Alleyn’s and I was

impressed by all their teachers, as I am by the present staff. I am proud of Alleyn’s – and SLESS!’687

The theme of friendship ran through our AOBs’ memories. David Wallace (C 1941-46) admitted that

he felt ‘relief on leaving but formed life-long friendships’. Alan Jackson wrote:

To me the most important accomplishment or gain from the years spent at Alleyn’s was the number

of friends made for life and the experience allowed me to express myself with confidence.

686

Young, p217 687


173

For some their appreciation of Alleyn’s came with hindsight. This was true for John Williams who

‘enjoyed school in retrospect…. My connections with the school have been strong, having attended

many dinners over the years. Initially at the Connaught Rooms in Holborn – evening dress, always!...

The schooling was great and led me in good stead through my life.’ John Holt (S 1945-51)

acknowledged in his book, The 1940s Revisited, that Alleyn’s ‘had been an excellent school, and I

shall always be grateful to my mother and father for sending me there.’688

Some expressed a debt of

gratitude: Eric Farley (Bn 1940-45) wrote separately to say ‘I am grateful for a sound education and

owe Alleyn’s a great deal.’

Peter Wrench (C 1945-49), I hope, speaks for all our pupils, both past and present:

All my amazing experiences in life and many great friendships are thanks to my fantastic time at dear

old Alleyn’s. May it endure forever! Although you may not meet fellow AOB friends for long intervals,

we are like brothers and it always seems like yesterday.

688

King, p79

174

Bibliography

Alexander, David Something of a Life, David Alexander, Blackheath, 2007

Barnes, Roy Twenty-Five Years On: One Boy’s Growing Up

Board of Education Report of Inspection of Alleyn’s School, Dulwich, Camberwell,

London, 1932

Jones, Colin & World War 2: What was it like Grandad? Bromley Probus Club, 2010

Topping, Dennis (Eds)

Chandler, Arthur R Alleyn’s The Coeducational School, Gresham Books, 1998

Chandler, Arthur R (Ed) South London Emergency School at Alleyn’s School, Dulwich, 1940-

45, produced on the occasion of a reunion, printed by The Heritage

Consultancy for Alleyn’s School, June 2000

Edward Alleyn Magazine, November 1939-February 1950

Gosden, PHJH Education in the Second World War, Methuen & Co, London, 1976

Green, Brian Around Dulwich, Village Books, Dulwich, 1989

King, Michael* The 1940s Revisited, Finial Publishing, Swanage, 2002

Kynaston, David Austerity Britain, 1945-51, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2007, London

Leinster-Mackay, Donald Alleyn’s and Rossall Schools: The Second World War, Experience and

Status, Tantalus Press, 2nd

Edition, 2006

London County Council Report by the Council’s Inspectors of a full inspection held on 14th

to

18th

March, 1938 at Alleyn’s School (Dulwich)

Longmate, Norman How we lived then: a history of everyday life during the Second

World War, Hutchinson & Co, Arrow Edition, 1973

Marr, Andrew A History of Modern Britain, Macmillan, London, 2007

Marr, Andrew The Making of Modern Britain: From Victoria to VE Day, Macmillan,

London, 2009

Miles, Susan (Ed) Drama & Music: The Performing Arts at Alleyn’s, Alleyn’s School,

London, 2009

Ministry of Education Report by HM Inspectors on Alleyn’s School, Dulwich Camberwell,

London, 1950

Pearce, Robert Contemporary Britain, 1914-1979, Longman, Harlow, 1996

Savory, Brian A brief dip in memories of Alleyn’s at Rossall [unpublished]

175

Schofield, Susannah ‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, privately printed, 2011

Winterbottom, Derek The Tide Flows on: A History of Rossall School, Corporation of Rossall

School, 2006

Young, Robert Before I Forget, published by Robert Young, Oxford, 1990

*This is AOB John Holt (S 1945-51) writing as Michael King

Abbreviations

Chandler: Alleyn’s The Coeducational School

Chandler SLESS: South London Emergency School at Alleyn’s School, Dulwich, 1940-45

D&M: Drama & Music: The Performing Arts at Alleyn’s

DLM: Donald Leinster-Mackay, Alleyn’s and Rossall Schools: The Second World War, Experience and

Status

EAM: Edward Alleyn Magazine

HMIs report, 1950: Report by HM Inspectors on Alleyn’s School, Dulwich Camberwell

�

176

Acknowledgements

I am delighted to record my thanks to the AOBs who shared so freely their memories of Alleyn’s in

the 1940s both on the Memories Day itself and in letters, emails and conversations. In addition,

there are others whose good nature, humour and minds I plundered in the piecing together of this

oral history jig-saw, and I should like to record my gratitude to them as well.

The School’s honorary archivist, Neil French (C 1954-61), and his assistant Robert Holden (S 1956-

62), have been pillars of patience in dealing with the constant quiz of queries and questions about

the 1940s. There was an especial eureka moment we shared when Robert succeeded in finding

Allison’s papers which had lain unnoticed in the Archives – but which had been referenced by

Professor Leinster-Mackay in his monograph, Alleyn’s and Rossall Schools: The Second World War,

Experience and Status. Again, as with the previous report, ‘Alleyn’s in the 1930s’, I must record my

thanks to Professor Leinster-Mackay for answering my questions, in particular, relating to the

education crisis Alleyn’s faced in these years.

To Calista Lucy, Keeper of the Archives at Dulwich College, I thank her for her prompt and efficient

help in letting me know when – and how – Lord Soulbury became a governor of Alleyn’s College of

God’s Gift.

To Dr Stephen Winkley, Headmaster of Rossall School, for clarification about the American aircraft

crash at Singleton.

To my friend Frances Tee for borrowing, on my behalf, seemingly inaccessible and prohibitively

expensive books about education in the 1940s at the library of the Institute of Education.

To AOBs Frank Halford, Alan Jackson, Bill Jones and Derek Smith who carefully explained and

expanded points of fact when I was (frequently) getting stuck in the writing up of the account. Their

recall is astonishing.

One AOB, John Cleary, with whom I was very much looking forward to discussing the finer detail

about the 1940s, died before I had embarked on writing the report. In the time I have been working

at Alleyn’s John was always a knowledgeable and friendly point of contact when I wanted Alleyn’s

matters unknotting. He unknotted with supreme skill, always adding a depth of understanding and

detail.

Susan Miles has been enormously diligent with proofing the final draft. I also benefited from the gift

of unused gems she discovered when she wrote and edited Drama and Music: The Performing Arts

at Alleyn’s.

I must admit that I fell at the last hurdle with reproducing pictures for this report: it was beyond my

technical expertise. This was picked up by Ian Coulby of the School’s IT Department who took the

image baton from me and set it right. He went above and beyond the call of duty in formatting

picture and word and I feel that the end result enhances the report immeasurably.

I must thank Vivienne Thurlow for overseeing the printing of the final report so carefully and for her

continued interest in the project.

177

And whilst I was ensconced in the research and writing up of Alleyn’s in the 1940s, ‘normal service’

in the Development and Alumni Office was maintained by my can-do colleagues, Martha Jones and

David Young. Martha helped in the compilation of the report with her technical wizardry and finding

quote-able quotes; and David was brave enough to edit the first draft: I thank them profusely.

Headmaster Dr Gary Savage has been hugely supportive of the School’s oral history project. He gave

the text the benefit of his historian’s input, and offered gems and steers which improved the

account enormously.

I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to my family who endured my absence as I abseiled into

archives of austerity. I am particularly grateful to my daughter Madeleine for allowing me to use

quotes she gleaned from her interviewees, AOBs David and Sandy Alexander, for her Year 6 Second

World War project.

All errors and assumptions must be assigned to me.

Susannah Schofield

January 2012

178

Index

Air-raids, 35, 53, 136

Albion Place School, 32

Alexander, David, 12, 31, 62, 75, 100, 192

Alexander, Sandy, 29-30, 33, 39, 90, 120, 122,

129, 141, 196

Alleyn Old Boy Club (AOBC), 4, 23, 158, 163,

166, 185

Alleyn Road, 15

Allison, Ralph, 21-22, 33-36, 38-42, 44-45, 49,

51, 55, 58, 62-63, 69, 73-79, 81, 84, 105-07,

113, 117-18, 122, 128, 157, 164-68, 176,

195

Allison, Rita, 117

Ammon, Lord, 179

Anglo-American Weekend, 40

AOBs, 2, 4-5, 19, 21, 23-24, 42-43, 46, 60, 63,

66, 68, 74, 77, 80, 87-88, 92-93, 97-98, 101,

107-08, 112, 120, 123, 125, 128-29, 131-32,

135, 137, 142, 144, 152, 160, 162, 165, 171-

75, 177-78, 180, 182-85, 187-90, 195-96

‘Arts Side’, 110

Assembly, 70, 81, 98, 116, 164

ATC, 140, 142-43, 147-49

Athletics, 39, 68, 132-33, 137-38, 174-75

‘At Homes’, 109

Attlee, Clement, 81, 115

Austerity, 4, 7, 114, 157, 159, 196

Baker, Joseph, 188

Ballet, 105, 125, 129

Barnes, Roy, 13, 16, 23, 49, 64-65, 67, 70-71,

79, 93, 94-96, 100, 103-06, 110, 112, 114,

120-24, 126, 129, 132, 140-41, 143-44, 148-

49, 152-54, 156-57, 162, 179, 192

Barnstormers, 89

Barrage balloon, 18, 34, 113, 136

Bate, John, 109

Battle of Britain, 11, 15, 33, 120, 142, 144

BBC broadcasts, 124

Bear Pit, 43, 60-62, 75-77

Beauval Road, 95

Beckenham, 16

Bed-making, 70

Bevin Boys, 182

Bickford-Smith, DG, 83, 105

Biggin Hill, 143

Bishop of Bath and Wells, 115

Bishop of Southwark, 155

Bisley, 67-68

Blackpool, 19, 22, 44, 46, 61, 65-66, 124, 135,

142, 180

Blitz, 10-11, 15, 33, 36, 178

Board of Education, 6, 8, 14, 22, 25, 27, 35,

38, 47, 51, 57, 66, 109, 139, 165, 179, 192

Boxing, 134

Boxley, 25, 27-30, 71, 133, 145

Breaks, 68, 70-71, 80, 114

British Restaurant, 21, 56

Brockwell Park, 16

Buildings, 6, 8-9, 15, 18, 35, 37-38, 49, 51-52,

58, 63, 78, 90, 106, 148, 151-52, 156, 158-

59, 167, 169, 187

Buisson, Eric, 48, 153, 188

Burbage Road, 16

Burley, John, 46

Butler, RA, 14, 25, 154, 164, 170, 179

Buttery, 71, 80, 109

Calton Avenue, 161, 169

Camberwell, 15, 31, 153, 171, 179, 192-93

Cambridge, 6, 61, 74, 89, 112-14, 128-29, 176-

77, 182, 185, 188

Catford, 10

Cavell, Percy, 30

CCF, 67, 87, 126-135, 140, 148, 184, 188

See also OTC, JTC, ATC

Certificate A, 141, 147-48

Chancellor Grove, 147

Chandler, Arthur, 4, 9, 11, 15-18, 22-23, 36,

44, 51-54, 58, 60, 75, 83, 86, 90, 96, 113,

130, 149, 153, 161, 178, 190, 192-93

Charnley, Geoffrey, 92

Chess Club, 60

Christmas, 9, 46, 66, 107, 132

Churchill, Winston,24, 161, 177-78, 180

Civil Defence, 9, 14

Clapham, 9, 88, 98, 144

Cleary, John, 79-80, 88, 98, 110, 125, 132,

157-58, 164, 187, 195

Cleveleys, 43-44, 48, 75, 124

Colours, 101, 138

Comprehensive schools, 57, 169

Concerts, 8, 14, 90, 105, 120-21, 127-28, 130-

31

Corporal punishment, 99

Cotton, Sir Henry, 171, 173

Council for Education in World Citizenship,

163

Coupons, 21-22, 83, 99, 158

179

Cox, Bruce, 11, 14, 20, 22, 53-54, 58, 85, 89,

140, 151, 185, 187-88

Crescent House, 13, 38, 42, 79, 106-07, 175

Crewe, Monty, 55, 89, 106, 185

Cricket, 52-53, 55-56, 58, 67, 70-71, 92, 101,

103, 106, 132-33, 136-37, 153, 160, 173-75,

185

Croft, Michael, 97, 117

Croft, Roy, 126

Cross-country running, 132

Croxted Road, 15

Dann, Roy,30, 45, 122, 127, 142, 151, 181

D-Day, 16, 178

Deal, 12, 27, 30, 36, 52

Desk inspections, 70

Detention, 17, 80, 95, 98, 101, 103, 110

Detling, 28, 29, 32

Dig for Victory, 9, 20, 53, 60, 65

Direct Grant, 7, 78, 165-66, 168, 170, 172

Discipline, 4, 8, 53, 69, 80, 88-94, 98-99, 102-

04, 106, 121, 153, 155, 157, 184

Dodd, George, 80, 93

Doodlebugs, 10

Doubleday, George,31, 33-34

Doubleday, RJ, 69

Drama, 43-44, 50, 55, 60, 75-76, 105-07, 117,

119, 124

Dulwich, 4, 7-8, 15-18, 22-24, 27, 29, 30, 39,

42-43, 48, 50-55, 58, 61, 74, 77-78, 118,

120, 134, 136-37, 143, 147-48, 151-53, 157,

159, 161, 164-65, 167, 183, 192-95

Dulwich College, 151

Durrant, AAM, 178

Eaglen, Alan, 11, 85, 87, 89-90, 102-03, 153,

183, 187

Eayrs, 'Teddy', 53-54, 82

Eccott, EN, 100

Education Act, 5, 7, 111, 114, 154, 164, 165,

169, 170

Elford, Vic, 171, 175

Elms, 52, 56, 72

Emergency schools, 9, 51

Epsom Downs, 143, 147

Evacuation, 2, 5-6, 8, 11-12, 23, 27, 30-31, 33-

36, 42, 48, 51, 73, 75, 82-83, 107, 114, 134,

153, 190

Ewens, Dr, 177

Exams, 8, 11, 54, 79-80, 87, 112-13, 115, 127,

149, 151-52, 164, 182, 185-86

Feeley, Gordon, 9, 19, 21, 22-23, 57, 92, 152

Fees, 7, 152, 161, 165, 169

Field Day, 25, 142-43, 147

Fifty Club, 31, 60, 61-62, 76, 146, 162

Films, 66

Fire-watching, 15-16

Fives, 5, 19, 30, 56, 60, 132-34, 137, 152, 158-

59, 175, 187

Fleetwood, 7, 14, 22, 34, 38, 44, 48, 64, 75,

107, 123, 124, 145

Fleming Report, 165

Flying bombs, 10, 16-17, 47, 54, 58

Food, 6, 19, 21, 46-47, 55-56, 71, 157, 163,

184

Football, 18-19, 22, 53, 55-56, 58, 60, 67, 73,

94, 96, 101, 132, 134-35, 138, 153, 174,

180-81

Ford’s Motor Works, 67

Forum Club, 55, 60-61

Founder’s Day, 22, 42, 50, 71, 118, 161, 179

Jim French, 17, 55, 86, 190

Gallymore, MJ, 110

Gaukrodger, GC, 55, 86

General Certificate of Education, 7, 169

General School Certificate, 54, 113

German measles, 29

Gilbert, Michael, 104, 119, 122, 128-30

Gilbert and Sullivan, 128-29

Giles, Dr, 15, 85, 94

Giles, Sidney, 76, 127-28, 130

Goddard, Brian, 162

Goebbels, Joseph, 25

Goldner, Norman, 61, 66, 89

Goodrich, Gerry, 172, 174-75

Gorell, Lord, 179

Governors, 73-74, 137, 160, 165-66, 169, 178-

79

Grammar School, 9, 32, 51, 74, 96, 111, 133,

135, 142, 168

Great Hall, 42, 90, 98, 106, 123, 129, 187

Green, David, 123

Green, NA, 16-17

Grigg, Lord, 24, 180

Groom, VE, 178

Gubyon Avenue, 17

Hack, Charlie, 9, 51, 54, 73, 100

Hajiantonis, Michael, 117

Half Moon Lane, 102

Halford, Frank, 21, 40, 43, 47, 50, 75, 92, 94,

121-22, 131, 135, 141, 162, 188, 195

Harvest, 9, 20, 54, 83

180

Harvey, Pat, 54

Haslam, VK,19-20, 60, 65, 83, 85, 89, 101, 161

Heber Road School, 21, 56

Henderson, Ralph, 6, 9, 25, 32, 35, 42, 51, 73-

74, 78, 80-82, 84, 92, 96, 102-03, 106, 109,

122, 137, 145, 163, 166, 168, 174

Herne Hill, 17, 56, 102, 152

Higgins, Lord, 76, 90, 127, 129, 137, 171-72,

174-75, 187

Higher School Certificates, 114-15

Hirst, Eric, 13, 71, 98, 188

Hitler, Adolf, 14, 17, 27, 48, 61, 63, 112, 146,

162

Hockey, 35, 134

Holiday club, 57

Hollingbourne, 27

Holt, John, 2, 10, 13, 17, 80-81, 87, 94, 98,

101, 110, 140, 143, 159, 172, 191, 193

Home Front, 14

Home Guard, 8, 15, 35, 83, 140-141, 144-47

Homework, 87-88, 95, 102, 109, 114, 149

Honor Oak Park, 153

House shirts, 5

Howlett, Robert, 23, 113, 147

Hudson, Sidney, 6-7, 49, 69, 73, 78-81, 84-85,

91, 101, 104, 114, 116, 138, 140, 148-49,

157-60, 163, 168, 170

Hughes, John, 3, 66, 92, 95, 100, 132, 137,

151-52, 174, 177, 184-85, 187-89

Hutt, 'Polly', 54, 85-86, 95, 171

Incledon, Sidney, 32, 96, 178, 183

Inspectors, 5, 47, 65, 73, 97, 130, 157, 192-93

International Forum, 39

Isherwood, Christopher, 94, 157

Jackson, Alan,10, 17, 21, 37, 44, 66, 79, 91,

132, 140, 153, 160, 172-77, 182, 185, 190

JAGS, 18, 80, 101-02, 149

James House, 38, 42, 45-46, 106

Jazz, 125, 176-77

Jenkyn, Peter, 24, 36, 58

Johnson, Leslie, 8, 12, 29, 33, 62, 65

Jones, Bill, 37, 85, 96, 112, 142, 178, 183, 195

Jones, Bub, 85

Jones, Prof RV, 178

Journals, 2, 68, 70

JTC, 78-79, 140-42, 144, 147-49

Junior County Scholarship, 8, 151-52

Junior School, 9, 19, 27, 30-31, 33, 36, 42, 45,

52, 60, 64-65, 88, 92, 98, 103, 106, 111,

122, 153, 187

Kennard, Frank, 131

Kent, 5, 10-11, 20, 27, 29-35, 37, 60, 71, 75,

89-90, 106, 118, 120, 133, 142, 145, 162

Lambeth, 14-15, 28, 153

Lammas Term, 47-48

Lancashire, 34, 37, 43, 53, 75

Lanchbery, Jack, 104, 118, 125, 128-29, 156,

171, 176

Latin, 11, 31, 52, 82, 85, 94, 95-96, 99, 113,

133, 182, 187

Lefevre, 96, 180

Leinster-Mackay, Professor Donald, 7, 35, 37,

40, 57, 74, 76, 81, 104, 127, 167, 168, 179,

192, 193, 195

Lenham, 27, 30

Lewisham, 10, 153

Library, 37, 50, 64, 114, 125, 187

Listers’ Café, 142, 143

Local Defence Volunteer, 15, 145

Logan, J,11, 85, 117

London County Council, 5-6, 51, 57, 152, 163,

165, 167, 177, 179, 192

Lordship Lane, 10, 17, 56, 93, 156

Lovelace Road, 24, 58

Mackesy, Alan, 90, 118, 130

Maidstone, 7, 9, 13, 15, 19, 23, 27, 29-30, 32-

34, 36, 41, 51-52, 73-74, 79, 82, 84, 96, 106-

07, 113-14, 124, 133, 135, 142, 145-46

Maitland, Sir John, 29, 83, 85, 96, 112

Maple, James, 18, 95

Marshall Plan, 157

Mary Datchelor School, 31

Matthews, Stanley, 135, 180-81

McAnuff, John, 105

McClymont, CJ, 18, 54-55, 82, 85, 106, 108

Meerendonk, FA, 148, 160

Memorial Garden, 161, 169

Merrill, John, 14, 40, 43-44, 56, 67, 98, 102-

03, 190

Middle School Club, 60, 62, 76, 89

Milk, 33, 47, 56, 70-71, 73, 83, 108

Ministry of Education, 4, 6-7, 96, 111, 136,

138, 169, 193

Ministry of Health, 12, 48

Model Society, 60, 64

Modern Language Club, 60, 63

Moody, Harold, 137, 171-72

Morning Quiet, 69

Moss, Gerald, 113

Munich Crisis, 8

Music, 43, 49, 55, 90-91, 108-118-31, 153,

168, 174, 176

181

Nairn Grove, 18

Napper, Ken, 98, 176

National Service, 81, 113, 141, 182-84, 186

Natural History Club, 60

Nazi, 25

Newport, 7, 13, 34

Norwood Report, 165

Norwood Road, 153

Oliver Goldsmith’s School, 9

'Operation Pied Piper', 27

OTC, 58, 71, 78-79, 89, 140-42, 145, 147

Out-houses, 48

Oxford, 6, 61, 74, 112-14, 129, 178, 182, 185,

188, 193

Palastanga, David, 171, 177

Parents, 27, 78, 109, 158, 163

See also 'At Homes'

Peckham, 9, 137, 151, 173, 187

Penge, 10

Phillips, Tojo, 79

Philpott, Peter, 30, 32-33, 40, 43, 66, 69, 89,

134-35, 176, 180, 182

Phoney War, 9, 32

Pilgrims’ Way, 11, 145-46

Prefects, 5, 17, 43, 53-54, 58, 88-94, 98, 103-

05, 108-09, 113

Pretlove, John, 125, 137, 174-75

Public Schools’ Employment Bureau, 185

Randall, Eric, 97, 149

Ratcliffe, TA, 160

Rationing, 21, 47, 157, 158

Ratzer, Terry, 86, 117

Record Club, 60

Rees, Ivor, 96-97

Reeve, Peter, 41, 43, 46-48, 68, 79, 98, 102-

03, 108, 113, 117, 125, 134-36, 175, 180

Resistance, 87, 88

Rewards, 101

Rifle Club, 68

Robertson, Charles, 167

Robinson, Edward, 11, 18, 30, 61, 74, 88, 102,

121, 151, 182, 190

Rodway, Peter, 19, 22-23, 58, 68-69, 86-88,

93, 98, 113, 119, 125, 129, 132, 152, 184-

85, 188-89

Rogerstown, 33

Roll of Honour, 5

Rose House, 37, 42, 106

Rossall, 2, 5, 9, 13-15, 19, 22-23, 30, 34-50,

52-53, 55, 58, 60-62, 64-65, 69, 70, 73, 75,

77, 78-79, 82-84, 89, 91, 96, 104-07, 113-

14, 117-18, 120-23, 127-28, 130, 132-36,

141-44, 146-48, 151, 161, 164, 176, 180,

190, 192-93, 195

Rossalleyns, 39, 62, 63

Rudd, FA,54-55, 89-90, 106, 130, 183

Sandling, 28-29, 60, 133

Sanitorium, 46

Savory, Brian, 54, 84, 96, 113, 123-124, 126,

134, 176, 180, 190, 193

Scarlet fever, 46

Scholarships, 6, 8, 89, 112, 128, 151-153, 176-

77, 182

School uniform, 98-99, 102

Science, 63, 82, 96, 110, 113, 117, 153

‘Science Side’, 110

Scientific Society, 60, 63

Scott Galbraith, John, 160

Shackleton, LAR, 95, 148-49, 152

Shooting, 43, 67-68, 71, 153

Shortages, 6, 22-23, 44, 57, 64, 82-83, 132,

160

Sirens, 8, 53, 76

SLESS, 5, 9-10, 14-18, 22, 24, 36, 46-58, 61,

73, 78, 82, 86, 90, 92, 96, 99, 102, 106, 113-

14, 117-18, 130, 136, 140, 147, 151-53, 180,

187-88, 190, 193

Smale, Ron, 11, 53-54, 85-86, 89, 153

Smith, Derek, 3, 14, 21, 39, 70-71, 85-86, 89,

92, 99, 101-03, 110-11, 149, 151-52, 158,

173, 184, 187, 190, 195

Smith, Ian, 9, 15, 55-56, 70, 73, 132, 156

Smith, WJ, 33, 43, 63, 85, 90, 99, 117-23, 125-

26, 129, 138, 174

Soulbury, Lord, 25, 165, 179, 195

South East London Inter-Schools Discussion

Group, 162

South London Emergency Secondary School,

see SLESS

Speech Day, 24-25, 30, 44, 77-78, 109, 113-15,

128, 141, 160, 163, 165, 167-68, 179, 180

Sport, 119-125, 132-33, 188

Spread Eagle House, 13, 38, 48, 106-08

Spring, Albert, 45, 84, 89, 91-92, 103, 122, 166

Spring, Ken, 92

Spurdens, Norman,90

Staff, 5-11, 15, 20, 24, 31-32, 36-39, 42, 45,

49, 51-52, 54, 57, 58, 74-87, 89, 91, 94-95,

97-98, 100, 103-04, 106, 111-12, 117, 129-

30, 137, 145-49, 151, 156-57, 160, 162-63,

166-67, 171, 180, 184, 189-90

182

Stamp Club, 60, 62-63

Standard Test, 136

Stewart, Micky, 43, 45-47, 49, 67, 92-93, 106,

117, 132-33, 135, 137, 171, 174-75, 187-88,

190

Sunray Avenue, 18

Swimming, 37-38, 52, 132-36, 183, 187

Swindlehurst, Michael, 89, 117, 120, 126

Sydenham, 10, 17

Taylor, Cedric, 172-73

Taylor, David, 87

Taylor, JA, 66, 94, 98

Taylor, RE, 82

Thain, Gerry, 21, 29, 31, 40, 43, 46-47, 74, 76,

89, 103, 141, 145, 180, 182-83

The Hall, 42, 106, 118

The Rossallian, 5

Thomas, Alan, 9, 51, 82, 99, 114, 151, 187

Thurlow Park Road, 153

Tilley, Henry, 145

Tin Tab, 56, 159

Tomlin, Bernard, 18, 22

Townley Road, 5, 9-10, 13, 18-19, 49, 53-54,

56, 58, 64, 70, 78, 81, 83, 95, 98-99, 102,

113-14, 126, 130, 154, 161, 169, 187

Transitionally Assisted School, 169

Tribe, Mr, 89, 92

Trist, Col, 35, 38, 45, 77

Tulse Hill, 17, 153

Tyson, Charlie, 9, 42, 51-52, 54, 57-58, 71, 73,

90, 106-07, 130

United Nations, 156

Upward, Edward, 85, 94, 118, 157

V1s, 10-11, 16-18, 24, 36, 48

V2s, 10, 17, 35, 48

VE Day, 26, 35, 70, 156, 192

Vernon, Russell, 161

VJ Day, 83, 156

Wade, Robert, 64

Wales, 5, 9, 12, 33-34, 36, 107, 109, 183

Wales, Martin, 19

Wallace, David, 23, 44, 46, 75, 190

Waller, Reg, 174

Walmer, 12, 133

War, 4-25, 27, 30-33, 35-40, 42, 44-45, 49, 51-

53, 55, 57, 60-61, 63, 65-68, 71, 74-75, 77-

85, 87-90, 92, 94, 96, 99-100,104, 107-109,

111-112, 114, 116-18, 123-24, 130, 132,

134, 136-43, 146-49, 151-54, 156-61, 163-

64, 169, 171, 173, 176, 178-80, 182-84, 190

War damage, 15, 159

War memorial, 160

War Office, 82, 142, 144-45

War Savings, 8, 13, 14

War-effort, 8, 82, 124

Waters, Trevor, 64, 85

Watt, Rev JH, 25, 30, 71-72

Weavering, 27-29, 133

Wetherick, Norman, 8, 51, 82, 85, 89-90, 94,

98-99, 151-52, 156-57, 172-73, 175

Who’d a thought it pub, 29

Wiggs, Dora, 55, 85-88, 98, 159

Williams, John, 10, 19, 56, 58, 68, 71, 75, 83,

98, 103-04, 112, 117, 122, 132, 138, 140,

148, 152, 158, 173, 184, 191

Winkley, Stephen, 19, 195

Winter of 1947, 158

Woodwarde Road, 19

Wrench, Peter, 3, 8, 13, 16, 26, 79, 82, 87-88,

93, 101-02, 132, 144, 148-49, 174, 183-84,

191

Wright, 'Pussy', 54-55, 64, 85-86, 106, 130

Young, Robert, 6, 29, 32, 55, 70, 73, 82, 84,

92, 99-100, 111, 117, 122, 128, 137, 140,

156, 158-59, 161, 166, 171, 190, 193

183

CONTRIBUTORS TO 1940S MEMORIES DAY REUNION

Guests at reunion held 1 March 2011

Alleyn Old Boys

Sandy Alexander (Brading's, 1938-47)

John Cleary (Brading's, 1945-51)

Bruce Cox (Tyson's, 1941-44)

Roy Dann (Dutton's, 1937-42)

Alan Eaglen (Tyson's, 1939-44)

Gordon Feeley (SLESS, 1941-50)

Frank Halford (Roper's, 1942-49)

Eric Hirst (Cribb's, 1944-50)

Robert Howlett (Brading's, 1944-50)

John Hughes (Cribb's, 1945-51)

Alan Jackson (Cribb's, 1945-51)

John Merrill (Roper's, 1942-48)

Peter Reeve (Cribb's, 1941-48)

Edward Robinson (Tyson's, 1938-41)

Peter Rodway (Cribb's, 1942-50)

Derek Smith (Roper's, 1947-53)

Ian Smith (Roper's, 1942-49)

Micky Stewart (Tulley's, 1944-51)

Alan Tait (Tyson's, 1940-45)

Gerry Thain (Tyson’s, 1938-44)

Alan Thomas (SLESS, 1940-41)

John Williams (Roper's, 1943-49)

Peter Wrench (Cribb's, 1945-49)

Facilitators

Aaiza Ali (Roper's, 2008-10), Gap Yr Administrative Asst

Neil French (Cribb's, 1954-61), Honorary Archivist

Robert Holden (Spurgeon's, 1956-62), Assist Archivist

Martha Jones, Development Office Assistant

David Young, Director of Development & Finance

Year 9 Pupils

Alex Croft (Roper’s)

Michael Hajiantonis (Cribb’s)

Hannah Levine (Cribb's)

Rebecca McDowell (Cribb’s)

Danny Nay (Cribb’s)

Lucy Steadman (Brading’s)

Kate Sullivan (Cribb’s)

Albert Wayman Scarlett (Cribb's)

Year 12 Pupils

Joseph Baker (Roper’s)

Charlie Carman (Brown’s)

Sofia Greaves (Tulley’s)

Jessica Lawler (Roper’s)

Connie McKimm (Tulley's)

Livvi Minghella (Tyson’s)

Daniel Petrides (Spurgeon’s)

Grace Rahman (Roper’s)

Kim Stallard (Brown's )

Jim Turnbull-Walter (Tyson's)

Staff

Rev Anthony Buckley, School Chaplain

Antony Faccinello, Senior Deputy Head

David Harley, Head of History

Neil Kinnear (Brading’s, 1963-70), Photographer

Jon Lilly, Deputy Head

Dr Gary Savage, Headmaster

Susannah Schofield, Head of Alumni Relations

Gillian Silver, Head of English

Max Tottenham (Cribb’s, 2003-10), Gap Yr

Administrative Asst

Contributors to project

David Alexander (Brading's 1933 1942)

John Bate (Tulley's 1932-39)

Robert Boughton (Tyson's 1935-41)

Eric Buisson (Cribb's 1941-49)

John Burley (Dutton's 1942-48)

George Doubleday (Tyson’s, 1937-46)

Eric Farley (Brown's 1940-45)

Michael Gilbert (Tulley’s, 1944-50)

Gerry Goodrich (Dutton’s, 1944-49)

Pat Harvey (SLESS, 1940-46)

Betty Johnson for Leslie Johnson (Brading's 1939-43)

Bill Jones (Roper's 1935-42)

Thomas Nicholson (Spurgeon's 1938-44)

Jeffery Orchard (Roper's 1942-50)

Peter Philpott (Brading's 1934-43)

David Pratt (Tyson's 1937-46)

Ron Smale (Brading's 1940-46)

Norman Spurdens (Tyson’s, 1932-41)

David Taylor (Tulley's 1956-63)

David Wallace (Cribb's 1941-46)

Trevor Waters (Brown's, 1939-49)

189

Sunday Times article about Alleyn’s move to Rossall, 20 April 1941

192

1940s Memories Day Reunion

Alleyn’s School

March 1 2011

Names of guests in group photograph on front cover

Gerry Thain

Alan Eaglen

Gary Savage Antony

Faccinello

Sandy

Alexander

Jon Lilly

Gordon Feeley

Ted Robinson Eric Hirst

Bruce Cox Alan

Thomas

Frank

Halford

John Merill

John Williams

Alan Jackson John Hughes

Ian Smith Micky

Stewart Alan Tait

Peter Reeve

John Cleary

Derek Smith

Pauline

Holloway

Robert Howlett

Peter Wrench

Peter

Rodway

Roy Dann

Anthony

Buckley

Alleyn’s in the 1940s · Alleyn’s in the 1940s ... The cadet forces and the Home Guard ... •...

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Transcript of Alleyn’s in the 1940s · Alleyn’s in the 1940s ... The cadet forces and the Home Guard ... •...