SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF 1918 - 1922.
I went to Lydney Grammar School, then known as Lydney Secondary
School, in late 1918, when I was 14. I was one of three boys of that
age, which was late for admission to a secondary school, and it was
uncertain, for a miserable week or two, whether the school could
take us, as none of us had managed to get a scholarship. Fortunately
it could, and we were admitted as paying pupils, for (I think) the
modest sum of £3 a term, which could have covered little more
than our books. It was then a small school (only 350, I seem to remember),
with all the merits of a small school, and particularly of small
school drawing on such a beautiful catchment area ( as the jargon
now goes, though I didn't remember hearing the phrase, in this
sense, in my younger days). Apart from Lydney children, we got to
school in various ways; there were no buses running through the Forest
in those days, and those who didn't come on bikes, came mainly
by train, either from the other side of the Severn (Berkeley and
Sharpness) over the now, alas, non-existent Severn Bridge, or from
the Coleford and Cinderford direction, in both cases on the now (alas)
defunct Severn and Wye Joint Railway. Some came on the main line
from Chepstow and other places. One of the advantages of coming by
train from the Forest was that one missed morning assembly. Most
(I think) brought packet lunches to eat in school, but some of us
spent up to sixpence for a bun and a drink in lieu of lunch at the
Bathurst Café up the street. There was a difference not easily
perceived and harder to define between those of us who came from
the Forest, and those who came over the Severn, perhaps derived from
different settings and occupations: they were rural and we were Foresters.
As the number of pupils was small, so also were the staff, the buildings, and
the playing-fields. It think it was at the beginning of my time that the first
additions to the School were made in the shape of a long line of wooden but
pleasant buildings stretching along the whole south side of the School. Our
main playing-field ran from the School south to a stone wall, in the middle
of which was a great and favourite tree, and beyond which were farmers' fields
and a distant sight of Lydney Church. At the end of my schooldays, before I
could benefit from it, we were able to use the swimming pool - both presented
to the town by Lord Bledisloe; and, in my last term, boys were allowed to play
tennis (a game hitherto reserved for the girls) as well as cricket. I don't
know that the School ever achieved fame at cricket; but it produced, year after
year, an excellent hockey-team, which played with and against an equally good
or, rather, better Old Boys' team - perhaps one of the best in the West
of England. However, my memory or partiality may be responsible now for this
belief. Anyway, Saturdays spent away or at home with the Old Boys' team
were one of my greatest pleasures.
It is pleasant now to remember that it was a singularly happy school, and I
am sure that this memory is not merely the result of a feeling which we all
know, that of idealising retrospect. Its content was due to various causes:
its smallness, as I think: the fact that it was co-educational; the nature
of the area it served, and therefore of its children; and, perhaps above all,
the quality of its staff. My headmaster was Mr. Frank Dixon, of whom I stood
in awe, which did not diminish as time went on and I had great occasion to
be grateful for his kindness and forethought. He had a deep affection for the
children of his school: one of my earliest memories is of the School assembling
on the morning of the first Armistice Day, 11 November 1918 , and being told
by him with scarcely concealed tears, as he thought of his dead boys, that
the war was over, and there would be no School that day. Miss R. L. M. Cleaver,
the senior English mistress, to whom I owed much, was head of the girls' side.
Mr. R. L. Willatt, whose wit I enjoyed, even when it was directed at me, came
back from the war in my first term, and set a high standard of exactness in
French. Miss Hatton was an imposing presence, and a first-class teacher. But
it would be invidious to name some, when all our teachers were so friendly
and approachable.
Though I daresay we possessed our normal share of devilry, I don't remember
any bullying, or even cliques. There were a number of sentimental and harmless
attachments between boys and girls. Compared (I suppose) with to-day, we were
a naïve and unsophisticated lot. There were no teaching aids, no telly,
and, indeed, not steam-radio. The School's"occasions" were
few and far between - a Sports Day in the summer, a play and a party, which
we eagerly looked forward to, at Christmas were almost their sum. I can't
remember, however, that any of us felt particularly bored. Miss Cleaver was
our coach for the play. I can only remember our performance of"Julius
Caesar", and that only because I took the part of Casca (after having
been tried and rejected for Antony); and my intolerable state of nerves in
this small part was not improved on the opening night when my sword stuck in
its scabbard at the line"here, where I point my sword, the sun arises." Had
the sun waited for my obstinate sword, a miracle similar to that of Joshua
at Gideon would have occurred.
There was always a Cooke, sometimes several, in the School, before, during,
and after my time. Indeed, the Captain of the School when I arrived was Robert
Cooke, a handsome and impressive person, before whom I abased my eyes as I
saw him descending the stairs on my first day. My heroes on the whole, were
hockey heroes: I remember particularly George Hastie, whose stick-work was
remarkable, and Tom Clarke in the school team. The only stylish cricketer I
can think of was my friend Gordon (“Pluto") Irvine. In my last
year, some of us attempted Higher School Certificate (now A. Level) at Bristol
University. We must have been very few; we certainly were on the Arts side,
where I was one of four, the other three being girls. Those were pleasant days,
with a great deal of private study, and freedom from routine lessons.
I've dredged my memory for these few details, which, no doubt, are of
more importance to me that they are likely to be to anybody else. In any case,
the mind remembers rather how it felt that what it felt; and if my facts may
be sometimes inaccurate, I hope something of the happiness of belonging to
Lydney Grammar School in the earlier years of the century has come through.
F. C. Horwood
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