Stamford School
Stamford School is an English public school in the market town of Stamford, Lincolnshire. It was founded in 1532 by a local man, William Radcliffe, with the encouragement of Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, though there is evidence to suggest that a school existed from the beginning of the fourteenth century. As a Roman Catholic chantry school, it fell foul of the Protestant reformers and was only saved from destruction under the Chantries Act of Edward VI by the personal intervention of Sir William Cecil (later Lord Burghley) who worked in the service of Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset and who secured a specific Act of Parliament ensuring its survival. Apart from the chantries of Oxford and Cambridge universities, only those of Eton, Winchester, Berkhamsted, St Albans and Stamford schools survived.
Teaching is believed to have begun in the magnificent Corpus Christi chapel of Stamford's twelfth century church of St Mary, but by 1566 was taking place in the remaining portion of the demolished St Paul's Church, originally built no later than 1152. This building continued in use as a school room until the early 20th century when it was reclaimed and extended and, in 1930, returned to use as a chapel. Some thirty years later a musicologically interesting nineteenth century Gray and Davidson pipe organ was installed although, regrettably, this was removed in the 1990s and replaced with an electronic substitute. Over the centuries, the school has built or absorbed 17th, 18th and 19th century buildings, besides the site of a further demolished medieval church (Holy Trinity/St Stephen's) and remains of the hall of Brasenose College built by the sessionists from the University of Oxford in the 14th century.
The right of appointment of the school's Master, a position hotly contested in past centuries on account of the post's disproportionately large salary, was shared between the Mayor of Stamford and the Master of St John's College, Cambridge. This arrangement continues to be reflected in the fact that both Stamford Town Council and St John's College have nominees on the school's governing body.
Stamford School has a sister school, Stamford High School, which was founded in 1877. In recent years, the two have been united under the leadership of a single Principal as the Stamford Endowed Schools. This organisation now comprises Stamford Junior School, a co-educational establishment for pupils aged between 2 and 11 years, Stamford School for boys aged 11-18, and Stamford High School catering for girls of the same age group. Sixth Form teaching is carried out jointly between Stamford School and Stamford High School.
Stamford School has four senior (Y10-Y13) houses. These are called Brazenose (sic), Radcliffe, Ancaster and Exeter. There are also two boarding houses called Byard, for boys aged 11 to 14, and Browne, which houses boys aged 14 to 18. The four junior (Y7-Y9) houses are Cecil (feeder house to Exeter), Willoughby (feeder house to Ancaster), St. Paul’s (feeder house to Radcliffe) and St Peter’s (feeder house to Brazenose).
The house names, which date back over half a century, reflect various aspects of the school's history. Brazenose and Radcliffe traditionally housed town boys, while Ancaster and Exeter accommodated boys who lived north and south respectively of the River Welland. While this used to be the case however, it is no longer so. Since September 2005 the houses have been selected randomly or, as some suspect, deliberately to ensure an even distribution of sportsmen, musicians and academics.
Additional boarding houses within the Stamford Endowed Schools are St. Michaels (Junior school boys and girls), Welland (Girls from the age of 14 to 17 ), and Park (Girls sixth form accommodation, 17-18).
Uniform
All boys wear black or charcoal-grey trousers and a school blazer, which is navy blue. The school's emblem is a stork sitting on a wool sack displayed over the motto + me spede meaning Christ me Spede, derived from the armorial bearings of medieval wool merchant William Browne. It is worn on the breast pocket of the blazer. Most boys wear a maroon crest, although school prefects wear a white one. House prefects, in the lower school, wear a maroon crest with a maroon ribbon attached to the top of the pocket. Blue crests are worn by fifth-form prefects. Badges, awarded for extensive house activity are worn usually on the left lapel. Boys can be seen wearing an array of different school ties. Every boy receives his tie specific to his house upon joining to school, but may be awarded others as a mark of his achievements through the school. These include House Colours, Representative Colours, and Full and Half School Colours. Stamford School Club ties are worn on Saturdays by boys representing the school in the day's fixtures.
Songs
Stamford School has a number of school songs that are, or were, sung in the chapel or at assemblies in the school hall. Besides the perennial favourite Jerusalem, the more formal songs were the Latin 'Carmen Stamfordiense', written by a Victorian Headmaster, Dr D.J.J. Barnard, and the more generic Dulce Domum. Barnard's 'Carmen' runs:
Musa vocat; quemque talem
Fas audire monitum
Et praebere se vocalem
Nunc si nunquam iterum:
Inter nos qui nunc cantamus
Floreat concordia
Teque semper efferamus
Laudibus, Stamfordia!
Surgat vox totius chori
(Procul hinc silentium)
Nostro bono fundatori
Principi burgensium:
Quater summis hic potitus
Senior honoribus
Scholam nostram, non oblitus,
Dedit junioribus.
Quod est bonum, quod decorum
Nos colamus strenui,
Nec inculti simus morum,
Fortes et ingenui:
Timor Dei, regis honos
Impleant praecordia;
Filios sic alens bonos
Floreat Stamfordia!
In the early years of the 20th century, however, one of the masters, A.W.S Cowie, who later served as Second Lieutenant in the Lincolnshire Regiment and was killed at the Battle of the Somme, composed a more light-hearted song. This piece, sung to the tune of The Vicar of Bray became increasingly popular and was gradually adopted as, in effect, the school song. It runs:
In Father Time's remoter days
By strange coincidences,
Noah built the ark, and someone else
Schola Stamfordiensis
And fools be they that do suppose
This is exaggeration,
For nobody our founder knows
Or date of our foundation.
(Chorus)
For we maintain, as age in wine
Improves its excellences
Rare virtue fills in every line
Schola Stamfordiensis.
Yet age has brought us no decay
And though our School's a small one,
We still succeed in learning here
That life and duty's all one.
Some of our sons all men may find
High in the lists of Glory -
Recording Angel, keep, we pray,
Our humbler heroes' story.
(Chorus)
Mens sana we develop here
By things like Greek and Science;
And corpus sanum by our games
Of skill and self-reliance:
Whilst over Brain and Hand alike
Stands Discipline, physician
To purify and train the Heart
In its correct position.
(Chorus)
Then keep it up! While England's schools
Uphold their reputation,
Old England has no cause to fear
A canine destination.
Let shivering rogues lament the times
And future consequences
We shall not fear, Dum Floreat
Schola Stamfordiensis!
And despite both the identity of the founder and date of the foundation being subsequently established beyond any doubt, the song continues to endure.
Distinguished Alumni (Old Stamfordians)
Stamford School is alma mater to many distinguished alumni, a number of whom have their own Wikipedia entry. They include:
Politics
- William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, Lord High Treasurer of England and chief advisor to Queen Elizabeth I
- John Cecil, 5th Earl of Exeter, MP for Stamford, Grand Tourist and connoisseur
- J.F. Horrabin, Labour MP for Peterborough, radical, journalist and broadcaster
- Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe, newspaper magnate, founder of the Daily Mail and Daily Mirror, owner of The Times
- Sir Norman Jude, Minister of State, South Australia
Law
- Sir Ronald Long, President of the Law Society
Music
- Sir Malcolm Sargent, conductor
- Sir Michael Tippett, composer
- Julian Wastall, composer
- Kieran Wade, recording artist with The Contrast.
Literature & the Arts
- Torben Betts, playwright
- Nelson Dawson, silversmith, jeweller, designer, etcher and painter of the Arts and Crafts movement.
- Colin Dexter, OBE, author of detective novels
- Dr Jack Dominian, psychiatrist, author and broadcaster
- Inspector Morse the fictional character, is described as an Old Stamfordian
- Francis Peck, antiquary
- Ralph Robinson, Renaissance scholar, first translator into English of Thomas More's Utopia
- Thomas Seaton, founder of Seatonian Prize for Poetry at the University of Cambridge
- John Terraine, military historian
- Dr Graham Webster, historian
The Armed Forces
Academia & The Church
- Zachary Brooke, Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity, University of Cambridge
- John Chevalier, Master of St John's College, Cambridge, and Chancellor of the University of Cambridge
- Charles Ellicott, theologian, professor of divinity at King's College London and the University of Cambridge and Bishop of Gloucester & Bristol
- Edward Miles Hare, Pali scholar and translator of Buddhist texts
- P. J. Lamb, Principal and Canon, St John's College, York
- L. A. K. Staveley, Fellow of New College, Oxford
Industry
- L.G. Dawson, Chairman, Division of Advanced Engineering (Aeronautics and Aerospace), Rolls Royce
- Dr W. R. Hare Chairman, Reckitt & Coleman Ltd.
- G. F. Murphy, Director, Imperial Chemical Industries.
- A. J. Turner, Head of financial policy at C.B.I.
- G. F. Whitby, I.C.I.
Sport
- F. H. Gilman, trainer, owner and breeder of Grittar, 1982 Grand National winner
- S. D. Hodgkinson, England Rugby
- A. J. Hudson, England hockey
- Mark James, Golf. Captain Europe Ryder Cup team, 1999.
- M. J. K. Smith, England Cricket Captain and England Rugby
- Iwan Thomas, athlete
Distinguished former schoolmasters
- Robert Browne, Clergyman and founder of the Brownists
- Sir Anthony Bruce Ewbank, Judge of the High Court
- William Dugard, Head Master, Head Master of Merchant Taylors, Royalist propagandist, printer of Basilikon Doron, treatise on government of James I
- Gerard Hoffnung, musician, humourist, cartoonist
- David Maland, High Master of Manchester Grammar School
- Graham Butt aka Gizz Butt, former guitarist with The Prodigy
Further reading
The History of Stamford School by B.L. Deed, OBE TD