The History of Sherborne House - Part 4
Sherborne House After William Charles Macready
The census of 1862 records Charles John Boyle to be tenant. He was a descendant of the famous scientist Robert Boyle of Stalbridge Manor two centuries earlier, whose sister had married into the Digby family - hence the connection perhaps. The census records the governess was at home with 6 of the younger children, two nursery maids, two housemaids, a nurse domestic, cook and gardener.
In July Robert Willmott took over Macready's lease of Sherborne House. He put in a 'hot air apparatus' and gas fittings. Robert Willmott was grandson of the founder of Sherborne's silk mill and built the row of 36 cottages in Horsecastles for his silk workers and 8 'respectable' houses in South Street. Willmott knew the Earl of Shaftesbury, a local man, the great philanthropist and factory reformer, who laid the foundation stone of the Carrington Buildings at Sherborne School in 1862.
Robert Willmott died in 1874 and ‘a splendid funeral procession left Sherborne House.’
Major Andrew Cathcart Bogle VC, who had seen distinguished service in India married Robert Willmott's widow and is the next tenant of Sherborne House in 1876. . The census of 1881 records Major and Mrs Bogle, her sister Margaret Messiter, and a footman, cook and two housemaids living in Sherborne House. There is a plaque to his memory on the south aisle of Sherborne Abbey.
In 1887 Lord Digby's School moved from what is now the Britannia Inn across the road into Westbury House which now houses a dental practice. And in 1891 General Sir Julius Richard Glyn KCB took over the tenancy of Sherborne House having seen action in both South Africa and Ireland.
In 1892 the Macready Literary Institution closed. As noted above as to what became of a substantial library and collection of fossils etc remains a mystery. And Lord Digby's School temporarily moved back into its original premises until 1898 when it moved into premises in Newland known as ‘St Swithin's Laundry’, a small but fine Palladian House which was sadly demolished in the early 1970s, the foundations lie beneath the present Waitrose car park.
There is a photograph of it reproduced in Sherborne Camera (1990) A Kindergarten was opened in the former Macready Institute in 1907 to help boost pupil numbers.
The Twentieth Century – and the making of a School for Girls
Richard Glynn died in 1905 and is buried in Sherborne cemetery and his second wife lived on in Sherborne House until her death in 1910. And Lord Digby's School became a Secondary School with a leaving age of 16. In 1910 Colonel Grant took over the lease of Sherborne House followed by Major D S Browne and in the same year Lord Digby's School was formally recognised by the Board of Education and Miss Ashwell as Headmistress.
A Schools Inspection Report of 1910 was to note that the ‘St Swithin’s Laundry’ buildings needed attention and in 1914 a building scheme was approved but postponed by the War effort. Miss Ashwell resigned in 1916 and the following year Miss Billinger was appointed Headmistress and in 1920 a full building inspection of the School declared that . . . 'the building is entirely inadequate for the needs of the school . . .'
In 1924 Littleton C Powys Headmaster of Sherborne Preparatory School became chairman of governors, brother of the more famous Sherborne writers John Cowper Powys, author of Wolf Solent set in Sherborne and Llewelyn Powys, author of an autobiographical novel, Apples be Ripe. Sherborne School has a Powys archive; hence ‘Powys Lane’ off Acreman Street.
In 1925 Miss Billinger bought ‘Stonegarth’ at the bottom of The Avenue as a boarding house and Miss Sparke took over the running of the Junior School as a separate entity to be housed in a purpose-built structure at the far end of Newland just below ‘Stonegarth’ – and which received a ‘direct hit’ during the air raid of 1940. And is now the site of ‘Newland Flats.’ Miss Billinger who lived in ‘Stonegarth’ was killed in this raid – thrown down the staircase by the force of the blast.
Major D S Browne lessee of Sherborne House died in 1927. Littleton Powys 'had the ear' of Col F J B Wingfield Digby who approved the secondary school taking over the lease of Sherborne House in 1930, although the latter preferred to give a 'green field site' for a new building outside the town. ‘The house and surroundings are admirably suitable' reads a Dorset County Education Committee memorandum of January 1927.
In the meantime Col C Kindersley Porcher took over the lease. He died in 1928 and his widow left the following year. Their youngest child, known as Molly, (by his second marriage) was still alive and living in Tarrant Gunville when I last updated these notes in 2006. Christine Stones taped an interview with her – Molly Robertson – following a walk we made round Sherborne House in April 2002 and the afternoon was written up for the Friends' Update. She was, we may take it, the last resident of Sherborne House as a private household. This makes for very interesting listening.
Lord Digby’s School Moves Into Sherborne House
On Monday 9 November, 1931, the Governors and Education Authority acquired the lease; and Lord Digby's School moved over the road and into Sherborne House. The School was formally opened by Miss Grier, Head of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, on 18 February 1932. That summer there were 91 pupils.
Two years later in 1933 a telephone was requested – but was refused at first. The first Old Girls Reunion held; Speech Day was held in the Methodist Hall in Cheap Street (now the Powell Theatre).
In 1934 a new, fully-equipped gymnasium was constructed in the garden behind the House and which also included a stage for school plays and speech days. First writing up these notes in 2006 I noted that ‘much of the original 1930s equipment is lost but the building yet remains but in a very sorry state. This is a survivor of what is becoming an increasingly rare class of building – a 1930s timber-built construction with a corrugated iron roof - and should surely seek formal DCC Listing.’ Photographs of this yet survive. It was duly pulled down by Radcliffe Homes in the building of the Portman Place. In the same year, 1934, tennis courts were laid out in the Paddock on the other side of Newland.
On 11 January 1937Dorset County Council purchased Sherborne House and in 1938 new premises for Foster's School were built at the end of Tinney's Lane (now demolished) and the ground behind Sherborne House is turned into a hockey pitch.
Following the 30 September 1940 air raid on Sherborne the Junior School in Lower Newland ( noted above), the girls were to be accommodated in Wilderness House (demolished for the building of Wilderness Close in St Swithin's Road in the 1990s) and the Juniors in a room in Sherborne House. Happily the air raid took place just after the children had left the building at the end of afternoon school – which received a ‘direct hit.’ The tennis courts in the Paddock also suffered bomb damage and were not repaired until 1947.
In 1940 the Boarding House closed and the Girls had their midday lunch at the British
Restaurant in Cheap Street (now occupied by Marsh's electrical shop). Trenches were dug in the back garden of Sherborne House, later filled in by German prisoners of war. Evacuees from London schools used the Cookery Room of Sherborne House - the ground floor, former ‘Stewards Room’ of the medieval west wing – and which was to remain the Domestic Science class room - and the Gymnasium on two afternoons a week for classes.
The girls dug up the garden to plant potatoes with the help of boys from the King's School. Sheep were grazed behind on the on the hockey field to save petrol . . . And following the death of Miss Billinger following the air raid, Miss Helen Thomson was appointed Headmistress – whom I remember in her later years.
In 1944 the Education Act abolished school fees and Lord Digby's School became a Grammar School with entry by examination, later known as the '11+'. The County Council provided school buses out to the villages.
In 1950 the Thornhill Mural was restored and the dark Victorian varnish removed from the staircase. And a few years later in 1957, the Art Room – the first floor of the medieval west wing - was re-furbished under the guidance of the Art teacher Ruth Gervis. (A friend of Ruth Gervis was Sarah Turing, Alan Turing’s mother. The Turings were away on colonial service and it was this which was to prompt their sending Alan to the King’s School). A ‘wing’ was constructed on the north side of the House to provide a cloak room and toilets on the ground floor and on the first floor above, a science laboratory. Until this time all lab-based/science lessons had to be done at Foster's. The Lord Digby's School Laboratory was however, only used for Biology teaching. There were no dining room facilities at Sherborne House; and at lunchtime the Girls walked in a 'crocodile' up to the dining room at Simons Road Primary School. This north wing was pulled down during the Radcliffe Homes development – which was perhaps to be regretted (all part of the history of the House) but this did serve to expose the complex architecture presented by the rear wall – see above.
In 1958 a lecture was given to the Girls by Joseph Fowler, author of Mediaeval Sherborne held in the first floor School Assembly Room, the ‘Red Room’ of the 1726 Inventory. I remember him walking in to the room, bent and grey haired – and the reverence with which Miss Thomson introduced him – but do not recall anything he said . . . The School Library was located beneath the Assembly Room in the former ‘Hall’ of the 1726 Inventory. This front entrance was, however, not used. This first floor ‘Hall’ was originally crossed by a corridor giving access to the ‘Green Damask Chamber’ which became the Fifth Form Room. On the north side of this ‘corridor’ had been a closet – with a ‘drain’ with no obvious access to a water supply or ‘down pipe. Joseph Fowler stood on the low platform which occupied the site of this former ‘closet.’
New dark blue full-skirted summer dress became uniform in 1961 in the place of the shirt-waster light blue dress and prefects were to wear a small dark blue fitted hat with a light blue tassel. School hats remained obligatory for everyone else.
The following year, 1962, John Betjeman visited Sherborne House as part of a very ‘Sixties-style’ film he made about Sherborne. I remember meeting him in Miss Thomson’s study (the 1726 ‘Drawing Room’) and am in the video (now CD) walking down the staircase. We were strictly forbidden to ever touch the mural.
In 1962 Miss Thomson retired and Monica Ditmas became Headmistress. The 1970s Saw 'Temporary-permanent' classrooms opened in the old orchard behind Sherborne House to make more space available for teaching -also to provide space for the eating of packed lunches. Teaching was to be increasingly shared with Foster's School, girls walking up and down Newland several times a day. Shelagh Hill was appointed Headmistress in September 1979 – and was to ‘organise’ the mounting of a blue plaque outside the east entrance to commemorate William Charles Macready.
In 1985 the top floor of Sherborne House no longer deemed safe for occupation and was closed to pupils. The top floor had hitherto provided a Staff Room, the ‘velvet room’ of 1726, the First Form room, the ‘wrought room’ of 1726 and the Second Form room, the ‘yellow damask room’ of 1726. There was also a small library at the top of the stairs which – I note – was already a ‘library’ at the time of the making of the Inventory. And recall it being full of old books – which were ‘out of bounds’ and not relevant to the school curriculum. This was occasionally used as a seminar room.
In 1987 Yeovil College opened its doors to Sixth-form pupils in Dorset and Lord Digby's School Sixth-form was reduced in size. There was local 'lobbying' to 'Save our Grammar Schools’ which did not succeed. Lord Digby’s School closed in 1992 and the pupils transferred to the Gryphon School.
The School fittings – blackboards, library shelving, the science lab and art room remained ‘intact’ for some years and the School Domestic Science Room (the former ‘Stewards’ Room’) and the high-roofed Geography Room (the former ‘Kitchen’) were used as Gallery space by both Sherborne Arts and the Friends of Sherborne House for the Exhibitions, talks and social events held in the House. And the 1960s cloakroom facilities remained in service.
Lord Digby’s School Closes in 1992
The story of Sherborne House from 1992 to its closure in 2008 and then its purchase by Mr Cannon in 2017 now invites writing up ... Katherine Barker, September 2019