Ivychurch Academy, Alderbury

The school was established around 1830 as Mr John Sopp's Academy, when the Sopp family moved from a school in Salisbury and leased Ivychurch House. John Sopp was an eminent teacher of Latin and Greek and had at least 18 pupils at his boarding school. Unusually for this period they all had separate beds and were also well treated. In 1856 John Sopp died and was succeeded by his son, George; a report of 1858 said, 'A log standing institution in this parish, is not calculated for the children of the poor or of the class immediately above the poor'. George Sopp died of a heart attack in 1862 and the Academy did not re-open after his death. The house was demolished in 1888.