Parochial School, Charlton

According to the Digest of Returns to the Select Committee on the Education of the Poor (House of Commons) in 1819, as at the previous year some twenty children were attending a school at Charlton, for which they paid 4d. weekly. In 1841 the lord of the manor, the Earl of Normanton, gave ¾ acre for the site of a school together with the sum of £100 and the promise of £10 annually to support the school. In 1859 HM Inspector William Warburton reported that some 30 to 40 children were taught by a mistress in “a very small brick school-room, with slate roof, boarded floor, and side desk” and that the school was chiefly supported by the vicar.

Unfortunately there are no Victorian school log books in Wiltshire & Swindon Archives, but the following general information would be relevant to the school for the middle part of the 19th century. Fees were paid for each child, normally at the rate of one penny (0.4p) or twopence a week and the ‘school pence’ were collected by the schoolteacher. There would have been a schoolmaster, or schoolmistress; probably the school was too small to have more than one monitor to help with the younger children and the teacher may even have been without any help.

School holidays were at similar times to those of today but often there was only 2 days at Easter but a week at Whitsun. The summer holidays were of five or six weeks and were called the Harvest Holidays as the children either helped with the harvest or carried food and drink to their parents, who were working in the fields. There were more half-day and whole day holidays for special events. Half a day would be given after the annual H.M.I. or Diocesan inspections and there were holidays for school treats, choir outings, chapel teas, Christmas parties and at times when the school was needed for other purposes.

There were also many unauthorised absences. These would be for seasonal work, such as haymaking (June) and early or late harvest (July or September), being kept at home to help their parents, and working when they should have been at school. Bad weather such as heavy rain, cold weather, or snow kept children away from school, often because their parents couldn’t afford to buy them suitable clothes. Apart from the usual colds and coughs there were more serious illnesses than today and these included, mumps, measles, whooping cough, scarletina and diphtheria.

The elementary subjects were the ‘3 Rs’ – reading writing and arithmetic. Scripture was often taught by the vicar and children would have attended church for services on some days. Older children were taught history and geography and there may have been some study of natural history. Singing was taught to all ages and all the girls and some of the boys would have done needlework.

In 1868 support came from subscriptions, payments from the children and from the incumbent rector; 13 boys and 17 girls were pupils at that date with Mrs Ann Helps as Schoolmistress. Attendance appears to have dropped subsequently and the school closed c.1871. By 1875 the children of Charlton were attending the National School in Rushall.