Early Schools Stockton

The earliest reference to education in Stockton goes back as far as 1387 and 1391 when two men from Stockton were summoned to attend the manorial court. They were charged with sending their sons to school probably in Salisbury at a time when the lord of the manor would have expected the boys to be at home working on their fathers' rsquo farms. In 1410 there was a John Schoolmaster apparently living in Stockton presumably he took his surname from his occupation. In the early 17th century a school was held in Stockton by Thomas Crockford vicar of Fisherton de la Mere. He claimed to have held the school for 14 years from 1602 and to have lived with the rector for five or six of those years. The next reference is in 1808 when there were three schools in the village each teaching eight young children. In 1818 there were two schools and the number of pupils had risen to 34. In 1833 the education of more than half the children was paid for by the wives of the rector and the lord of the manor. In 1859 a report written by the Rev. Warburton an Inspector of Schools stated rsquo 25-30 children mixed are taught by a respectable middle-aged mistress in two warm and comfortable but rather low and ill-lighted rooms in a cottage one window of which looks into the grounds of the park and the others into the village street. The subjects of instruction are reading spelling writing and arithmetic with needlework. The school is said to be a good one of its kindrsquo.

There was also a second school in the village where ten children were taught reading and needlework by a dame who was a dissenter.