SCHOOLS 



ing example of ' co-education ' as a mixed grammar school for boys and 

 girls under the tuition of Mr. Vann and an assistant mistress. They 

 number at present 19 boys and 19 girls. 



FOTHERINGHAY GRAMMAR SCHOOL 



The school of Fotheringhay, which now only lingers on in the 

 shape of a small yearly payment applied in aid of elementary educa- 

 tion, is said in the official reports' to be of unknown origin. 



Its origin, however, is undoubtedly to be found ^ in the splendid 

 collegiate church which stood near the great castle of Fotheringhay, 

 the chief seat of the dukes of York before they ascended the throne. 

 Projected by Edmund of Langley, fifth son of Edward III, who after 

 a great victory in the Spanish war was created duke of York in 1385; 

 begun by Edward, the duke of York who perished leading the van of 

 the army at Agincourt, and who obtained patents for the foundation and 

 endowment from Henry IV in 141 2 and from Henry V in 141 5; and 

 completed by Richard, duke of York, whose head was crowned in 

 mockery after the battle of Wakefield ; it was augmented by Edward IV, 

 who ' translated' his father's body there in 1466. 



A grammar school was, as usual, an integral part of the college, 

 which consisted of a master and eleven fellows with eight clerks and 

 thirteen choristers. The grammar master was to be a fellow and not 

 merely an officer of the college.' 



The accounts of the college for two of its last years preserved 

 among the chantry certificates* make no specific mention of a gram- 

 mar school, but only of a song or choristers' school, Thomas Top- 

 cliffis receiving a fee of ^^ a year with ioj. for taking care {tuicione) 

 of the choristers, while Richard Beall, one of the clerks, received 

 ^(^4, of which 20s. was for teaching [informacione) the choristers sing- 

 ing. The grammar school master being one of the fellows is not 

 separately mentioned. The chantry certificate for the college under 

 Oundle ^ says that ' there has been a free school kept in Fotheringhay, 

 which is now dissolved ; it were therefore expedient that there were 

 a new erected in this town of Oundle, the same being within 3 miles 

 of Fotheringhay.' But the college having been dissolved, apparently 

 under Henry VIII's Chantries Act, Fotheringhay School is not in- 

 cluded in the schools continued in the warrant of continuance for the 

 county under Edward VI's Chantries Act, though Oundle School was. 

 But there must have been some similar warrant for Fotheringhay, since 



1 C.C.R. xxiv, 204. 



'In 167; Mr. Phillips, the king's auditor, writing to Mr. Jonathan Welby, then vicar and 

 schoolmaster, said : ' No doubt it is very ancient, and probably as ancient as the college of Fother- 

 ingay, and had the same Founder ' {Topogr. Brit. No. 40, p. 99). 



^ P. R. O. Aug. Off. Misc. Books, 147. The song schoolmaster was not a fellow. 



* English Schools at the Reformation, 153-4, from P.R.O. Chantry Certificates, 99 and 93, the former 

 being the account of John Russell, master of the college for the years I 544-5, and the latter the account 

 of his executors for 1546-7. See also Aug. Off. Misc. Books, 146 



^ The entry. Certificate 35, No. 40, was unfortunately omitted from Enghsh Schools at the Refor- 

 mation, which purported to contain all the entries as to schools in the chantr)- certificates. 



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