SCHOOLS 



ampton ; but the two last-named bodies appoint governors only while 

 they contribute not less than jC4°° ^ y^^'' ^o the school. Considerable 

 additions have been made to the school buildings in Abington Square, a 

 sum of ^4,000 having been given by the town council. The fees are 

 uniformly six guineas a year throughout the school. With these advan- 

 tages the school was in 1901 in a flourishing condition with 167 boys 

 in it, almost the same number that there were in the grammar school in 

 1888. The head master since September, 1894, is Mr. R. Elliot Steel, 

 who was a Manchester Grammar School boy, a Demy of Magdalen 

 College, Oxford, where he gained a first class in the natural science 

 school in chemistry and physics. Besides being head master of the day 

 school he is also principal of the technical school, which mainly con- 

 sists of evening classes with about 800 students of both sexes. 



OUNDLE GRAMMAR SCHOOL 



Oundle School is at the present moment the largest and best equipped 

 school in Northamptonshire, while its history is far better preserved than 

 that of any of the other schools in the county. The foundation has 

 hitherto been usually attributed to Sir William Laxton, Kt. and alder- 

 man, grocer of the city of London, in 1556. It has, however, already 

 been shown by the present writer ^ that there was a grammar school and 

 grammar-school master at Oundle before 1 548, and that the master was 

 continued when the chantry which supported him was abolished. The 

 finding ^ of the commissioners under the Chantries Act of Henry VIII, 

 made between February and July, 1 546, mentions only that the gild of 

 Our Lady was founded to support a priest or priests at the pleasure of 

 the aldermen and brethren of the gild for four yearly obits and doles 

 to the poor. The certificate of the commissioners of Edward VI clearly 

 shows the school, for after saying that the gild was founded by 

 Joan Wyat to find two priests, it gives one of them, ' William lerland of 

 the age of Ixxviij yeres and hathe byn a teacher there xl yeres, and hathe 

 no other lyving, ^5 ^j. 8^/.,' and continues : — 



And forasmuche as there hathe byne a free schole kepte in Fotheringhey, whiche 

 is nowe dissolved, yt were therefore expedient that there were a new erectyd in this 

 towne of Oundell, th same being within iij miles of Fotheringhey. Also ther ys one 

 house callyd the Guilde howse worth by yere to be lett xii^, under whiche there is 

 inhabiting vij pore wydows rent free, the upper parte of whiche house ys very mete 

 for a scole.* 



When Mrs. Jane Wyat founded the gild which maintained school 

 and almshouse has not yet been discovered. As the schoolmaster, 

 William lerland, had taught there for forty years it was founded before 

 the reign of Henry VIII. A lady of this name * was granted the 

 presentation to the church of Cressingham in Norfolk in the first year 



' EngRsh Schools at the Reformation, p. 153 (i 896). 



' Chant. Cert. No. 36, item 6. The sums of money are written in the original in Rom.in 

 numerals. 



' Chant. Cert. No. 35, item 40. * P.R.O. MS. Cal. of Pat. Rolls, Hen. VII. 



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