A HISTORY OF NOTTINGHAMSHIRE 



school, being intended to give practical as well 

 as theoretical instruction in handicrafts to girls 

 as well as boys, and to prepare them for learning 

 a trade. It was founded out of Brunts' Charity 

 by a scheme of the Charity Commissioners under 

 the Endowed Schools Acts, which received the 

 royal approval 26 September 1891. 



Samuel Brunts, who was a Unitarian, by his 

 will, 31 January 1709, after a gift to the Uni- 

 tarian minister, gave 2 a year for a bread dole 

 for the poor, and 8 for the following uses, viz. : 

 ' 4 a year for putting forth apprentice such a 

 poor boy born within the parish of Mansfield, of 

 honest parents, as his trustees should think meet, 

 and 4 for the putting to school poor boys of 

 honest parents, so as to make them fit for honest 

 trades.' The residue was to go to poor people 

 who ' received no alms from any public stock.' 

 The endowment consisted of about 375 acres of 

 land in Mansfield and 17 acres in Nottingham. 

 Thanks to the growth of Nottingham the endow- 

 ment had by 1891 risen in value to 3,800 a 

 year, of which 2,900 came from the Notting- 

 hamshire property, and was expected to rise and 

 has risen by about 1,000 a year more. This 

 whole residuary income, after providing for re- 

 buildings and expenses of management, was to 

 be applied in pensions of 4 a year apiece, to 

 over 400 persons. The apprenticeship share was 

 still represented by casual payments of only 4 

 a year. The payment for schooling, also only 

 4 a year, was made to the master of Thomp- 

 son's School, a small elementary school founded 

 by Charles Thompson by will of 4 December 

 1784, with an endowment of about 100 a year. 



The scheme of 1891 merged the endowment 

 of Thompson's School with Brunts' and provided 

 for the establishment on Brunts' Close, Wood- 

 house Road, of a technical school for boys and 

 girls. Buildings were to be provided at a cost of 

 5,000, and the school was to be endowed with 

 750 a year out of Brunts' Charity till 1902, 

 and thenceforth with 1,000 a year. The 

 tuition fees were to be not less than 6d., nor more 

 than is. a week. This school was built at a cost 

 of 6,000 by Messrs. Evans & Jolly, architects. 

 It was opened in 1894 under Mr. Charles 

 Stacey, B.Sc., of London University. It has 

 260 scholars, about equally divided between the 

 sexes. 



THE GIRLS' GRAMMAR SCHOOL 



This school was opened in temporary hired 

 buildings in January 1885 under Miss Crossland. 

 In 1889 there were 81 girls in the school. It 

 was intended that the greater part of the endow- 

 ment should be provided out of the endowment 

 of the Eight Men's Intake, but owing to techni- 

 cal difficulties and opposition eventually only 

 one-sixth of that income, about 45 a year, was 

 applied to this school, by a scheme under the 



Charitable Trusts Acts, the rest being with 

 questionable propriety in view of its history, as 

 above stated applied for the benefit of the vicar, 

 the hospital, and other non-educational objects. 

 In 1891 a piece of land belonging to Brunts' 

 Charity in Woodhouse Road was assigned for 

 the site of the school, and new buildings were 

 erected on it at a cost of over 5,000. On 

 Miss Crossland's retirement, Miss. M. Macrae 

 was appointed head mistress. In 1899 there 

 were 170 girls in the school. A Portland scholar- 

 ship of 20 a year has been founded by the 

 Duke of Portland. The school is under the 

 governors of the grammar school, with three 

 ladies added. There are now 180 girls paying 

 tuition fees of 8 a year. The school shares, as 

 already shown, in the Clerkson Exhibitions. 



TUXFORD GRAMMAR SCHOOL 



This school owes its existence to Charles 

 Read, who in less propitious times, with smaller 

 means and less adaptation of means to ends, 

 emulated the achievements of the first Protestant 

 Archbishop of York, Robert Holgate, in found- 

 ing no less than three free grammar schools. 

 While Holgate confined his benefactions to 

 his native county of York, Read divided his 

 between the three counties of York, Lincoln, 

 and Nottingham, at Drax, Corby, and Tuxford. 

 All these foundations were on the same lines, 

 and all were failures as grammar or secondary 

 schools, Tuxford perhaps most so of all. Drax 

 School at least had a fair endowment in land, 

 and aimed at Greek and Hebrew as well as 

 Latin. But Corby and Tuxford not only re- 

 ceived a smaller endowment than Drax originally, 

 the master having 30 a year at Drax and 20 

 a year at the other two places, but suffered still 

 further and more acutely through the fatal mis- 

 take of having been given a fixed rent-charge 

 instead of lands to produce the same amount. By 

 his will 30 July 1 669, 1 proved 27 June 1671, 

 Charles Read devised to his executors and their 

 heirs a rent-charge of 97 io*. io\d, a year 

 arising out of the manor of Folkingham, Lin- 

 colnshire, and directed them to convey half of it to 

 ' six able freeholders, or others, men of integrity 

 and estate, of the parish of Tuxford ' in trust to pay 

 20 thereof yearly to a schoolmaster, who should 

 instruct the children of the inhabitants for the 

 time being in reading, writing, and casting 

 accounts, and in Latin as occasion should require, 

 in a free grammar school to be erected and 

 established after his death in the said parish for 

 that purpose ; also on trust to pay 5 apiece 

 to four poor boys, sons of widows of ministers 

 and decayed gentlemen and their widows, who 



1 Char. Com. Rep. xxxii, pt. iv, 327, where the will 

 is set out under Corby; and pt. ii, 650, where the 

 account of Tuxford School is given. 



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