A HISTORY OF GLOUCESTERSHIRE 



School (though fit for all the purposes of the Hospital) are not large enough to secure and 

 entertain many of the citizens' children, whose parents would choose to have them brought 

 up and educated under their own view and inspection rather than at distant schools, and the 

 buildings near College Green now employed for the said Hospital will better accommodate 

 more than twice the number of young gentlemen than the present Grammar School. 



The buildings of Queen Elizabeth's Hospital were the old St. Mark's or 

 Billeswick, otherwise Gaunt's Hospital. But as the gift of them to Queen 

 Elizabeth's Hospital by the corporation had been confirmed by Act of Par- 

 liament, another Act was thought necessary to effect the exchange, and a 

 Private Act of 9 George III was accordingly obtained for the purpose. A 

 great deal of abuse has been hurled by some local historians 1 at the corporation 

 for this act, and it has been imputed to merely personal motives, the head 

 master Lee having married one Alderman Dampier's daughter. But it would 

 be odd if an alderman was able to make a whole corporation carry out such a 

 transaction merely for the private benefit of his son-in-law ; and the fact is 

 that Lee did not become Dampier's son-in-law until nearly two years after 

 the council had determined on the exchange. It was, in fact, merely a case 

 of suiting the long coat to the tall boy and the short coat to the small boy : 

 giving the larger building to the school of over 100 boys of 13 to 19 years 

 old, and the smaller to a merely charity school of 36 boys under 14. It 

 was, however, a misfortune for the Grammar School, as it postponed the 

 time for the provision of proper buildings long after Queen Elizabeth's 

 Hospital was given new and palatial accommodation. 



It is represented that the exchange of buildings took place before the 

 Act was passed. But it seems to be doubtful whether this is not founded 

 only on the fact that money was entered in the chamberlain's account for 

 17678, rendered, as usual, some time after the event. 



The school is said to have prospered exceedingly under Lee at first. 

 But, as usual with all public schools in the eighteenth century, he was allowed 

 to stay on long after he had passed his zenith. He held the head-mastership 

 for no less than 48 years, till his death in 1811. The result was that for 

 several years it is said that the school consisted of one boy. In 1803 a com- 

 mittee of Old Boys called the attention of the council to the condition of the 

 school. But the council refused to grant a retiring pension, and so Lee was 

 allowed to stay on till he dropped. 



On the appointment of his successor, John Joseph Goodenough, in March, 

 1812, the school orders were revised, chiefly by raising the entrance fee from 

 5-r. to 4, while he was allowed to charge 16 i6s. a year for instruction in 

 all subjects but Latin and Greek, which alone, according to the convenient 

 doctrine of the Court of Chancery, were free. The Commissioners of Inquiry 

 concerning charities in 1822* found a school of only 50 boys, 35 boarders and 

 1 5 day boys. Four or five boys were ' on the foundation, there not having 

 been more than ten for many years. They rather absurdly represented the 

 admission fee as illegal, and it was reduced again to 5J., though as far as the 

 Foundation deed went that was equally illegal, the sum mentioned by Robert 

 Thorne being 4^. Dr. Goodenough was allowed, in 1820, to take a living 

 in Buckinghamshire. In his later years the school sank almost to nothing. 



1 J. Latimer, Annals of Bristol, 1 8th cent. 375. He falls into the error of supposing that the Grammar 

 School was then a day school. ' Char. Com. Rep. vi, 481. 



