SCHOOLS 



nors appear to have used the school as a Sunday 



school, as under the next master, John Atkinson, 

 B.A., it was resolved in 1796 ' that the Sunday 

 School which has been kept there be removed.' 

 In 1802, on Atkinson's death, his post was ad- 

 vertised as worth ^^90 a year. The Rev. John 

 Wilson was appointed, and in 1808 the salary 

 was raised to {,120 and the head master was 

 given sole charge of the school, with the usher 

 under him, and a French master to attend three 

 days a week. But the freedom of the school 

 was insisted on, while the pay of the masters was 



" not raised proportionately. We thus find a 

 constant succession of new masters, the Revs. 



. Henry Johnson ( 1 8 1 3), Robert Heath ( 1 8 1 3- 1 6), 

 William Allen (1816-21), and John Stoddart 

 (182 1-3), following one another at short intervals. 

 William Allen, indeed, was an absentee, living 

 at the Old Hall, Peel, and his successor, accord- 

 ing to the usher Lowthcr Guisdale, planted all 

 the care of the school on him. In 1823 

 Lowther Guisdale, usher since 181 1, was pro- 

 moted to the head-mastership and held office for 

 seventeen years. At the visit of the commis- 

 sioners of inquiry* in 1828 the school was in 

 decay. There were only three masters, the head 

 master receiving £160, the usher £100, and 

 the writing master £jSi ^""^ ^^^ head master 

 and usher eked out their incomes by clerical 

 duty. Thirty boys alone were learning classics, 

 the French master had been discontinued, and 

 there had been no Speech Day since 1824. 



In 1829 the school received a new endowment 

 in the Popplewell exhibitions, founded by ' John 

 Popplewell, a native of this town, but late of 

 Woodford in Essex.' This endowment was 

 increased by his two sisters, Ann and Rebecca 

 Popplewell, in 1831. The trusts were for 

 university exhibitions at Oxford or Cambridge, 

 and might have been of great benefit to the 

 school if they had been less restricted by con- 

 ditions. The exhibitions were confined to boys 

 who had been three years in the school, ' whose 

 parents if living should have resided at least three 

 years in the parish of Bolton,' which formed a 

 small part of the borough, ' and who proposed to 

 take a degree ... in either divinity or law or 

 physics . . . and were members of the church 

 of England.' This last restriction, in a place 

 which had for centuries been a stronghold of 

 Nonconformity, and in which the great majority 

 of the better class were Nonconformists, proved 

 especially harmful. Only seven boys enjoyed 

 the benefit of the fund, which produced ;£i20 a 

 year in the forty years from 1842 to 1882. 



An opportunity was offered in 1878, when a 

 new scheme was proposed, of removing these 

 cramping and out-of-date restrictions, but the 

 four governors refused to avail themselves 

 of it. 



CAar. Com. Ref. xix, 155. 



In 1844 the Rev. Wentworth Bird and the 

 Rev. Thomas Ireland, usher, both resigned in con- 

 sequence of the examiner's report. From 1844 

 to 1882 under the Rev. Diston Stanley Hodgson 

 the school was in a somewhat moribund con- 

 dition. The governors had made new rules in 

 1858 restricting the number of boys to 80, of 

 whom 36 were free boys, and of boarders to four, 

 and requiring strict observance of Church of 

 England demands, including attendance at church 

 on week days in Lent. This innovation was 

 not authorized by anything in the original 

 foundation. Curiously enough, in 1848, a 

 proprietary school, called the Church of Eng- 

 land Educational Institution, but enforcing no 

 dogmas or attendances at church, had been 

 opened. Being on a better site and in new and 

 ampler buildings, it for some years entirely 

 eclipsed the ancient foundation, all the ' best 

 people,' Dissenters as well as Churchmen, send- 

 ing their children there, because it was more 

 select, owing to the absence of free boys. 

 The grammar school site, buildings, rules and 

 education were strongly condemned by Mr. 

 James Bryce in his visit for the Schools Inquiry 

 Commission in 1865. There were only 25 

 boys in the upper school, and of these 1 5 alone 

 learnt Latin, and the lower school was practically 

 elementary. 



Efforts were made by the Charity Com- 

 missioners in 1878 to improve matters by a 

 scheme under the Endowed Schools Acts, but 

 owing to the governors' opposition to the elimi- 

 nation of the religious disabilities and other pro- 

 visions it was not approved by Queen Victoria 

 in Council till 29 June, 1882. Mr. Hodgson 

 resigned in 1878, and the school was wholly 

 closed in 1880. The old corporation of self- 

 elective governors was dissolved, and a new 

 governing body provided for, including four 

 representatives of the town council and school 

 board. But at first it was dominated by the old 

 governors. Instead of moving the school to an 

 adequate site they merely replaced the old build- 

 ings by new ones at a cost of ^{^4,000. The 

 school was reopened in September, 1883, under 

 the Rev. J. E. Hewison, M.A., of St. John's 

 College, Cambridge. But it was never a suc- 

 cess. In 1889 there were only 39 boys, though 

 the population was now 115,000. In 1892 a 

 visit by Mr. A. F. Leach as assistant commis- 

 sioner resulted in a new scheme, a new master, 

 the bringing in of new endowment from Na- 

 thaniel Hutton's Charity, the removal of the 

 school to a new and ample site and the acquisition 

 of new buildings. 



The new scheme became law 3 March, 1894. 

 Representatives of the Lancashire County 

 Council and the Hutton Charity Trustees 

 were introduced on the governing body. 

 The reorganization of the Hutton Charity, 

 founded (4 February, 1691) by Nathaniel Hutton, 



599 



