28 April 2022

In search of some of
the lost schoolhouses
of Stony Stratford

The former ‘British School’ on the corner of High Street and Wolverton Road (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Patrick Comerford

As I continue to enjoy the architectural heritage of Stony Stratford, I have written in recent weeks about two former schools in this town on the edges of Milton Keynes: Saint Paul’s School, now Saint Paul’s Court, on High Street, and the school on the corner of Wolverton Road and London Road which was once associated with Wolverton Saint Mary’s – it was designed by the local architect Edward Swinfen Harris and now the Old School House public house.

But Stony Stratford has many other former school buildings that are of architectural and historical interest.

The former ‘British School’ on the corner of High Street and Wolverton Road is now a public hall. The school was founded in 1844 for girls and boys who were not allowed to enter Church of England schools.

It is built in yellow brick and has an interesting composition, with its double entrance doors – presumably for boys and girls – with their fanlights in stilted arches, its curved corner and return.

This two-storey, three-bay building has a centre with a pediment on wide piers, a tympanum that is flush with the piers, and a blind circular panel with the legend ‘British School 1844.’

The central window on the ground floor may have been inserted at a later date.

The curved corner once the ticket office for local steam trams.

The school closed in 1907, and this landmark building in the heart of Stony Statford is now a public hall and a dance studio.

The former Dame School House at No 103 High Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

At the other end of High Street, the former Dame School House is at No 103. This is now a private, family home. When it was on the market recently, the estate agents described it as ‘a Grade II listed Georgian house,’ although a plaque on the house dates the school to ca 1650.

The house retains many of its original features, including fireplaces and exposed wall and ceiling beams, a steep early tiled roof, and hipped dormers with sash windows. The six-panel front door is set in a Regency doorway with a reeded surround.

The former Rose and Crown on High Street was a grammar school in the early 17th century (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

A much earlier school on High Street dated from In 1609, Michael Hipwell, an innkeeper, left a bequest in the income from his properties to ‘keep a Free Grammar School in the back’ of his inn, then the Rose and Crown and now Nos 26 and 28 High Street.

Inside, these houses are said to retain some good late 16th century features, including stone fireplaces, moulded jambs and Tudor mouldings on a doorway. in next room. This building is the reputed site of Edward V’s arrest in 1483.

The former school premises or ‘ladies’ seminaries’ in the Market Square (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Stony Stratford had three schools in the Market Square in the 1830s, including a ‘ladies’ seminary’ in a corner house that has since been demolished, and a second ‘ladies’ seminary’ run by the sisters Miss May Linnel and Miss Helen Linnel.

Later in the mid-19th century Elizabeth Baxter, Mary Linnel and a Miss Chibnall ran schools in the square, and Robert Bell ran a boys’ boarding school – all probably housed at different times in the 19th century in the building now known as Market House.

A ‘ladies’ seminary’ was run by the Banks family at Woollard House on Church Street in the 1860s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

In the 1860s, another ‘ladies’ seminary’ seems to have been run by a Mrs Banks and her daughter at the home of ‘Mr Woollard the Tanner’ on Church Street.

The former York House School, on the corner of York Street and High Street, now the Conservative Club (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

York House, on the corner of York Street and High Street, was a private school from 1853 or earlier. When the school moved to London Road around 1902, it took its name with it, and was known as York House School.

York House School was run by a Mrs Slade and her two daughters until they retired in 1933.

The former school premises on London Road is now the York House Centre with community facilities, while the former school premises on High Street is now the Conservative Club.

The former York House School, now the York House Centre on London Road (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2022)

Praying with the Psalms in Easter:
28 April 2022 (Psalm 64)

‘Hide me from the secret plots of the wicked … who whet their tongues like swords, who aim bitter words like arrows, shooting from ambush at the blameless’ (Psalm 64: 2-4) … a fresco in a church in Georgioupoli in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

During this season of Easter, I am reflecting each morning on the Psalms, and in this Prayer Diary on my blog each morning I am reflecting in these ways:

1, Short reflections on a psalm or psalms;

2, reading the psalm or psalms;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Psalm 64:

Psalm 64 may be treated as a prayer for deliverance from enemies, or as a thanksgiving, or a testimony to divine judgment. In the slightly different numbering in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate, this psalm is counted as Psalm 63.

Psalm 64 is directed against the ‘wicked’ (רעע‎) and ‘workers of iniquity’ (פֹּעֲלֵי אָֽוֶן‎), whom God shall shoot with an arrow (וַיֹּרֵם אֱלֹהִים חֵץ‎).

The psalm is divided into either 10 or 11 verses, depending on whether the introductory לַמְנַצֵּחַ מִזְמֹור לְדָוִֽד‎ ‘To the leader’ or ‘To the chief Musician (נצח‎), A Psalm of David’ is counted as a separate verse.

In verse 4, the wicked shoot arrows secretly at the righteous.

In verse 7, God shoots an arrow (arrows, plural, in some translations) at the wicked, but for some these will be saving arrows, as in verse 9: all will ‘will tell what God has brought about, and ponder what he has done.’

The arrow of God leads to a turning to God.

Verses 6-7 have been the subject of confusion in early Bible translations. The Authorised or King James Version translates these verses Hebrew as: ‘They search out iniquities; they accomplish a diligent search: both the inward thought of every one of them, and the heart, is deep. But God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly shall they be wounded.’

But in the Vulgate, Jerome, based on the Septuagint text, rendered this as: Scrutati sunt iniquitates; defecerunt scrutantes scrutinio. Accedet homo ad cor altum, et exaltabitur Deus. Sagittæ parvulorum factæ sunt plagæ eorum. This translates to ‘They have searched after iniquities: they have failed in their search. Man shall accede to a lofty heart: And God shall be exalted. The arrows of children are their wounds.’

The adjective altum in Latin has both the meanings ‘high’ and ‘deep,’ and it is here used to translate the Septuagint Greek work βαθεῖα, ‘deep,’ but it offered itself to an interpretation of an ‘exalted heart.’

The ‘arrows of children’ (Sagittæ parvulum) render the Septuagint Greek words βέλος νηπίων, although these words have no correspondence in the Hebrew text as it has been received.

They ‘whet their tongues like swords’ (Psalm 64: 3) … a ceremonial sword and mace in Kilkenny (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Psalm 64 (NRSVA):

To the leader. A Psalm of David..

1 Hear my voice, O God, in my complaint;
preserve my life from the dread enemy.
2 Hide me from the secret plots of the wicked,
from the scheming of evildoers,
3 who whet their tongues like swords,
who aim bitter words like arrows,
4 shooting from ambush at the blameless;
they shoot suddenly and without fear.
5 They hold fast to their evil purpose;
they talk of laying snares secretly,
thinking, ‘Who can see us?
6 Who can search out our crimes?
We have thought out a cunningly conceived plot.’
For the human heart and mind are deep.

7 But God will shoot his arrow at them;
they will be wounded suddenly.
8 Because of their tongue he will bring them to ruin;
all who see them will shake with horror.
9 Then everyone will fear;
they will tell what God has brought about,
and ponder what he has done.

10 Let the righteous rejoice in the Lord
and take refuge in him.
Let all the upright in heart glory.

Today’s Prayer:

The theme in this week’s prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) is ‘Logging in the Solomon Islands,’ and was introduced on Sunday morning by Brother Christopher John SSF, Minister General of the Society of Saint Francis.

The USPG Prayer Diary this morning (28 April 2022) invites us to pray:

We pray for those working to prevent deforestation in the Solomon Islands.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org