Plymouth Grammar School, sometimes called Plymouth Corporation Grammar School, was a grammar school in Plymouth, England.
The school was closed in 1937.
History Founded or refounded in 1562, one source states that the school was established by the Corporation of Plymouth in the reign of King Henry VII, paying the schoolmaster £10 a year and providing rooms over an ancient chapel. Nicholas Carlisle, A Concise Description of the Endowed Grammar Schools in England and Wales (London: Baldwin, Cradock and Joy, 1818), p. 335 A late 16th-century pupil was Martin Blake, who was believed to be a grandson of William Blake, one of the school's founders.John Frederick Chanter, The Life and Times of Martin Blake, BD (1593-1673), Vicar of Barnstaple and Prebendary of Exeter Cathedral, with some account of his conflicts with the Puritan lecturers and persecutions (London, 1910), p. 7
A report of 1841 notes the existence of letters patent of Elizabeth I in the 15th year of her reign, confirmed by letters patent of Charles II and an Act of Parliament in the same year."Plymouth – Grammar School" in Digest of the Reports Made by the Commissioners of Inquiry into Charities (W. Clowes, 1841), p 88
The heyday of the school was under the master John Bidlake (1755–1814), an old boy of the school who was an author and artist as well as a schoolmaster. At the school he taught at least four boys who went on to become notable artists, Benjamin Haydon,Clarke Olney, Benjamin Robert Haydon, Historical Painter (University of Georgia Press, 1952), p. 6 Samuel Prout,John Ruskin, ed. Sir Edward Tyas Cook, The Works of John Ruskin, Vol. 12, p. 308Richard Lockett, Samuel Prout (1783-1852) Batsford, 1985, ), p. 23 Philip Hutchins Rogers, and Charles Lock Eastlake, and also Nathaniel Howard, later a classical and Persian scholar who translated Dante,Werner Paul Friederich, Dante's Fame abroad, 1350-1850: the influence of Dante on poets and scholars (Rome, 1950) p. 280 and the electrician William Snow Harris."Harris, Sir William Snow" in Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition (Cambridge University Press, 1911), at Wikisource
There was a charitable trust founded in 1732 by the will of a Plymouth apothecary, Henry Kelway, which was to educate and clothe as many boys born in Plymouth or Saltash as the funds would stretch to, with preference for Kelway's own descendants, and if possible to send them on to Oxford to be prepared for holy orders, which by 1818 occasionally happened. The trust funds left by Kelway then amounted to £4,860, invested in Bank Stock, .
In 1821, the school was called a charitable institution and its buildings were in St Catherine's Street, Plymouth. They consisted of a school-room, described as a narrow, gloomy apartment with "forms for seven classes", and a house and garden for the master, the Rev. W. Williams, together with a boys' play ground, all next to the school-room."Charitable Institutions...The Grammar School" in Samuel Rowe, The Panorama of Plymouth (Plymouth: Rowes, Whimple Street, 1821), tree id=1ZJYAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA21 pp. 21–22
In 1867, the school was teaching 45 boys, of whom ten were foundationers, paying two guineas a year to be taught Classics and English, the rest paying £9 a year for Classics, English, French, German, and other subjects. The Master was the Rev. W. Harpley, MA.Herbert Fry, Our Schools and Colleges (1867), p. 140
Originally for boys only, in the twentieth century the school began to admit girls, becoming coeducational. Its last headmaster, Frank Sandon, commented in 1950 on the closure of the school in 1937: "Unfortunately, the Plymouth City Council did not believe in co-education and I did, and... my school was closed."Frank Sandon, "A secondary technical school in a remote area", in The Vocational Aspect of Secondary and Further Education, 2:5 (1950), 185-201
Notable former pupils John Bidlake (1755–1814), author, artist, and schoolmaster Sir George Birdwood (1832–1917), Indian civil servant and naturalist"Birdwood, Sir George Christopher Molesworth" in Encyclopædia Britannica (12th edition, 1922), Vol. 30 pp. 456, 457 Octavian Blewitt (1810–1884), author Guise Brittan (1809–1876), Commissioner of Crown Lands, New ZealandMichael Blain, "The Canterbury Association (1848–1852): A Study of Its Members' Connections" (Christchurch, NZ: Project Canterbury, 2007), p. 18 Charles Lock Eastlake (1793–1865), painter J. Rendel Harris (1852–1941), biblical scholar and curator of manuscripts"Harris, James Rendel", cam.ac.uk, accessed 6 October 2023 William Snow Harris (1791–1867), electrician Benjamin Haydon (1786–1846), painter Nathaniel Howard, classical and Persian scholar Collingwood Hughes (1872–1963), Conservative politician"Obituary: Mr. Collingwood Hughes Former Conservative M.P. For Peckham", The Times, 30 March 1963, p. 10 Samuel Prout (1783–1852), watercolour painter Philip Hutchins Rogers (1794–1853), painter Sir John Snell (1859–1938), electrical engineerH. M. Ross, "Snell, Sir John Francis Cleverton" in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography online edition by Oxford University Press, 2004 Bertram Steele (1870–1934), scientist, first professor of chemistry at the University of QueenslandBarry Chiswell, "Steele, Bertram Dillon (1870–1934)" in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 12 (1990), pp. 60–61 Sydney Thelwall (1834—1922), clergymanJohn Peile, John Archibald Venn, Biographical Register of Christ's College, 1505-1905, Vol. 2 (1913), p. 559 Robert Walling (1895–1976), soldier, journalist, and poet
Further reading Charles William Bracken, The Plymouth Grammar School (Devonshire Association, 1945) Notes