Bromsgrove town centre hides a big surprise – all 100 acres of Bromsgrove School, discovers Richard Peach.
For a visitor walking around Bromsgrove, it can sometimes feel like a large chunk of the town centre has disappeared into another dimension . . . the place really should be much bigger than it is.
Head south from the high street and suddenly there’s just one road where you might expect many. What’s happened to all that land between Worcester Road and the bypass to the east?
And while you don’t need the services of Dr Who’s Tardis to find the answer, it is still quite an eye-opener to discover Bromsgrove’s “hidden world”.
Climb the steps into the grounds of Bromsgrove School, past the Thomas Cookes building overlooking Worcester Road, and you really are entering another place; a whole dimension of the town opens out and spreads before your eyes for nigh on 100 tranquil acres.
The building you have just passed was the first on this site, albeit a storey shorter, in 1695 and was the original schoolhouse of the “New School” of Bromsgrove, re-founded by Sir Thomas Cookes in 1693 (see below for an unlikely tale as to his motives for saving the school).
Before this, the school had existed for around 200 years in a number of locations around the town, but from this firm base, the school grounds expanded to become the tree-lined vista they are today.
As it grew in area, the school also grew physically with the addition of buildings, from the traditional Kyteless – with an Elizabethan feel (although it was begun in 1913) – through to the very modern buildings of the past decade, such as the Humanities building.
In fact, £20 million has been spent on the school in the past 10 years.
On one side of the enormous quadrangle, next to the Kyteless building, is the Memorial Chapel (both pictured above), the inspiration of one of Bromsgrove School’s most inspirational headmasters, RG Routh.
Opened in 1931 as a memorial to those pupils who had fallen in the First World War, it was designed by architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, who also designed Battersea Power Station and the Anglican cathedral in Liverpool.
Bromsgrove School has also grown significantly in numbers from the original 12 foundation boys paid for by Sir Thomas Cookes’ endowment, particularly since the end of the Second World War.
Even war and the commandeering of the school buildings by the Tank Board, India Office and Ministry of Supply for four years could not stifle the school which, on September 7 1939, set about moving to Llanwrtyd Wells – with everything in place in a variety of buildings ready for the boys’ arrival three weeks later.
About 240 boys arrived, although the figure had dwindled to 200 by September 1941, but by September 1943, the school was home again after a four-year exile.
The numbers have risen ever since to their current total of around 1,300 in the Bromsgrove “system” , around 200 of whom are from 27 countries other than Britain.
Of the 1,300 pupils, about 750 are in the Senior School and about 450 in the Preparatory School, with 210-220 in the Pre-Preparatory and Nursery School.
John Rogers, Foundation Director at the school, says: “We are probably the largest employer in Bromsgrove, with about 420 people.”
He believes this is a mantle that has come to the school since the closure of Garringtons and the contracting out of various services by the district council.
Sir Thomas Cookes would be surprised indeed if he could have foreseen the school he saved growing to have such an influence over Bromsgrove and carrying the town’s name around the world.
As the current Headmaster, Chris Edwards, says: “We are inspired, not overwhelmed, by a noble history.”
Ripping yarn behind act of generosity
The saviour of Bromsgrove School, Sir Thomas Cookes, was a baronet from Tardebigge, whose generosity towards the end of the 17th century laid the foundations for the school we see today.
Sir Thomas was married to Lady Mary, the only daughter of Lord Windsor of Hewell Grange – the “stately home” of this area, now a prison.
No one knows what inspired Sir Thomas to come to the rescue of the school, but there is a tale which, while far-fetched, continues to be retold because of a very unusual carving that is still displayed prominently in St Bartholomew’s Church, Tardebigge.
The story, very briefly, tells how Sir Thomas bet a dinner guest that he would not enjoy finer service anywhere else. Unfortunately, his butler forgot to set out the mustard and so Sir Thomas hurled his carving knife at him, felling the poor man and killing him.
For this, he was sentenced to Trial by Ordeal; in his case starvation was fitting to the crime. Yet, so the story goes, he survived because his wife fed him from her breast during frequent visits to his cell.
He was eventually released thanks to a deal with the Bishop of Worcester in which Sir Thomas agreed to endow handsomely the failing little grammar school at Bromsgrove.
Such tall tales were common in those times, but this one has survived for so long because of a memorial carving to Sir Thomas and Lady Mary in Tardebigge church.
Not only does the monument (pictured left) have a small carving-knife-like blade on its top, it also portrays Lady Mary with her bodice undone and her breast exposed.
The question sometimes asked is why would Sir Thomas have sanctioned such a monument if there were not some truth to it? Then again, perhaps he just had a great sense of humour?
* Bromsgrove School has a remarkable claim to fame for the bravery of its former pupils – five of whom have been recipients of the Victoria Cross.
This figure is even more impressive when compared with the tally of the Coldstream Guards, which stands at 13 VCs.
The school possesses the medal of one of its old boys, Capt Eustace Jotham, who shone on the cricket field at Bromsgrove and died in a blaze of glory on the North West Frontier of India in 1915.
The other Bromsgrovian VCs are Lieut Commander Percy Dean, Sgt NG Leakey, 2nd Lieut FB Wearne and Field Marshall Sir George White.
* The list of famous names to have attended the school is topped by AE Housman, whose best known poetry is contained within A Shropshire Lad.
Recent well-known celebrity names are the actors Ian Carmichael – famous for such roles as Lord Peter Wimsey and Bertie Wooster – and Trevor Eve, who starred on TV as Eddie Shoestring and is currently in Waking the Dead.
And then, of course, there is Alvechurch lad and old Bromsgrovian Sir Digby Jones, the past Director-General of the CBI.