David Boucher (SH 54-59) remembers:

My Introduction to St Bees School – 1954.

“I started at St Bees in September 1954. At the time my parents lived in Uganda. They put me on a plane (a Handley Page Hermes) at Entebbe and 26 hours later I landed at London Airport (it wasn’t called Heathrow then) and was met by my grandfather. After staying one night in London we proceeded to Wallasey where I was kitted out with trunk, tuck box etc.

Unfortunately, on the day before I was due to start school, I developed “Montezuma's Revenge” (I think I drank water at Cairo airport) and as a result I was five days late arriving at St Bees.

My grandfather drove me up and left me at Eaglesfield in the hands of Cyril Wood, the Housemaster (M 45-59).

My first meeting with my fellow new boys was at supper that evening. I sat next to Mike Craig (SH 54-59), who wanted to know why I wasn’t black since I had come from Uganda! At the head of the table was ‘Al’ Ogden (FS 51-56), one of the prefects, who, when he was served with the meal, enquired what it was. Jonny Graham (SH 54-59), who was sitting on his other side declared that it was ‘blind scouse’ qualifying it by explaining that you go blind looking for the meat. Unfortunately the cook, who was serving the meal, heard him and delivered him a slap around the head!

The following morning I made my way to school for chapel followed by lessons. Lunch was taken at our senior houses, in my case School House. If you managed to get there in good time you could engage in a game of ‘yard soccer’. This consisted of two sides kicking a tennis ball at each other and hopefully scoring goals. There was no limit as to the number of people on each side and no real rules - great fun. A pair of brand new Clarks shoes lasted roughly one week. It became yard cricket in the summer with once again no established rules.

We very soon learnt that the people to be wary of were the members of Senior Studies. It was their brief (self-decided) to make sure we minions were aware of the important things about the school. Top of the list was to know the members of the first XV and be able to recite their names. Basically this was sacrosanct and we lived in fear that if challenged we might not be able to do it. So you better believe it, we very soon had the first XV fixed in our memories. So, some 63 years later, here it is:

Gallon, Collins, Parker, Newton, ---, Kennedy, Colbeck, Booth, Wilson, Townsend, Brown, ---, Mawson, Young, Plint (?)

My sincere apologies to those I have omitted - perhaps someone may be able to help out here.

So began five enjoyable years of education in the broader sense at a school with some unique characteristics: three quarter days, wearing shorts year round, ‘Officially Hot’ days, to name but a few and not forgetting Colin Cawthorn’s
(M 54-62) glider (where our President, Dacre Watson (SH 56-62) learned to fly!!).

Congratulations to the Trustees for reopening the school and good luck to those students starting in September 2018 as they embark on a tremendous opportunity.”

(Does anyone have any pictures of this glider which they would be willing to donate or to send as a photo attachment please? We have no images of it in the archives. Ed.)

 

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St Bees School,    St Bees,    Cumbria,    CA27 0DS.

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