Founded in 1614 with an endowment from William Jones, a successful cloth merchant and trader in Elizabethan times, Monmouth School is run as a trust, the William Jones's Schools Foundation, by the Worshipful Company of Haberdashers, one of the Great Twelve City Livery Companies, and has close links with its sister school, Haberdashers' Monmouth School for Girls. In 2018, the Haberdashers' Company renamed its group of schools in the town, the Monmouth Schools, and made corresponding changes to the names of the boys' and girls' schools. Further changes were initiated in June 2022, when the Haberdashers opened a consultation on merging the school with the girls' school in the town to create a fully co-educational establishment. In October 2024 the amalgamated schools were relaunched as Haberdashers' Monmouth School.
The school is situated on the eastern edge of the border town of Monmouth, adjacent to the River Wye. Nothing of its original buildings from the 17th century remains as the school was completely rebuilt in the mid to late-19th century. Later developments have included the Science Block (1981-84) and the William Jones Building of the early 21st century (2014). In 2014, the quatercentenary of the school's foundation was celebrated with a service at St Paul's Cathedral.
Established originally as a grammar school, by the early 1870s Monmouth was a member of the newly-formed Headmasters' Conference and had acquired the status of a public school. Between 1946 and 1976 it joined the direct-grant scheme, returning to full independence from 1976. A member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference, the school's roll numbered approximately 650 pupils. The fees as at 2024, the last year of operation as a single-sex school, were £25,245 for day pupils, and £48,702 for boarders. The William Jones's Schools Foundation, which funds the Monmouth Schools on behalf of the Haberdashers’ Company, recorded an income of £20.5M against an expenditure of £24.0M in its accounts for 2020.
History
William Jones, the school's benefactor
Years of foundation: 1613–1616
In 1613, William Jones, a prosperous merchant and prominent haberdasher, gave the Haberdashers’ Company £6,000, with a further bequest of £3,000 in his will after his death in 1615, to "ordaine a Preacher, a Free-School and Almes-houses for twenty poor and old distressed people, as blind and lame, as it shall seem best to them, of the Towne of Monmouth, where it shall be bestowed".[3]
Jones was born at Newland, Gloucestershire[4] and brought up in Monmouth, leaving to make his fortune as a City merchant engaged in cloth trading with the Continent.[a][6] Grateful to his livery company's support throughout his career, the motivation for his bequest appears both philanthropic and evangelical; the county of Monmouth in the early 17th century still retained a significant Catholic presence[7] as local historian Keith Kissack noted: "the priority given to the preacher illustrates [Jones's] concern to convert an area in the Marches which was still, when the school opened in 1614, strongly recusant".[b][9] The order for the establishment of the school was made, retrospectively by James I in 1616 and decreed "for ever in the town of Monmouth, one almshouse and one free grammar school".[10]
The Haberdashers' Company purchased four fields in the sum of £100 for the Monmouth School site,[11] receiving permission on behalf of Jones by royal decree in 1614 for this charitable purchase as required under the statute of Mortmain. By Jones's death at Hamburg in 1615, the almshouses, and the schoolroom and headmaster's house had been completed, although nothing now remains of the original school buildings.[4]
The remainder of Jones's considerable bequest was used to purchase the manor of Hatcham (from the estate of Henry Lennard, 12th Baron Dacre), and surrounding land at New Cross in Surrey, the rent rolls funding the salaries and running costs associated with the school, as well as paying pensions to the almshouse residents.[12]
The first headmaster was the Revd John Owen, M.A. of Queens' College, Cambridge, appointed on a salary of £60 per annum.[c][14] Neither Owen, nor many of his 17th and 18th-century successors, lasted very long unlike the school day which ran from 7–11 a.m., followed by an afternoon session from 1.30–5.00 p.m.[15]
Years of uncertainty: 1617–1799
The 17th-century school buildings
The mid-twentieth century school historian, Harold A. Ward, described its early history as "the precarious years".[16] Ongoing religious controversy, exacerbated during the English Civil War, made the town a divided and uncertain setting for Monmouth School. Divisions between staff, and the financial instability, and remoteness, of its City Haberdasher patrons, who were compelled to make substantial loans to the Parliamentary Government that remained unpaid for decades and then also required to finance the rebuilding of their livery hall which was destroyed during the Great Fire of London,[17] contributed to internal weaknesses.[18] These difficulties continued well into the 18th century, and at one point, during the headship of the "morose and tyrannical" John Crowe, who was removed from his post after becoming insane, the school roll fell to just three boys.[19] A source for information regarding the school in the mid-17th century is the diary of the school's usher, More Pye. The diary, extracts from which were published in the Monmouthshire Beacon in 1859 but which is now lost, records Pye's experiences in great detail from the date of his appointment in 1646 until his resignation in 1652.[20] An example is Pye's entry for February 18, 1647; "Pd (paid) 6d ffor (for) wormeseedes and triacle for ye boys". A less parochial entry for November 11, 1647, records Pye's monarchist sympathies, "Ye King's Magy (Majesty) made an escape from Hampton Court, out of ye Armye's power. Vivat, vivat in aeternum".[d][20]
Years of controversy: 1800–1850
Ward described the early 19th-century period of Monmouth School's history as years of "controversy".[22] These focused mainly on three issues; relations between the school and the town, relations between the school, the town and the Haberdashers' Company and the Court of Chancery, which together were responsible for the school's funding and oversight, and attempts to expand the school's curriculum beyond the traditional study of Latin and Greek. The first issue saw the school perceived as part of the faction of the Dukes of Beaufort, premier county landowners, and the directors of the town's governance from their regional base at Troy House.[23] Early 19th-century Monmouth had a strong Radical tradition led by burgesses such as Thomas Thackwell, and fuelled by the liberal positions held by local newspapers, the Monmouthshire Beacon and the Monmouthshire Merlin.[24] The school's leadership was perceived in the town to be too close to the Beauforts, and Thackwell ran an almost fifty-year campaign against their attempts to defend the established order.[23] The second controversy related to the governance of the school and another long campaign of attrition saw the School Lecturer lose responsibility for preparing its annual report, this being transferred by the Court of Chancery to a Board of Visitors.[25] The last area of conflict arose between the school's leadership, which wanted to maintain the tradition of a curriculum that involved the study solely of Latin and Greek,[26] and the Court and the Haberdashers' Company which sought to expand teaching to subjects such as writing and arithmetic. In a damming report in 1827 they condemned "the present masters, though so liberally paid, and having so little to do, consider themselves engaged only to teach Latin and Greek. A school teaching those branches of learning only will never be useful to a place of such confined population as Monmouth".[27] Reforms introduced by John Oakley Hill in 1852, saw the establishment of Upper and Lower Schools, the former continuing to provide a classical education, while the latter had a curriculum focused on writing and arithmetic.[28]Archdeacon Coxe, who undertook extensive tours of Wales at the end of the 18th and in the early 19th century accompanied by his patron and friend, Sir Richard Colt Hoare, recorded his impressions of the school in the second volume of An Historical tour in Monmouthshire, published in 1801. Describing the school as enjoying "a high reputation under the care of (the headmaster) the Revd John Powell", Coxe retells the mythical story of the school's establishment and records a "portrait of the founder, habited in the costume of the age of King James the First, with an inscription 'Walter William Jones, haberdasher and merchant of London etc.' is preserved in the school room".[13]
Years of expansion: 1851–1913
The School Close with the memorial sundial to G. H. Sutherland, Head of School, who drowned in the River Wye in 1921
In the early 1850s the Court of Chancery insisted on the appointment of an external examiner. His report of 1852 was not encouraging; "many of the boys appear so ignorant as to be a disgrace to their parents, still more than to their teachers".[29] If the academic outlook remained bleak, the financial position of the school was transformed in this period. The sale of part of the New Cross estate to railway developers, and the vastly increased rents accruing from the development and expansion of London saw the Haberdashers' fortunes dramatically increase.[30] The availability of funds led to the complete rebuilding of the school on its original site between 1864, the school's 250th anniversary, and the end of the century.[31] Monmouth School's expansion was undertaken during the long incumbency of the Revd Charles Manley Roberts, headmaster for 32 years from 1859 to 1892.[32] During Roberts's time Monmouth became an early member of the prestigious Headmasters' Conference (established by the Revd Edward Thring of Uppingham in 1869), a mark of its increasing reputation and status as a public school.[e][35] The school's reputation for sporting prowess also rose, its rugby teams and rowers enjoying particular success.[36] As a result of rising revenues from rents and investments,[37] by the mid-19th century, Monmouth's endowment was one of largest of any school in England and Wales.[f] To use the resulting surpluses, the original foundation was reorganised in 1891 to support a new girls’ school and an elementary school in the town, as well as a boys' grammar school West Monmouth School in Pontypool.[39] As importantly for the school's development, the rule that limited applications to boys from Monmouthshire and the neighbouring counties was set aside, and applications were opened to the entirety of Wales and England.[35]
Monmouth School's Combined Cadet Force was reportedly the last CCF in Great Britain to change its uniform to khaki from the traditional blue at the outbreak of war in August 1914.[40] The Great War brought the award of the school's only Victoria Cross, conferred upon Captain Angus Buchanan in 1916 for his conspicuous bravery during the Mesopotamian campaign.[g][42] Blinded by a bullet to the head the following year, he returned to Monmouthshire and practiced as a solicitor in Coleford, unveiling the school's war memorial in 1921.[43] In total, seventy-six Monmouth old boys were killed on active service during World War I.[42] The school's Bricknell Library, established in 1921, commemorates one of them, Ernest Thomas Samuel Bricknell, who died in October 1916 from wounds received in action at the Battle of the Somme.[h][45]
Further loss of life occurred in 1921, when the Head of School, G. H. Sutherland, drowned in the River Wye during a rowing match between Monmouth and Hereford Cathedral Schools: Sutherland is commemorated on the sundial in the school cloister.[46] The Second World War added the names of a further sixty-one Old Monmothians to the lists of the dead inscribed on its war memorial.[47] During the War, Monmouth School hosted the entire school and staff from King Edward VI Grammar School, Birmingham, who were evacuated following the Luftwaffe's bombing of the Midlands.[48]
Recent years: 1946–present
Internal conflict within the school's management continued in the mid-twentieth century, with the governors sacking two headmasters within three years.[49] This led to the school's expulsion from the Headmasters' Conference, and to that body's advising against any of its members applying for the vacant headship.[49] This impasse was resolved in 1959, with the appointment of Robert Glover.[50] Reorganisation of the Haberdashers' endowments also occurred at this time. The elementary school, founded with Haberdashers' funds in 1891, was transferred to Monmouthshire County Council control in 1940 with West Monmouth School at Pontypool following in 1955.[51] This left the William Jones's Schools Foundation responsible for Monmouth School and Haberdashers' Monmouth School for Girls – also known as HMSG – both of which joined the Direct-Grant scheme in 1946.[52]
Another significant development for the school's location was the building of the A40, which "severed (Monmouth) ruthlessly from the river on which in the past it had depended" and cut off the school from its historic frontage onto the River Wye.[53] This led to the permanent closure of the school's ceremonial entrance, the Wye Bridge Gate, constructed by Henry Stock in the 1890s. The direct impact on the school was perhaps less significant, Ward had recorded an early comment on the entrance "that ancient gate which never opened is but thrice a year on notable occasions, such as when the coal cart comes".[54]
In 1976, with the ending of the Direct-Grant system, the school returned to full independence.[55] Having argued strongly against the ending of the government grant system, the headmaster at the time, Robert Glover, gave a warning as to the likely consequences, "if direct grant goes, the school which has served the boys of Monmouth for four hundred years, will suddenly become for many families financially prohibitive".[55] In response, a committee of the Old Monmothian Club, headed by Lord Brecon and Sir Derek (later Lord) Ezra launched a campaign to raise funding for scholarships which amassed £100,000 in ten weeks.[56] During his tenure Glover also secured re-admittance to the Headmasters' Conference. To mark the school's four-hundredth anniversary[57] a service of thanksgiving was held at St. Paul's Cathedral, on 19 March 2014, attended by some 2,200 pupils and staff from the school and from Haberdashers' Monmouth School for Girls, as well as Haberdashers and friends of the Schools.[58][59]
In 2018, the Haberdashers' Company rebranded its group of schools in the town as Haberdashers Monmouth Schools and renamed the senior schools as Monmouth School for Boys and Monmouth School for Girls respectively.[60] In its most recent accounts, published in 2020, the William Jones's Schools Foundation, which funds the Monmouth group of schools on behalf of the Haberdashers’ Company, recorded an expenditure of £24.0M against an income of £20.5M.[61] In June 2022, the Haberdashers began consultation on proposals to merge the Boys and Girls schools, making them fully coeducational.[62][63] In October 2024 the amalgamated schools were relaunched as Haberdashers' Monmouth School'.[64][65]
The Monmouthshire antiquarian Charles Heath described the traditional, and almost certainly inaccurate, story of the school's foundation in his Accounts of the Ancient and Present State of the Town of Monmouth, published in 1804.[66] Heath records that William Jones, now established as a successful and wealthy merchant, returned to his home town of Newland disguised as a beggar. Receiving a hostile reception, he travelled to Monmouth, where he was more warmly received and where, as a consequence, he funded the construction of the school and associated almshouses.[67] The story is taken from an earlier oral tradition, also recorded in Archdeacon Coxe's An Historical Tour in Monmouthshire, published three years earlier.[13] In 1899, the Revd William M. Warlow published his History of the Charities of William Jones at Monmouth and Newland.[68] His fellow clergyman and master, the Revd K. M. Pitt wrote a more focused account, Monmouth School in the 1860s.[66] H. A. Ward published Monmouth School: 1614–1964: An Outline History to commemorate the school's 350th anniversary.[68] In 1995, Keith Kissack published his history, Monmouth School and Monmouth: 1614–1995.[69] In 2014, in celebration of the school's quatercentenary, two masters at the school, Stephen Edwards, who wrote the text, and Keith Moseley, who took the photographs, published a new history, Monmouth School: The First 400 Years.[70]
Buildings
Interior of Monmouth School Chapel, 1865
William Jones's original legacy provided for a schoolroom, on the site of the present chapel, houses for the headmaster and Lecturer, and almshouses segregated by sex.[14] A painting by John A. Evans, of later date and purchased on behalf of the school by the then headmaster Lionel James in 1921, shows the buildings and is titled The Old School Room. Built A.D. 1614. Pulled down to make room for the present school room, 1865.[71] Nothing of these old buildings remains. The local writer and artist Fred Hando records that the bell, which hung above the schoolroom, was cast by the Evans Foundry at Chepstow in 1716.[72]
In 1864 the Haberdashers undertook a substantial rebuilding of the school.[73] Funded by the rising fortunes of Jones's bequest on the back of the Victorian expansion of London, the work was mostly undertaken by William Snooke and Henry Stock, of the firm Snooke & Stock, surveyors to the Haberdashers' Company.[i][75] Snooke built the chapel, two schoolrooms and a classroom in 1864–65, followed in the 1870s by the library, Headmaster's House and the buildings which now form Monmouth House and Hereford House;[76] these buildings are all Grade II-listed.[77][78][79] The Monmouth Alms Houses, on Almshouse Street, were rebuilt by James Bunstone Bunning in 1842, and redeveloped by William Burns in 1895–96.[80] They now form part of the school and incorporate a large inscription panel describing the benefactions of Jones's Foundation.[76] The almshouses are also Grade II-listed.[81] The chapel was further extended in 1875.[82] Snooke's work was not universally praised; a report from the School's Commissioner commenting, "the architect has arranged the buildings in a most inconvenient manner, and the ventilation is deficient."[83] School House, with its ceremonial arched entrance and coat of arms facing the Wye Bridge, and the adjacent Technology Block, were designed by Henry Stock in 1894–95.[76] They became Grade II-listed buildings as of 8 October 2005.[84][85] The style of the School House Block mirrors that of the main block of Haberdashers' Monmouth School for Girls, which Stock designed at the same time.[86] The war memorial was dedicated in 1921, with Capt. Angus Buchanan attending the ceremony:[42] it is a Grade II-listed monument.[j][90] To the west of Stock's School House Block, and set into the wall previously facing the Wye and now completely overshadowed by the A40 by-pass, is a pair of wrought iron gates of 18th-century date. They came from Haberdashers' Hall in London which was destroyed during the Blitz in 1941.[k][84]
The school's building of greatest architectural merit is the Grade II*-listedChapel House.[93] The architectural historian John Newman describes the 18th-century building, situated on the Hereford Road away from the main school site, as "the best house in the entire street".[94] More modern developments include the School Hall of 1961, redeveloped in the early 21st century and now the Blake Theatre,[95] the Red Lion Block of the same date and the Science Block of 1981–84.[76] In 1985–86, two ceramic murals were designed for the chapel by the Polish religious artist Adam Kossowski, a friend and wartime colleague of the school's Head of Art from 1947 to 1978, Otto Maciag (1918–2000).[96] Executed by Maciag, and another art master at the school, Michael Tovey,[97] the murals were dedicated at a service led by the Rt Revd Clifford Wright, Bishop of Monmouth, on 3 October 1987.[98] Bishop Wright described them as "masterpieces of twentieth-century religious art".[99] In November 2008, a £2.3million sports pavilion was completed[100] and opened by the former British Lions player and Welsh captain, Eddie Butler, an Old Monmothian.[101] It was designed by the architects Buttress Fuller Alsop Williams.[101][102] In 2011, the school began the Heart Project.[100] This led to the sale of some outlying sites, such as St James's House, and the re-organisation of others, to assist in the raising of funds for the redevelopment of the main school site.[95] Further funds came from the Haberdashers' Company, and the first phase was completed with the rebuilding of the Red Lion Block, renamed the William Jones Building.[100]
The school in the 21st century
The William Jones Building
With over 700 pupils, the school offered boarding and day places as well as preparatory departments. A range of GCSE, A and AS-level subjects were available. Tatler's (2020) Schools Guide noted its strong academic performance.[103][104] The school charges fees for attendance; for January 2025, the annual fees were: £25,245 for day pupils, and £48,702 for boarders.[105] The school operated a substantial bursary programme.[106][107][108] In September 2018, Monmouth School was renamed Monmouth School for Boys after a merger of all five Haberdashers' Company Schools in Monmouth. The Foundation now operates under the name Haberdashers' Monmouth Schools and comprises: Monmouth School for Boys (formerly Monmouth School), Monmouth School for Girls (formerly Haberdashers' Monmouth School for Girls or HMSG), Monmouth School Boys' Prep (formerly The Grange), Monmouth School Girls' Prep (formerly Inglefield House) and Monmouth Schools Pre-Prep and Nursery (formerly Agincourt School).[60]
Houses
There were three age-divisions in the school; Lower (forms I and II) Middle (forms III, IV, and V) and Sixth form (forms VI.1 and VI.2). Within these divisions, the school operated a House system. As of December 2022, the houses were:
Monnow House, the lower school boarding house;
Wye and Dean Houses, the lower school day houses;
Severn House, Town House, Monmouth House and Hereford House, the middle school day houses;
New House, Weirhead House, and School House, the middle school boarding houses;
Tudor, Glendower, and Buchanan Houses, which comprised the sixth form centre and VI.2 boarding.[109]
Extra-curricular activities
The school had its own theatre, The Blake, opened in 2004.[110] Funded by Bob Blake, a former pupil, it was used as a venue for performances by both the school and the girls' school, as well as by external performers.[95] The Glover Music School has an auditorium and teaching and practice rooms.[l] The strong musical tradition owed much to Michael Eveleigh, Director of Music at the school from 1950 to 1986, and his successors,[112] there having been only five directors of music since the Second World War.[113][114] Other extra-curricular activities included overseas expeditions, music and drama events as well as a newspaper, The Lion, a creative writing pamphlet, The Lion's Tale, The Mon-Mouth, a bi-weekly, student-run newspaper and an annual magazine, The Monmothian, first published in 1882.[115] The Combined Cadet Force, founded in 1904, which has both Army and RAF sections, is operated in collaboration with HMSG.[116]
Sport
Monmouth School boathouse
The school maintained a notable sporting tradition,[114] with a high number of successful sportsmen amongst its alumni.[117] Its main sports were rugby, rowing and cricket. The school's rowing club, affiliated to British Rowing (boat code MNS),[118] produced three championship crews at the 1988,[119]2007[120] and 2009 British Rowing Championships.[121] Facilities included a boathouse, a sports complex which houses a six-lane swimming pool, indoor facilities including a weights and fitness suite, tennis courts, and a full size astroturf pitch.[122] The Hitchcock Sports Pavilion, completed in 2008, stands beside the playing fields, on the other side of the Wye from the school's main site. In addition to rugby, rowing and cricket, the school offered a range of other sports including soccer, tennis, basketball, golf, cross-country, athletics, swimming, water polo, canoeing and squash.[123]
Other
The school had an alumni society, the Old Monmothian Club, founded in 1886.[124] In June 2009, the school paid out £150,000 to settle a landmark pensions rights case brought by female catering and support staff who claimed that, as part-time workers, they had been unjustly excluded from the school pension scheme.[125]
↑ W. J. Townsend Collins, in his anthology Monmouthshire Writers, records the traditional story of Jones being forced to leave Monmouth as a youth when unable to settle a debt of ten groats.[5]
↑ John Gwynfor Jones, in his essay Language, Literature and Education in the third volume of the Gwent County History, describes Jones as "puritanically inclined".[8]
↑ Archdeacon Coxe records slightly different rates in his An Historical Tour in Monmouthshire, published in 1801. Coxe notes that the master received, "a house with a salary of £90 a year; to the usher, a salary of £45 per year with a house; and to a lecturer, for the purpose of inspecting the almshouses, reading prayers and preaching a weekly sermon, an excellent house and garden, with a salary of £105 a year".[13]
↑ Manley Roberts' desire to enhance the reputation and status of the school was circumscribed by a traditional snobbery against education in Wales. Siân Rhiannon Williams, in her essay Education and Literacy in the fourth volume of the Gwent County History, notes, "sons of the Monmouthshire gentry were educated in the public schools of England, a tradition which contributed to Monmouth School's difficulty in attracting even the highest rankings of the local professional classes".[33] An inspector appointed by the Haberdashers' Co. to enquire into the issue in 1870 reported that: "The sons of professional men in the neighbourhood hardly ever attend, an objection being felt by their parents to the lower class of boys in the School".[34]
↑ John B. Hiling, in his study The Architecture of Wales: From the first to the twenty-first century, omits mention of Henry Stock's contribution, ascribing the work solely to "W. Snoke" (sic).[74]
↑ The memorial was designed and built by Alfred William Ursell, a monumental mason from nearby Ross-on-Wye,[87] whose son 2nd Lieut. Victor Ursell attended Monmouth, died at the Second Battle of Arras in May 1917,[88] and whose name is inscribed on the memorial.[89]
↑ The CADW listing gives 1941 as when the gates were installed, although Fred Hando records this as happening in 1961.[91] Hando is supported by the school's historian, Harold A. Ward, who dates their installation to after 1958, when the wall fronting the River Wye was moved back to facilitate the construction of the A40.[92]
↑ The music school honours Robert Finlay Glover, headmaster from 1959-1977, and was part-funded by his daughter, the conductor Jane Glover.[111]
↑ Edward Culley, a mathematician and classics scholar, was the first headmaster to be appointed since the establishment of the school who was not in holy orders. Nevertheless, his candidacy enjoyed considerable ecclesiastical support. The South Wales Daily News, in its report of his appointment in 1891, noted that his referees included the Bishop of Chester, the Bishop of Liverpool and the Dean of St Asaph, as well as the Master of Balliol.[127]
↑ "For the Record". Times Digital Archives. The Times. 18 July 1988. p.35.
↑ "2007 Archive of Results". Web Archive. National Rowing Championships of Great Britain. Archived from the original on 6 December 2016. Retrieved 9 September 2020.
↑ "2007 Archive of Results". Web Archive. National Rowing Championships of Great Britain. Archived from the original on 6 December 2016. Retrieved 9 September 2020.
Clark, Arthur (1979). The Story of Monmouthshire, Volume 1, From the earliest times to the Civil War. Monmouth, Wales: Monnow Press. ISBN9780950661810. OCLC866777550.
— (1980). The Story of Monmouthshire, Volume 2, From the Civil War to Present Times. Monmouth, Wales: Monnow Press. ISBN9780950661803. OCLC503676874.
Collins, William James Townsend (1945). Monmouthshire Writers: A Literary History and Anthology. Newport: R. H. Johns. OCLC236089162.
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