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VII.
Wednesbury, in times past, has enjoyed an unenviable reputation for bull-baiting, cock-fighting, and kindred sports of the same elevating character, to the utter neglect, by natural inference, of education and other civilizing influences. That this is, to a great extent, calumnious and unmerited, goes without saying : but that popular tradition dies hard was manifested so late as 1868, when Punch libelled the locality at the time of Bishop Selwyn's appointment to the diocese of Lichfield, by publishing an article in which the inhabitants of the Black Country were unfavourably compared with the savages of New Zealand, among whom this Bishop had laboured so many years previously.
The earliest educational efforts to record will be the benefaction of Thomas Parkes, who by will dated January 11th, 1602, gave a school-house situated in the parish, together with a close called "Clay Pit Leasowe" to maintain a schoolmaster to teach ten poor children of the town for the term of four score years after his decease. Whether the charity was enjoyed by the poor for the specified time, or whether it fell under the blighting influence of the Five Mile Act in 1665 cannot be ascertained ; but anyway we are certain of its entire extinction, and no reliable history of it will probably ever be forthcoming. It has been surmised that a relic of the foundation was the school which was held in the old Wednesbury Market Cross, where 12 boys and 8 girls were taught till about 1804. To the credit of the town it is known that the inhabitants subscribed not only to educate, but to clothe eight boys in this Market Cross School, and that to augment the funds of this establishment, the celebrated William Romaine, rector of St. Ann's, Blackfriars, once preached a sermon in the Old Church. At Wednesbury, 1820 saw the Old Meeting House of the Society of Friends in Lower High Street converted into a British School. It was a mixed school, and for several years the only elementary school in the town. The first schoolmaster was Edward Gittoes, and well-remembered by some of our older townspeople, who learnt under him, will be the monitorial system of Lancaster then introduced - the boy-monitor exhibiting a printed letter of the alphabet the form of which was imitated in a sand-desk by the finger of the learner, and then obliterated by a sliding-rubber, the surface of the sand being thus smoothed again preparatory to the next exercise. Some few people among us, may perhaps remember being marched two abreast down to Wood Green (1833) to receive from Mrs. Samuel Lloyd, who took great interest in the work of this school, a medal commemorative of Wilberforce and the abolition of slavery in the Colonies.
But excellent as was the Old British School, it could scarcely be accounted adequate to the requirements of the parish even in those days. A spirit of change came over the educational provisions of the country, although it needed all the powers of Brougham, Chalmers, Whateley, and Curran, to obtain the establishment of a Government Department of Education (in 1839) empowered to make grants of public money to aid in the efficient education of the working classes. The Parish Church School had been partly erected in 1829 for Sunday School purposes, and a second part was added in 1843. The site was given by Sir E.D. Scott and E.T. Foley, Esq. : the playground added in 1852 was given by the same baronet and Lady Emily Foley ; and Mr. Richard Williams aided in the further extension of the yard in 1877. The original building fund comprised £180 given by Government, £105 given by the National Society as it was a "National School," £30 given by the Lichfield Diocesan Society, and £269 raised by subscriptions, followed by £106 raised in a similar manner. The first erection cost £400, and the second £584. As a day school it was not at once used to its utmost capacity, for the Government Inspector, Mr. Moseley, in 1844, reports as follows : - "Wednesbury School, girls and infants : population benefited by the school, 10,000 ; number of children for whom accommodation is provided is 208 ; number on the books, 80 ; number present at examination, 32 ; number of classes, 7 ; number of paid teachers, 1 ; passes in reading : simple, narrative, 18, reading with ease, 4 ; writing on paper, 6 ; mistress's stipend, £24 5s. 0d. ; Expenditure on books, £5 ; on repairs, &c., £1 ; income from endowment, £17 1s. 4d. ; from subscription, £10 15s. 1d. ; from fees, £4" The date of inspection was August 14th, and the report goes on to say "A girls' school in which the children have been taught to read (mechanically) and I suppose to sew with tolerable care and attention, but in which all other instruction appeared to me to have been lost sight of. At the time of my visit this school represented the entire elementary education, connected with the church, in the town of Wednesbury, and the surrounding district, containing a population of 10,000. An efficient boys' school has since been opened in a schoolroom which was unoccupied at the time of my inspection, and the master's house then unfinished, has since been completed." The first schoolmaster here was named Room, and his first pupil teacher was Edward Hackwood, a protegè of the Rev. Isaac Clarkson. This system was well carried out till 1862, when the Revised Code required an individual examination in the thee R's, for success in which a fixed sum was paid by the Department. Under this scheme the Old Church School was admirably worked by another master, the late William Quelch. In fact this school has always maintained a reputation above the average, and in dozens of homes in the town its name may be found on the certificates of the "Iron and Coalmasters' Association for awarding Annual Prizes," the last examination of this society being held in these very schoolrooms in 1873.
St. John's Parish Schools were built in 1848, at a cost of £1,158 including £123 paid for the site. They were opened on the 11th of March, 1849, and a Church collection realized over £100 ; a local subscription list having previously amounted to £487. The remainder of the cost was borne by the Education Department, the National Society, and the Lichfield Society. These schools have always been extremely popular in the town, the children of a large number of the respectable inhabitants having been educated there. Among its most successful masters have been William Miles and William Phillips, the former being chiefly instrumental in the building of the Boys' new room, and the latter may be well remembered for the flourishing condition to which he raised St. John's Night Classes, and for the foundation of St. John's Institute, on similar lines to the Mechanics' Institute. These two Institutes, in connection with the Society of Arts, and the Science and Art Department, carried on a very useful work of supplementary education for several years, and were aided by the South Staffordshire Association for the Promotion of Adult Education and Evening Schools, of which the late Lord Lyttelton was president. The scholars of St. John's Institute distinguished themselves in every branch of education, religious, moral, secular, and physical : they took prizes at the Athletic Competitions held at Sandwell Park ; they took prizes for industrial work at the Walsall Exhibition ; and Lord Harrowby's prize-winner for religious essays was a member of this Institute. This kind of educational work has ben judiciously revived by the Science Classes at the Free Library, but as has been lately pointed out, the scheme greatly needs an extension to meet the needs of the locality. Why should there not be "Lectures on the Steam Engine," "Metallurgy Classes," "A School of Mines," and other branches of instruction given which would be more appropriate to the district than "Botany Lectures ?" Would not our Miner-students be delighted to bring specimens from the bowels of the earth, and would not our studious fitters and pattern-makers willingly make models to stock the cabinets which ought to be provided at the Free Library ? If the town does not need a Grammar School, assuredly its requirements would be fully met by the establishment of a Technical School.
St. James's schools were built in 1845, and were licensed by the Bishop for divine service, till the church was erected in 1848. St. James's schools have done a good work among the poorer classes of the town, but have always been burdened with debt, and a source of endless trouble to their managers. The boys' department has just been closed, and still it is difficult to carry on the other two departments in so poor a neighbourhood. It may be remembered that a Ragged School was successfully conducted some seventeen years ago by an enterprising tradesman of the name of Heseltine ; this was the only provision for the education of the poor of the town that has ever been made. Of the other public elementary schools, the Springhead Wesleyan school is an old established institution, although it was first opened by a Mr. Shenstone as a Middle-class school ; the Old Park British School (for boys only) has always flourished ; even from the time of Mr. Job, some twenty years ago, to the present, its reputation has always been a high one ; with the Old Park Works to supply the funds, it has never had to suffer from a shortness of income like the other voluntary schools. The schools above enumerated are the only ones that worked under the old system before 1862, when Mr. Robert Lowe (Lord Sherbrooke) introduced the Revised Code, by which principle of an annual individual examination was established, each child being yearly tested by H. M. Inspector in the three R's, a certain fixed sum being paid for success in each. Then in 1870, the principle of compulsory attendance was established by Mr. Forster's Act, and School Boards were constituted.
Wednesbury was not slow to take advantage of the Act. A School Board was elected without contest on the 15th of March 1871, and the first meeting was held on Thursday, March 30th, Mr. Richard Williams being Chairman. Mr. W.H. Southern was selected as Clerk, and discharged the duties of his office with marked ability, till ill-health compelled him to resign in September, 1873. When the Board came into existence, it found other Schools at work, besides those already alluded to. They were, St. Peter's Mission, in Meeting Street l ; Wesleyan Schools, Holyhead Road ; St. Mary's Roman Catholic Schools, Church Street ; St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Schools, Portway Road ; Church School, King's Hill ; and the National School, Moxley. Board Schools were established in Russell Street, and at King's Hill, a report having been presented that the number of children of School age was Between 3 and
5......................1445 while the existing elementary Schools (already enumerated) together with three private adventure schools, provided only accommodation for 4,344 children. Since this, new Schools have been erected in Lower High Street (in place of the one in Russell Street) and at New Town. Middle Class Education has always been left to private adventure, although the late Vicar (Rev. J. Lyons) did propose to establish a Grammar School with the funds of the over-grown Hopkins' Charity. His application to the Charity Commissioners in this matter was strenuously opposed, and the proposal fell through. However, the middle classes have been fortunate in times past, when their Education has been entrusted to such teachers as the Marshall family, who have "wielded the ferule" for three or four generations in this town ; and the renown of Peter Turner's establishment (where Lloyd's Old Bank is now situated) is still sung by those who attended it. A Higher Grade School in Walsall Street, is still carrying on the work in a highly efficient manner, Mr. Longstaffe, M.C.P., being the principal.
Still when we look around, one is compelled to echo a remark made in the pulpit a few weeks ago by the vicar of Merthyr that "the people who have come to the town and made fortunes have left nothing behind them to mark their connection with the place but old pit shafts and chimney stacks" ; no town was ever so destitute of charitable institutions ; it seems to be the rule in Wednesbury for its manufacturers and successful traders to reside as far from the town, as ever the money which they make in it, will allow them.
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