Sam Bamford's Memories of Schools. [leisure trust, arts heritage, sports centres, fitness health, rochdale, link4life, entertainment, Rochdale Boroughwide Cultural Trust, museum, middleton arena, gallery, touchstones, local studies, central, bowlee, springhill, marland, heywood, littleborough,]
Middleton Free Grammar School.
From The Autobiography of Samuel Bamford.
My father having been appointed to the situation of governor of the workhouse of Salford, with his wife as governess, I was placed as a half-day scholar under the tuition of the Revd. James Archer, at the Middleton Free Grammar School. 1 soon began to improve in writing. This indulgence of schooling lasted, however, only during a very brief space, for my aunt, in consequence of her own ill health, becoming more and more exacting ' in the hateful drudgery of the bobbin-wheel, I was not able to perform my allotted task in time for school attendance, which, therefore, soon became irregular, and was next discontinued. A word or two about this school may not be out of place here.
The Reverend James Archer was at that time the head master, and John Kenyon, the parish clerk, was the assistant. The school was one fine open room, with oaken desks and seats all around. On an elevated compartment of the wall facing the door, was an inscription stating that the school was erected by Doctor Alexander Nowell, of Brazennose College, Oxford, with dates and other particulars which being in latin I did not understand. The building both internally and externally, was then in the state in which it was first presented to the public by the honoured donor. The alphabet, spelling, reading, writing, and arithmetic were taught, in the higher school, to both boys and girls, and Mr Archer charged them for it, whilst all in the lower school were instructed in spelling and reading, free of any charge except a fee of a shilling at entrance, a shilling a year for coal, and a shilling at "the barring-out" at Christmas, when the school broke up for holidays, and the scholars were regaled with spiced ale and spiced cake. I do not recollect that the rudiments of the classics were at that time taught to any one, though I should suppose they would have been had applicants for such instruction presented themselves. Mr Abraham Cuppage succeeded Mr Archer as head master. He divided the school into two parts, and in so doing he very ungraciously obliterated the tablet which set forth the honoured name of the founder, and the purposes of the grant. Since then other alterations have been made by the present Master, which are calculated to render the building more adapted to his convenience. These or any other departures from the design of the venerable founder are to be regretted; and strong must be our disapprobation of the perversion of the funds by the Principal and Fellows of Brazenness College, who instead of supporting the school with the monies they, as trustees, receive for that purpose, have in past times, and do at present, apply them to benefit their own institution, or in more direct terms apply them to their own emolument.
Sunday School
From The Autobiography of Samuel Bamford
At this time the Methodists of Middleton kept a Sunday school in their chapel at Bottom of Barrowfields, and this school we young folks all attended. I was probably a far better speller and reader than any teacher in the place, and I had not gone there very long when I was set to writing. I soon mastered the rudimental lines, and quitting "pot-hooks and ladles," as they were called, I commenced writing "large-hand." For the real old Armenian Methodists, the immediate descendants of the Wesleys, the Nelsons, and the Taylors, thought it no desecration of the sabbath to enable the rising generation, on that day, to write the Word of God as well as to read it. Had the views and very commendable practice of these old fathers been continued in Sunday schools generally, the reproach would not have been cast upon our labouring population, as it was on the publication of the census of 1841, that a greater proportion of the working classes of Lancashire were unable to write their names, than were to be found in several counties less favoured by means of instruction. The modern Methodists may boast of this feat as their especial work. The church party never undertook to instruct in writing on Sundays; the old "Armenian Wesleyans" did undertake it, and succeeded wonderfully, but the "Conferential Methodists" put a stop to it; other religious bodies, if I am not mistaken, did the same, and in 1841 it was a matter of surprise to many that our working population was behind that of other counties in the capability of writing names. Let the honour of this stoppage be assumed by those who have earned it; by the "ministers of religion" so called, generally, and by those of the "Conferential Methodists" especially.
Every Sunday morning at half-past eight o'clock was this old Methodists' school opened for the instruction of whatever child crossed its threshold. A hymn was first led out and sung by the scholars and teachers. An extempore prayer followed, all the scholars and teachers kneeling at their places; the classes, ranging from those of the spelling-book to those of the bible, then commenced their lessons, girls in the gallery above, and boys below. Desks which could either be moved up or down, like the leaf of a table, were arranged all round the school, against the walls of the gallery, as well as against those below, and at measured distances the walls were numbered. Whilst the bible and testament classes were reading their first lesson, the desks were got ready, inkstands and copy-books numbered, containing copies and pens, were placed opposite corresponding numbers on the wall ; and when the lesson was concluded, the writers took their places, each at his own number, and so continued their instruction. When the copy was finished, the book was shut and left on the desk, a lesson of spelling was gone through, and at twelve o'clock singing and prayer again took place, and the scholars were dismissed. At one o'clock there was service in the chapel; and soon after two, the school reassembled, girls now occupying the writing desks, as boys had done in the forenoon; and at four, or half-past, the scholars were sent home for the week.
My readers will expect hearing. that the schooI was well attended, and it was so, not only by children and youths of the immediate neighbourhood, but by young men and women from distant localities. Big collier-lads and their sisters from Siddal Moor were regular in their attendance. From the borders of Whittle, from Bowlee, from the White Moss, from Jumbo, and Chadderton, and Thornham, came groups of boys and girls with their substantial dinners tied in clean napkins, and the little chapel was so crowded that when the teachers moved they had to wade, as it were, through the close-ranked youngsters.
Bibliography
• Bamford, Samuel: The Autobiography of Samuel Bamford, Volume One: Early Days, together with an account of the arrest, &c., Frank Cass & Co. Ltd. 1967
This book is available for loan from the Reserve Stock Collection at the Wheatsheaf Library.
Many of the other works of Sam Bamford, including newspaper articles and letters, are held at the Local Studies Library at Touchstones, Rochdale and at Middleton Library
