Schoolmasters

The Burials and Births data list no less than 19 parents with the occupation of Schoolmaster (no schoolmistresses, but see below).  This is a little misleading, however, since there are separate records for each new baptism and several of the schoolmasters had quite a lot of children.  In fact, it turns out there are a total of 8 schoolmasters in the baptism records, as follows:

Later Note: Mr Nunn is mentioned in grandiloquent terms in the 1850 Annual Report of the Committee responsible for the Holy Trinity Schools, thus:

In the inscrutable but unerring ordering of Divine Providence, your long-tried and much-valued master, Mr. Nunn, was laid upon the bed of lingering and dangerous sickness, and for a length of time your Committee were in painful suspense as to the result. But the prayers of the friends of riper years, and of the loving children under his training, were heard, and it pleased God to give him and all who were deeply interested in his or their own welfare, “an happy issue out of their affliction.”

You can download the full report, entirely written in such flowery language, here. )

  • Richard Clarke, 20 Cloudesley Terrace.  4 children baptised: 1839, 1842, 1848.
  • William Cornish, 1 Stonefield Street.  1 child baptised: 1839.

(Later Note: the Cornish family included one son, also called William, who became a professor of music, and another, Alfred, who is listed in the 1851 census as a merchant's clerk.  Alfred's son, Albert, became a sergeant in the South Wales Borderers and died of dysentry in Basra, Iraq in 1916 - download his war record here)

  • Thomas MacDougal, 27 Lower Islington Terrace.  1 child baptised: 1849.
  • Edward Stevens, 14 Cloudesley Square.  2 children baptised: 1860, 1862.
  • Robert Sturman, 11A Stonefield Street.  1 child baptised: 1864.
  • Lawrence Major, School House Cloudesley Street.  4 children baptised: 1870, 1872, 1874, 1878.

Lawrence Major appears to have been a particularly illustrious Master of the Infant School (see below) and is commemorated in Holy Trinity church, as the following extract from Rebecca Preston's Chronology of the church (p131) describes:

No account of Holy Trinity would be complete without mention of Cloudesley School and its remarkably headmaster, Mr Lawrence Major. The schools were first opened privately in 1831 as a district Infant School, by William Allen. In 1839 they were taken over by the Vicar of Holy Trinity (Mr Fell), and opened as Holy Trinity District Infant School. In 1862 the present building to accommodate boys and girls were added. Under Mr Major’s amazing and able leadership and during Canon Haigh’s incumbency, the Schools reached an exceedingly high standard of perfection; the Honours Boards … are an eloquent tribute to the long list of brilliant successes attained by the scholars. The Schools were closed in 1898. Two windows were erected in the Church in 1904 to the memory of Lawrence major. One was the gift of the congregation and the other of his old scholars. …

  • Arthur Gibbard, 1 Cloudesley Square.  1 child baptised: 1889.

Note that at least two of these families actually lived in the school variously described as "Infant School Trinity District", "Infant School House", and "School House Cloudesley Street".  It seems likely that the others also taught there.  Another source - the Post Office London Directory for 1860 - confirms that James Nunn and Edward Stevens were teachers at "Trinity Church National and Infant Schools" as "Infant Master" and "Master" respectively, and lists Mrs Isabella Hannah Stevens as "Mistress".  From a later Directory for 1900 we can identify two more teachers at the school as the following entry makes clear:

  • In 1900 (see image below):

- "Cloudesley National Schools"

- Lawrence Major, Master (see above)

- Mrs Major, Mistress (Jane Ann - Mr Major's wife!)

- "Cloudesley Infants Schools"

- Miss Ebbels, Mistress

Trinity School Record 1900