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I went to Parnella School first, which was one of a succession of private schools at the time, reminisces Lillian Hinxman. The well-to-do tradesmen sent their children to Miss Bennett's school, the Devizes College in St. John's Street, but we went to Parnella House because it was a bit cheaper!
When Miss Bennett's closed I remember that in the Advertiser, an old paper which was published by Gillmans in The Brittox, someone called it his alma mater and had such a veneration for it, but I don't know that the education was so superior, I expect it was about the same as all the rest of us got!
I wrote endless compositions which, I suppose, must have done me some good. I was taught by miss Davies and she must have had some success with me because when I transferred to the new Devizes Secondary School, which opened just in time for me when I was eleven and a quarter years old, I was put in the second form.
The new school's headmaster ruled us with a rod of iron, although he did have his mellow moments. Unfortunately I was very bad in his subjects; I always failed when I got into the lab'. I knew that if I was doing an experiment and it was supposed to end with a reduced weight of something, mine would always end with an added weight!
I think that I must have been a bit of a nuisance at school once, against the rules we stayed after school and played about on the gym apparatus. One of the masters who was taking detention came in and told us not to do it and to go home. We carried on; I climbed on a bar to do a turn or something, and fell and broke my collarbone. I wasn't popular for this!
Each term we had an exam and if you managed to struggle through you had a merit holiday. For one of these the senior mistress took us for a walk around Roundway, during which I saw a dog in a kennel by the roadside and put my hand practically in its mouth. It bit me and I was not popular for that either!
 | From:
Devizes Voices compiled by David Buxton
Tempus Publishing
ISBN 0 7524 0661 2
£9.99
For a complete list of local history books published by Tempus Publishing visit: www.tempus-publishing.com |
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