Schools in Ham – by SJ

We had the Russell School, we had Meadlands and we had this third one which was quite anomalous which they built on land which had been set aside for a secondary school which later became Grey Court and there were several little private schools in Richmond whose parents they took them out of there and put them into one of the primary schools if they could and I went to, […]

Memories of Sudbrook School – by MW

Well, the only things I can really remember – it must have been before the War – I used to go to a private school down Dysart Avenue, number 23, I went down the Records Office to check. It was a Mrs. Emerson, there were two rooms, two classes, one in the front room and one in the back room.  The back room was the lower class, the front room […]

A harridan teacher at Sudbrook School – by SJ

I was at a private school for about a year. It was in Dysart Avenue.  It was a house which they had converted into a school and the woman was a harridan.  I should think about 12 [children] and while she tried to berate us to read, write and eh maths, that was it, we did maths as well and she was horrible, she really was and it was a […]

Early days at Sudbrook school – by LGT

My daughter was one of the original pupils at what subsequently became Margaret Luddington’s school, Sudbrook School, in the Village Hall here, but it started in Petersham Lodge, which was down River Lane from us. She had a sort of schoolroom there. The people who owned that house then had rented her out a big room

Old Vicarage, a private school – by GDS

My first school was a school on Richmond Hill called the Old Vicarage. I believe now it is quite a posh sort of school but in my day it wasn’t. It was only one year after the war had ended so things were still rather chaotic. When I was 7 my mother went back to work fulltime – she worked in the city – so I got myself home from […]

Cycling to Tiffin Girls School – by EB

Well I had the choice of Richmond County or Tiffins, and my mother said I can’t afford the bus fare to Richmond County you’ll have to go to Tiffins and you can go on your bike there.  So I was the only one out of all my friends who all went to Richmond County and I had to go to Tiffins, so I used to cycle to Tiffin Girls School […]

Getting to Mortlake school for boys – by GS

I started my secondary school and met up with a lot of my old mates, although I was a little bit later starting school as they were already there.  I started secondary school at Mortlake, that would have been in the latter end of 1953, and then I stayed there until 1956 and then I transferred for the last few months to Grey Court, because Grey Court was opened on […]

Richmond Park was our playground at Mortlake School for boys – by DM

We didn’t have any green field area, we only had a tarmac playground so all our sports activities used to take part in Richmond Park.  We played football at school in Richmond Park.  We used to go cross country running so I we used to have to run from Mortlake, up Sheen Lane, out to Pen Ponds, round Pen Ponds and back again.  That was cross country running for you!

Two buses to get to East Sheen Grammer School – by KM

I passed the 11 plus so it was off to grammar school for me and four others from my class in Meadlands and, as we later found out, some other local kids from the other local junior schools as well. We didn’t know them at the time but we then became new friends when we went off to grammar school. I asked to go to Kingston Grammar School, which would […]