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old Grammar School at the southern end of George
Lane, is referred to by the Devon historian, W.G.
Hoskins, who says, "Few schools in England
can have such rich associations in the history of
painting, but few towns in England can have been
so unaware of their greatest son". JoshuaReynolds,
the son of Samuel Reynolds, a Headmaster of this
School, was born in the old school house in 1723.
The house was pulled down in 1871, and there was
no memorial to Reynolds until a tablet was put in
the Church in 1904. |
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The School was known as Hele's
School, Plympton, after Elize Hele who owned Sir
Walter Raleigh's old manor house at Fardel, in
the parish of Cornwood. Elize was born in 1560
at Winston Manor, three miles to the south of
Plympton. He was a lawyer of the Inner Temple
in London, had been treasurer to James I and owned
much property in South and West Devon. After the
death of his only child, Walter, at the age of
11, Hele decided to bequeath a number of his estates
for charitable purposes. Elize died in 1635 and
was buried in Exeter Cathedral. His trustees,
John Maynard and Elize Stert, issued the money
to fund three schools: Hele's School at Exeter
and The Blue Maids School, Exeter, which was later
renamed The Maynard School and, in 1658, Hele's
School, Plympton. They also set up a Hele Trust,
which still administers the Plympton School building.
The cost of the building completed
in 1671, was £1,099. The School is built
in a gothic style, possibly designed by the architect
of Charles Church, Plymouth. A cloister of arches
and columns decorated in contrasting bands of
limestone and granite, supports the schoolroom.
It has five large mullioned windows. Above the
schoolroom door is a small gallery where the Headmaster
could stand to watch his pupils at work.
The School was intended
as a charitable school for boys of surrounding
parishes but, such was its excellent reputation,
the local gentry sent their sons too. John Parker
of Saltram, who was to become the first Earl of
Morley, used to walk daily to the School through
Underwood. His grandmother, Lady Catherine Parker,
gave Joshua Reynolds his first pencil. Joshua
Reynolds was the seventh child of the Reverend
Samuel Reynolds. Born on July 16th, 1723, his
baptism is recorded in the St. Maurice Church
register. He was actually named in the register
as Joseph, and the record was later corrected.
Preserved in the Royal Academy is a drawing, on
the back of a Latin exercise, of the schoolhouse
window.
On the paper his father
has written, "This is drawn by Joshua in School
out of pure idleness". Although Reynolds settled
in London he returned frequently to Devon, visiting
Saltram, where a number of his portraits of the
Parker family can be seen. It was largely his
personal links with families such as the Parkers,
Edgcumbes and the Mudges, that introduced his
friends, Dr. Samuel Johnson and Fanny Burney the
eighteenth century novelist, to the South West.
In 1768, Reynolds became the first President of
the Royal Academy. He was knighted by George III
in the following year.
In 1773 he was chosen
as Mayor of Plympton. He told George III, "This
gives me more pleasure than any other honour I
have received", then tactfully added, "except
that which Your Majesty was graciously pleased
to bestow upon me". Reynolds painted a portrait
of himself and presented it to Plympton Borough.
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In 1773 he was chosen
as Mayor of Plympton. He told George III, "This
gives me more pleasure than any other honour I
have received", then tactfully added, "except
that which Your Majesty was graciously pleased
to bestow upon me".
Reynolds painted a portrait
of himself and presented it to Plympton Borough.
The corporation, in financial difficulty, sold
the portrait in 1837 to the Earl of Egremont for
£150. In 1973, on the occasion of the 250th
anniversary of Reynolds' birth, the Civic Association,
in conjunction with Plympton Grammar School, arranged
various celebrations including the donation of
wrought iron gates to the old School. They were
ceremonially opened by Sir Thomas Monnington,
the President of the Royal Academy.
The Post Office honoured
the famous son of Plympton by issuing a set of
commemorative stamps. The respect for Reynolds
talent, and the affection that he inspired, undoubtedly
initiated the remarkable sequence in which three
other artists who had attended the Grammar School,
each became the pupil of his predecessor. James
Northcote (1746-1831) joined Reynolds in London
as his pupil and assistant.
A noted portrait painter,
he also wrote the first biography of Reynolds.
His amusing tales and remarks are recorded by
William Hazlitt in "Conversations of Northcote".
We read there that when Benjamin Haydon told him
he wished to be a historical painter, Northcote
retorted that "He would starve with a bundle of
straw under his head". Haydon (1786-1846) had
been Headboy of the School in 1801. At School
he formed a drawing class, and once drew a hunting
scene on the schoolroom wall with burnt sticks.
Famed for his large canvasses of biblical subjects,
such as "The Raising of Lazarus", he was also
involved in schemes for artistic and social reform.
Wordsworth and Keats, who were among his many
illustrious friends, each wrote sonnets in his
praise. Northcote's forecast of his financial
fortunes proved all too accurate, however, and
after having been frequently imprisoned for debt,
he committed suicide.
Charles Lock Eastlake
(1793-1865) was Haydon's pupil. He was elected
President of the Royal Academy, and became the
first Director of the National Gallery. Napoleon
posed for Eastlake's popular painting of him on
board the Bellerophon anchored in Plymouth
Sound, before the voyage to St. Helena. Like Haydon,
Eastlake was made a Freeman of Plymouth. Reynolds
father was a lifelong friend of the Reverend Zachariah
Mudge, who became the eminent Vicar of St. Andrews,
the mother church of Plymouth, in 1731. John Mudge,
his son, was a pupil of the School, and a friend
of Joshua. Mudge, a Fellow of the Royal Society,
was awarded a gold medal for his work on telescopes.
He became a doctor of medicine, and was Dr. Johnson's
physician.
Another former pupil
was Jack Russell, the famous hunting parson, and
breeder of the terrier. He became, as he said,
"Cock of the walk", after beating, in a fight,
Bulteel, the son of a well-known local family.
During the latter half of the nineteenth century,
an attempt to replace the classical curriculum
of the School with commercial courses proved unsuccessful.
Numbers dwindled, and the School closed in 1903.
It was decided to re-open the School in 1921 on
a co-educational basis. The School occupied Castle
Barbican, purchased from the widow of J. Brooking
Rowe, the author of "A History of Plympton Erle".
By 1931, the growth of the Grammar School necessitated
the use of the original old schoolroom. With continued
growth in numbers, the School moved out of Plympton
St. Maurice in 1937 to its present site in Stone
Barton.
Based on:
© MILLS, Audrey F, 1981: Plympton St.
Maurice Guide, First Edition, Plympton St.
Maurice Civic Association |
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