SCHOOLS and School Days In The New Mill Valley, the second book in a series about different aspects of life in this valley, was launched at Holme Valley Civic Society’s recent meeting by Pamela Cooksey, local historian and the book’s author.
The aim of the book is to record the development of education up to the 1940s in the New Mill Valley, which lies between Mytholmbridge and Gatehead.
As in the rest of the country, local schools until 1870 included those with some kind of charitable status, church and chapel schools and a number of privately run schools including dame schools, which were usually run by a single woman or a widow in her own home. At best the children would be taught basic reading and writing and some simple arithmetic; at worst some dame schools provided only low level child care.
The Elementary Education Act of 1870 led to the start of a national system of elementary education. Locally, elected school boards were established to control schools, build new ones and raise a local rate to finance them. The boards appointed teachers and paid them.
In 1902 school boards were disbanded and it was then the responsibility of the education department of the West Riding County Council to provide state educational facilities for children living in the New Mill valley.
From 1862 onwards, head teachers had to keep a logbook in which they had to record only basic facts and no personal opinions about their school, although this was largely ignored in the valley! Head teachers’ concerns included staffing, pupils’ attendance, classrooms, the curriculum and punishments.
From 1789 the shortage of teachers to assist the head teacher had led to the acceptance of the monitorial system whereby selected 10 and 11-year-old children received one shilling a week for teaching younger children what they themselves had learnt from the head master, but dissatisfaction with this system led to the introduction in 1846 of pupil teachers.
They were intelligent pupils over the age of 13 who undertook a five-year apprenticeship. They were instructed for seven-and-a-half hours every week by the head teacher and had to teach five-and-a-half hours every day. They were paid £10 to £20 per annum and had to sit an exam at the end of the five years. Successful candidates were then able to study at a teachers’ training college to become certified teachers.
Photographs of pupils in our valley schools taken in the 1880s to the early 1950s show that children were mostly well-dressed. Many were accepted in school at a very early age because schools were glad of the fee, but the younger ones tended to fall asleep in class.
Logbook entries show that attendance at school was a problem as many children worked long hours in the mills and the mines. The families needed the money the children could earn and consequently regular attendance and tiredness at school were major problems. Many children also were required to help at home doing domestic chores and looking after younger siblings.
Poor health was also the norm for both children and their parents. Their living conditions and inadequate diet meant that they fell victim to the frequent epidemics of measles, whooping cough, smallpox, scarlet fever and influenza which led to further absences from school.
Photos of late Victorian classrooms in the New Mill Valley, as in other areas, showed windows set high in the walls on which were alphabet, spelling and number charts. There were rows of double desks and long benches for the children and a teacher’s high desk and chair. Tall cupboards held the slates, exercise books, ink bottles, pens and nibs and children copied from the blackboard.
Laziness and lack of effort led to punishment. It appears that the dunce’s cap, which had to be logged, was not noted in the valley schools and the cane and short stick were only used when absolutely necessary.
Loss of free time and the giving of tasks were the common punishments. However, rewards, such as prizes, privileges and outings for good work, behaviour and attendance were much favoured by local head teachers as an incentive to others to try harder.
The next meeting of Holme Valley Civic Society will take place at 7.30pm on Thursday April 18 in Holmfirth Civic Hall when local historian David Cockman will give an illustrated talk on his search for Martha Stocks, a former Holmfirth resident, whose gravestone can be found in the little park behind Wagstaff’s shoe shop in Holmfirth. All welcome.
