A brief glance
A brief glance at its history 1899-1999
- Ashwells Road, Bentley
- The Rev. Canon William Quennell M.A.
- James Fisher Hough O.B.E., M.A.
- Speech by Harold Parrish, 1956
- Speech by R.T.D. Stoneham C.B.E., D.L., 1956
- Annual Dinners
- The Chronicle
A brief glance at its history 1899-1999
At the Society's Annual Dinner in March 1999 it was recorded that during the twelve months since last we met at table, three of our past presidents had died: 1981 John M. Will (1920-1930), 1965 R. H. (Tubby) Clements (1924-30) and 1987 Reg. C. Vowels (1938-47). If the work of these three only for the school and their Old Brentwood's Society were faithfully recorded then the whole of this special issue would be filled with their deeds. At the end of this article the names of the 75 men who have served as President are recorded, all were pupils at the school except for seven. The four headmasters: 1926 James F. Hough, 1959 C. Ralph Allison, 1980 Richard Sale and 1993 John Evans. Also, two assistant masters 1963 H.V. Higgs and 1979 Joe Hodgson and one Chairman of the Governors, Sir Hubert Ashton in 1973.
In the absence of the early minute books or other records it has been necessary to refer to R.R. Lewis' History of Brentwood School and copies of the Chronicle. So let us have a brief glance at our history, our first hundred years.
In Charles II's reign those gentlemen that had formerly been of Brentwood School had taken part in the School Feast held in London. In 1868 it seemed as though an Old Brentwoods Society would be formed largely through the efforts of William Quennell. A team of Old Brentwoods played the School at football and an Old Brentwoods service was held in chapel, and a dinner held at the White Hart in Brentwood.
But in 1899 either at the suggestion of Edwin Bean, as his son Charles maintained, or at the suggestion of Charles, as his father states in his Historical Sketch, the Society of Old Brentwoods came into being. A meeting was held at Shenfield Rectory at which were present Canon William Quennell, A.S. Killby and C.E.W. Bean in July 1899. As a result a letter was sent out to all Old Brentwoods signed by William Quennell, Chairman of the Governors, and Edwin Bean, the Headmaster. A list of the names of 29 Old Brentwoods who had consented to join the proposed Society was given. Life Membership, it was suggested, should be half a guinea, an annual or biennial dinner should be held, and an Old Boy's column in the Brentwoodian would keep members informed of what was happening. The subscription to the Brentwoodian was a shilling a year.
A preliminary meeting of fifteen Old Brentwoods was held at the schoolroom of St. Philip's Church, Bethnal Green, where W.J. Ferrar was Vicar on 15th September 1899, and the first committee was as follows:
President: The Revd Canon W. Quennell
Vice-President (Ex officio): The Revd Edwin Bean, Headmaster
Hon. Secretary: C.E.W. Bean
Committee: The Revd Dr Linklater, The Revd W.J. Ferrar, H.S. Bowen, Colonel R.H. Lyon, F.D. Clapham.
About 60 had joined the Society.
The first Annual Dinner was held at the Holborn Restaurant, London, at 7.30 p.m. on Thursday, 18th January 1900. Tickets, exclusive of wine, were five shillings. Thirty-one sat down to dinner. Only one, William Quennell, had been present at the dinner at the White Hart, Brentwood, 32 years before.
The second Annual Dinner was also held at the Holborn Restaurant, but from 1902 onwards it was held at the Great Eastern Hotel, Liverpool Street. The Annual General Meeting was at first held after dinner, but later it preceded the meal.
Charles Bean was Honorary Secretary in 1899, 1901 and 1904, and A.F. Burgess, who was up at Oxford, undertook this work during 1902-3. Robert T.D. Stoneham succeeded in 1905, and his enthusiasm and hard work ensured the success of the Society and enabled it to play its part in the erection of the New Buildings now known as the Main School. From 1908 his brother, Ralph, and later H. V. Higgs helped him as Assistant Secretary.
Those founding fathers were also involved with the administration of the school. William Quennell (1849-56) was Second Master 1862, Headmaster 1870-80 and Chairman of the Governors 1892-1907. Edwin Bean, the son of an Old Brentwood was Headmaster 1891-1913, R.T.D. Stoneham (1895-1900) was Chairman of the Governors 1955-62, and A.F. Burgess (1888-99) Assistant Master 1909-39. James Hough was Headmaster 1914-45 and H.V. Higgs, Assistant Master 1910-57. Thus it is appropriate that the first rule of the Society states:
"The Society shall be called ‘The Society of Old Brentwoods’. Its objects shall be to afford opportunities to members of meeting at regular intervals; to keep members in touch with one another and with the School by the circulation of notices and by such means as may from time to time be expedient; to promote the interests of the School”.
In 1904 cricket fixtures were arranged and an O.B.s Debating Society was formed. In 1906 R.T.D. Stoneham (1895-1900) called a meeting at School House with a view to forming Football and Cricket Clubs confined exclusively to Old Brentwoods; this was not agreed. The Brentwood Rovers and Brentwood Alumni Football Clubs, mostly Old Brentwoods joined together and flourished, like the cricket club, until December 1912. Both clubs seemed to collapse in 1913.
Harold Parrish (1911-17) gathered a small meeting of enthusiasts in January 1920 to reform the Football Club. The Cricket Club was impossible to re-form after the war until Mr. Hough and Miss Hough invited cricketers who lived a long way off to stay in the School House, sleeping in the dormitories for the annual week of six one-day matches against the School. By 1929 H.R. (Bunny) Wilkins (1914-19) became the Hon. Secretary and with the assistant master E.P. Paul got the Old Brentwoods Cricket Club running well. In 1947 the name 'Brentwood Bunglers' was gradually adopted officially. In 1927 R.G. Ries (1920-24) was elected Captain of the Old Brentwoods Athletics Club with the headmaster, J.F. Hough, Chairman. The Old Brentwoods Golf Club held their first meeting at Romford in June 1931 with B.C. Crouch (1919-26) the first Hon. Secretary (he was a Cambridge Blue in 1928 and 1929). The Tennis and Squash Club was formed in December 1932 with Orlando Wagner (1885-86) as President and Mr. J. F. Hough, Headmaster, and Harold Parrish (1911-17) as Vice-Presidents. In 1934 the club changed its name to O.B.s’ Lawn Tennis and Squash Rackets Club, using three courts at Shepherds Bush. Most of the presidents of the Society between 1949 and 1972 were at the school between 1913 and 1930 under Mr. Hough. These were the generation of Old Brentwoods with their old headmaster that made the Society successful during the years between the wars. They needed a home and Burland Road Ground was conceived. In 1937, Mr. Hough told the Society that the old school playing field in Sawyer's Hall Lane was up for sale (6¾ acres) and suggested that the Society should purchase it. A Sports Field Fund was opened with Mr. Hough as treasurer but the outbreak of war on 3rd September 1939 cut the appeal short.
In September 1939 the Old Brentwoods Football Club were able to forsake the County Ground, and to play on their own field. The ground had been levelled, re-hedged and ditched, and changing accommodation had been provided by the erection of a four-roomed pavilion, the gift of P.A. Bayman. But the next season saw the Football Club once more on the County Ground and through the kindness of the Brentwood Cricket Club they were able to play there from 1940 to 1951.
In 1940 the field passed into the possession of the Brentwood Urban District Council under an arrangement between them, the Society and the War Agriculture Executive Committee. The Council held the field as a playing field until May 1949, while the Council's own field was ploughed as part of the war effort, for which it was more suitable than the Society's field. The Brentwood and Warley Football Club continued to use the field until May 1952 when their new ground was ready.
A caretaker committee, whose chairman was C.S. (Kip) Dunlop and Secretary R.H. (Tubby) Clements, worked hard to get the ground restored after years of neglect. An ex-R.A.F. sectional hut was purchased and together with the old pavilion formed the basis of the club rooms.
The first match played on the field after the War was against the Society's old friends and rivals the Old Chigwellians in September 1952. By 3rd April 1954 the club could be officially opened by W.S. Macfarlane, the President of the Society, who severed a rope of cords in the Club colours and then invited J.F. Hough to be the first person to cross the threshold and set foot inside. Provision had been made for a kitchen, servery and the usual offices, but central heating had to be deferred for lack of funds. The Garden Party on 12th June 1954 was a great success and as a result the Clubhouse was finished by the laying of a permanent floor covering and the installation of central heating.
Work on the square of the Sports Ground began in 1954 and by 1955 it was fit for play. The Old Brentwoods Cricket Club was formed once again at a meeting in the Clubhouse in Burland Road on 28th September 1954. W.S. Macfarlane, the Honorary Secretary of the Bunglers, was elected President, Brian Carter, Captain and G.W. Horrex, Vice-Captain. The Honorary Secretary was P. Hughes and the Honorary Treasurer, J.E. Raven.
In 1960 a further cricket team was formed in connection with the Society - The Brentwood Martyrs. It consisted of masters, Old Brentwoods and present boys, and its fixtures were arranged for the week following the end of the Trinity Term. Its first match was on 21st July against Bomber Command.
By 1973 the Society possessed at Burland Road two excellent Association Football pitches, a flood-lit practice pitch, a cricket square and practice wickets. The Clubhouse had first class changing rooms, a plunge bath, showers, two bars, a main hall and kitchen. But a further soccer pitch in Hartswood Road had to be hired from the Brentwood Urban District Council. The Rugby Football Club which had been formed in 1967 had to use a School pitch for home matches until they were able to get a pitch at Navestock in 1970. As the Chronicle states, there can be few other clubs in which players have been lost on the way to a home fixture.
The Society had no squash courts, and only a limited use could be made of the School courts.
The other affiliated clubs - the Golfing Society, the Lawn Tennis Club, the Athletics Club and the Cross Country Club continued to flourish.
Michael King, the Honorary Secretary, wrote in the Chronicle of October 1975: “A roll call of those who contributed to make the Burland Road Ground a success would include the names of Hough, Parmenter, Parrish, Bayman, Clements, Young, White, Pailthorpe, Boon, Pepper, Stratford and many others”.
It gradually became obvious that it would be advisable for the Society to sell its field which was near the centre of Brentwood and to purchase another further into the country. The field was now too small for all the Society's activities - and there was the danger that part of it would be required for a proposed Town Centre Ring Road. There was also an unofficial suggestion that it might be required for a new town swimming pool.
The land was sold in 1975 for £300,000. Temporary accommodation was obtained at the Essex Water Company's Ground at Kenilworth Avenue, Harold Park.
The new site at Ashwells Road, Bentley, is slightly over three miles due north along the Ongar Road from the School. It consists of 22 acres. There are four Association Football pitches, two Rugby pitches, a cricket square and tennis courts. Parking facilities are for 120 cars. There are two squash courts, extensive changing rooms and showers, a very well-appointed large club room and bar on the first floor which can be used as three, two or a single area, depending on the occasion. Dinners for up to 110 people can be served.
The new Clubhouse and ground was in use in the spring of 1978 - no mean achievement - and the official opening was on 10th June 1978.
During the last 20 years the Club has flourished and improved - there are tennis courts and excellent furnishings and dining facilities. Others have written about their clubs and the activities of the Society which may help to bring to life the history of the last 20 years at Ashwells.
The Old Brentwood's Society and its members have supported many appeals to enrich the School. First helping Edwin Bean in the early days to build the main school building and then the 1914-18 memorial appeal which fully financed the Memorial Hall. Also, after the second world war, the Old Brentwood's Memorial Appeal financed the war memorial in the chapel and built the Pavilion, designed by Laurence King (1916-24), in 1955. The Hough Memorial Gates were built in 1965 and several School appeals have been held since.
In July 1899, 29 Old Brentwood's consented to join the Society and suggested meeting once or twice a year for half a guinea. No Clubhouse, no sports club and the first dinner cost five shillings and 31 members came. In March 1999, 2,500 Old Brentwoods pay an extra Annual Subscription of £10.00 in order to receive 'The Chronicle', another 500 are paid-up life members but do not receive The Chronicle and a further 2,000 members are on the list of members as ‘registered but not contactable’. We have an excellent Clubhouse set in beautiful grounds. Thanks to the benefaction of the estate of Joe Hodgson (Master 1934-74), and our President in 1979, we have a strong financial background. The present Chairman of the Governors of the School, Colin Finch (1947-53), has been Chairman of the General Committee until recently; Colin is another R.T.D. Stoneham. Colin has chaired a group of hard working O.B.s who have steered the Society to its hundred years birthday, the envy of all other schools.
Let us conclude this un-authoritative history with the list of our Presidents; each name represents a host of others. We apologise immediately that some of the degrees and titles may be slightly inaccurate and cease to be included from 1974 onwards. We close with pictures and an appreciation of the two headmasters that made the Society possible; Canon William Quennell and James Fisher Hough.
There is not space for Stoneham, Ferrar, Bean, Wilkins, Dunlop, Bayman, Macfarlane, Parrish, Vincent, Higgs, Bailey, Wright, Ashton, Hodgson, Will, Griffiths, Vowels, Finch, Boon, etc … . Let us all in our various ways continue to contribute to the good name of Brentwood School and its Society of Old Brentwoods.
The Society has a two-fold endeavour of keeping old friends in touch with one another and of making the heritage from the past generations continuously available to the present. The changes that take place at the School must be reflected in the membership of the Society and we look forward to the extra number of girls seeking membership.
Please send contributions to the next edition of The Chronicle concerning our history. Also, is there someone who would find the time to write the 'authorised version' of our first hundred years?
The Rev. Canon William Quennell M.A. (President of the Society of Old Brentwoods 1899-1908)
Born on August 11th, 1839, the third son of Mr. Robert Quennell, surgeon, of Hornchurch, he came shortly after his father's death to attend Brentwood School, where Mr. Bell was then the ‘acting Headmaster’. Two years later the foundation was reorganised, and he was one of the 45 boys who, in 1852, assembled under the new Headmaster, Dr. W. de Lancy West.
Close ties that united scholar to master grew into a friendship and lifelong intimacy, and those who knew both remarked their similarity of manner and turn of thought. In 1869, having gained a Classical Scholarship at Worcester College, he went to Oxford, and was placed in the Second Class in Moderations, in both classics and mathematics, taking his B.A. in 1861, with a Second Class in the Final Classical School. Returning to Brentwood he became Second Master in 1862, and was ordained deacon in the same year, and priest in 1863, by Bishop Wigram of Rochester.
In January 1870, after Dr. West had accepted the Headmastership of Epsom, he was unanimously elected to fill the vacancy at Brentwood, and in three years had raised the numbers from 70 to 146. In the zenith of his success a sudden blow fell upon him by the loss, in 1874, of his first wife, whom he had married two years previously. He continued in the Headmastership until 1879, when the illness of his second wife, the daughter of Archdeacon Mildmay, compelled him to resign, and until her death in 1881 they resided at Cannes. From 1881 to 1892 he was Vicar of Tring, and from 1890 to 1892 Rural Dean of Berkhamstead; after which date until his death he held the Rectory of Shenfield. On going to Shenfield he was elected Chairman of our Governors, and was annually re-elected, until failing health compelled him in 1907 to retire from the chair. In this capacity he rendered signal service to the School by steering it through the financial and other difficulties with which the decay of tithe and rent had beset it. When the new scheme of 1893 came into force he took the chief part in framing the regulations of the Governors in accordance with its provisions. It was his earnest wish that the School should develop on the lines laid down by Dr. West and continued by himself, and his last act as governor was to enlist the sympathies of Mr. Evelyn Heseltine, who became a very generous benefactor to the School and Chairman for the Governors from 1907-1928. (Edwin Bean in his ‘Historical Sketch’ referred to Heseltine as the second founder.)
In September 1899, with the Headmaster, Rev. Edwin Bean, he founded The Society of Old Brentwoods and was appointed the first President, which he held with enthusiasm for ten years (1899-1908). But his work for the School, great though it was, formed only one of his many activities. In the diocese he was a leading figure, being Inspector of Church Schools, and an examiner of pupil teachers, as well as Secretary for Church Defence, and of the Essex Board of Education, and 1897 he was made Honorary Canon of St. Albans, and in 1898 Rural Dean of Barstable. From 1900 to 1906 he represented the Essex Clergy as Proctor in Convocation. In county work also his activity was remarkable. He was Chairman of the Billericay Advisory Sub-Committee for Education, and Vice-chairman of the Board of Guardians. In freemasonry, too, he held very high rank, being for a time Grand Chaplain of England.
James Fisher Hough, O.B.E., M.A. (President of the Society of Old Brentwoods 1926)
He was born on 9th January 1878 and went to Wolverhampton Grammar School and then for two years to Mason's University College just before it became the University of Birmingham. From there he became an exhibitioner of St. John's College, Cambridge, where he read for the Mathematical Tripos. He came to Brentwood in 1903 as Second Master at the age of 25. He taught Mathematics and Physics and Chemistry. He became Headmaster in January 1914 with 211 boys and piloted the School through two wars, carried out great building programmes and extended the School fields. During the second war he was appointed Chairman of the Urban District Council of Brentwood and when he retired as Headmaster in 1945, there were 887 boys at the School, including the Preparatory School.
In 1945 he was appointed a Governor of the School, in 1958 he became an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. His benefaction to the School and The Society of Old Brentwoods had no limits, a legacy of green fields and impressive buildings. He died on 16th January, 1960, aged 82 years.
These are the bare facts, now follows two contemporary speeches made by two prominent Old Brentwoods at Jimmy Hough's 80th Birthday Dinner.
“It is very kind of the Society to give me the very high honour and the exceedingly great pleasure of proposing the health of Mr. Hough and expressing our gratitude to him and his sisters for all that they have done for the School and the Society. I bring in his sisters at the beginning because they have done so much to help him in his day to day life at the School and I feel that their completely selfless attitude to life has encouraged him in his work and at the same time has let him so free to give full rein to his most generous nature. Furthermore, they have added to their indirect generosity, direct and personal contributions in money as well as work to the welfare of the School and, in particular, I would remind you that the enlargement of the School Chapel was a joint gift by Mr. Hough and his sister Ethel”.
“So when I speak now of Mr. Hough and his work for the School and the Society, you will understand that his work has been also very much of a family affair.”
“I do not consider my function to be the recital of the life of Mr. Hough and all his good works, because that would take a very long time and might make him impatient. I have in mind a notable occasion at Cambridge, when I was putting the finishing touches to an impromptu speech I was drafting on the menu card and Mr. Hough surprisingly said - now then stop worrying about your speech - just keep it short and pass the port round again”.
“I shall therefore content myself with trying to convey to him how much we have always admired him. How grateful we are to him for all his generosity and apart from that, in so far as it can be separated, how very fond of him we have always been, what a joy it is to have him and his sisters with us tonight and how much we hope we shall enjoy their company for many years to come”.
“When I see the happy three so fond of one another, I think how fortunate we are that in their fondness for everyone else, they favour us in particular”.
“I was not at Brentwood when Mr. Hough first came to the School. I did not enter until his popularity was well established and his amiable weaknesses fully exposed. Thus we newcomers could join in the exploitation of his love of games and keep him talking at the beginning of class on the prospects of the first and second elevens, the possible outcome of house matches, the sports and swimming, etc. After that discussion in common decency we felt compelled to work hard and it may be that it was Mr. Hough who was exploiting us. Anyhow, both parties were very well satisfied”.
“On the other hand I do not recall that Mr. Hough's outspoken criticism from the touch line of the pavilion was so well received; but as it was usually merited and acted on, it speeded up the game; and it was readily forgiven when high praise was just as freely given in the same penetrating voice”.
“The effect of all his good qualities was that the Governors of the School appointed him Headmaster in 1914, and this appointment was the wish of Mr. Bean the retiring headmaster and the unanimous desire of the parents and boys. So Mr. Hough's whole-hearted devotion to the interests of the School was given a much wider field for expression.”
“At once he made it his business to get to know people who would be useful to the School, and our Society has benefited at the same time. It was Mr. Hough who introduced the Soccer Club to the County Ground; and he it was who told us of the chance of buying our sports field. He knew the right people to approach - write to Old Nevill - he played on the ground in 1860 when the School owned it - he ought to be good for a substantial sum - and he was - £500. It was Mr. Hough who knew the right people for arranging that our field was not ploughed up during the war. Not only has Mr. Hough given much to the School, but he has made it pleasant for others to do the same. Everyone to Mr. Hough was a potential helper of the School, because he had been brought up in a family where service to others was one of the essential qualities and he paid others the compliment of assuming that they had been brought up in the same way”.
“In running the School he assumed that all boys were naturally idle and he also knew that Satan finds work for idle hands to do. He felt very strongly about this”.
“Now then little boy what are you doing idling your time away, go down and help push the roller - or carry these chairs or take a run round the Avenue. They have enough on the roller sir - I can't believe that - now then get on. Or, I was just going to - well you aren't doing, get on and do as I say and you can do the other thing afterwards”.
“The only ones who resented this were the idlers who were too idle to keep a proper look out or too idle to efface themselves and they deserved no sympathy. One of the most attractive films I ever saw at the School was one of Mr. Hough organising the clearance of the ground on Sports Day. This shows him in his best style carrying two chairs and directing 20 or so conscripts at the same time.”
“Most of us, myself included, like to talk about ourselves, but many of us remember the talks at School in the dormitory when he unfolded some of his ambitions for the School and when meeting him frequently in later years as Hon. Secretary of the Society, I was privileged to hear of his successful acquisitions as they followed one after the other. He is a great businessman, but he has never claimed to be. He used to say to me - it's so easy, these properties come up for sale and no one seems to have the sense to buy them, although they are so cheap. So I'll get the bank to help me and I'll buy them! This statement would end with eyebrows raised, head slightly inclined with a look of wonder in his eyes, mixed with a certain amount of shrewd satisfaction”.
“Well he has given them all to the School now and crowned all his other gifts to the School, the Society, the hospital and the town. Among these earlier gifts that of over £3,000 to our playing field”.
“There has been some recent public recognition of his great worth and we can congratulate him most heartily on the award of the Order of the British Empire. This is an order reserved, I conclude, for those who do the highest good in a quiet, modest and unobtrusive way and, as Members of Parliament as such never seem to receive such an order, I assume it must be awarded where great good has been assuredly done and there cannot be opposing opinions on the matter.”
“Mr. Hough is a great character in every sense in the term and we have not only benefited from his overwhelming generosity, but our lives have been enriched immeasurably by his influence, his example and his very good company. Or as we put it at School much more simply and effectively –
He is an absolutely smashing chap”.
“I ask you now to drink to the health of James Fisher Hough and wish him many happy returns of his birthday on reaching the noble age of eighty years, and I join with it a wish which must be always with him, for the good health and long life for his sisters Ethel and Edith”.
“Although his ‘Old Boys’ will have many tales to tell of ‘Jimmy’ Hough it may be of interest to recall his early days at the School”.
“It is now some 57 years ago, but I well remember his advent as Second Master to my old Headmaster, the Reverend Edwin Bean, as at the time I was Secretary of the Society of Old Brentwoods and thus came into close contact with him. He was a quiet young man but, although making no fuss, he very soon proceeded to ‘adopt’ the School, he largely helped to develop the House system and he laid the foundations for his subsequent long and successful headmastership”.
“May I quote from the Rev. Bean's Historical Sketch, which he produced shortly before his retirement in 1913:
‘James Fisher Hough, M.A., late Exhibitioner of St. John's College, Cambridge, has been for ten years past an ideal Second Master and I rejoice that the Governors have chosen him to succeed me’".
“When he came to the School the numbers were just under 90, when he took over they had rather more than doubled and when he retired they were more than tenfold”.
“In one capacity or another I was in the closest possible touch with him for nearly 60 years; although his opinions were quite definite and clearly expressed he was always ready to listen to other people's suggestions and I doubt whether it was possible for him to lose his temper. The School soon became his ‘child’, nothing was too good for it and on many occasions at his own expense, without fuss and indeed without anyone's knowledge, he subsidised its interests. The School has had many good friends, but Hough was one of its greatest benefactors: but what I think he would chiefly wish to be remembered by is the Chapel which at his own expense he so enlarged”.
The Society is held together in the first place through the affiliated clubs, Ashwells Clubhouse and the School itself. However it is the Chronicle and the Annual Dinners that reach out to help keep a contact with those who move a long way off.
The first Annual Dinner was held at the Holborn Restaurant, London, at 7.30pm on Thursday, 18th January 1900. Thirty one members were present and the tickets cost five shillings (25p). The second Annual Dinner was also at Holborn and then the venue changed to the Great Eastern Hotel, Liverpool Street, from 1902 until the outbreak of war.
During the twenties and thirties the Hotel Victoria was used and the dinner in December 1928 was photographed for it celebrated Mr Hough's Silver Jubilee year at Brentwood.
For a good many years The Connaught Rooms, Holborn, became the favoured meeting place for our annual dinner and for many years in February which was London's favourite month for ‘pea-souper’ fogs and snow. However the dinners invariably attracted 200 O.B.s. To celebrate the School's 400th anniversary, the Annual Dinner was held at The Mansion House on Friday 17th May. Tickets £3.3s.0d. each, dress was evening dress (tails) and decorations, but those unable to manage evening dress were to wear dinner jacket without decorations.
By 1977 the Annual Dinner moved from the Connaught Rooms to the Bloomsbury Centre Hotel. The change of venue was supposed to revive the event but failed. Returning to the Connaught Rooms until 1980, the annual event was changed to the School, where it has continued to be held since that date.
All of the dinners have been attended by over 100, many to the Edinburgh Hall's capacity of 150. As well as both male and female OBs, many guests are present, including the Heads of the School, the Girl's School, the Preparatory School and the Pre-preparatory School, teachers, the Head Boy, the Head Girl and representatives from other societies
As with the first dinner over 100 years ago with William Quennell and Edwin Bean, Chairman of the Governors and Headmaster respectively, we enjoy a fellowship which is interwoven with our peers and our masters and the very bricks and mortar of the fine Brentwood School buildings.
The first number of the Old Brentwoods Chronicle is dated December 1906. Before then the news of the Society was published in the Brentwoodian, and in an ‘Annual Report’ which was circulated to members. The Chronicle helped to cement the Society together in those early days. It was published in December each year, but the 1912 number was held over until November 1913. This was the last number before the 1914-18 War. During that war, news of Old Brentwoods was published in the Brentwoodian. The next issue was that of June 1926 - 13 years later - and it has been published regularly ever since.
R.T.D. Stoneham (1895-1900) Hon. Secretary of the Society from 1905-1926, was the first editor responsible for the Chronicle's first years 1906-1913. It was also Robert Stoneham's efforts that helped re-start the journal with the help of various members of the Society's General Committee. In the 1930s and during the second world war, Harold Parrish (1911-17) became editor with others, one being Sir Dennis Wright (1921-29) who has sent us the following memories.
The Chronicle and other memories
“Old men forget. But I do just remember that shortly after coming down from Oxford in 1932 I became a member of the Society's General Committee. The records - for which I am grateful to the School's Librarian - show that from July 1933 until August 1935 I was Hon. Secretary to the Chronicle Committee and from 1935-37 Joint-Editor with Harold Parrish, the Society's long-serving Hon. Secretary, in whose fusty Pump Court, Middle Temple Chambers, we held all our committee meetings. I was, I remember, largely responsible for the ’John o' Groats’ pages, also dinner and dance reports and initiated ‘Dates for your Diary’”.
“Being then in the advertising business, I also acted as the Society's press officer and took some pains to get the Society’s dinners and dances publicised. I still possess a number of clippings for 1933-36 showing that we advertised the London dinners (at 10 shillings a head) in the Times, the Daily Telegraph and Morning Post. The dinners, in late September or October, were held in the Trocadero in 1933 and 1934, the Connaught Rooms in 1935 and 1936. Good accounts of the dinners, often with a full list of those present, appeared in the Times, Morning Post, Daily Telegraph, as well as the Brentwood Gazette, Essex Times, Essex Weekly, Ilford Guardian, Ilford Recorder, Romford Recorder and Romford Times”.
“In 1934 I was a founder member of the O.B. Squash Club though I cannot remember any official affiliation with the Society. I was then living in digs in Bayswater and served as the match secretary. I made arrangements with the West London Squash Club at Shepherd's Bush to use their courts for our ‘home’ matches. We had fixtures with the Bank of England, Eton Manor, the School etc. Regular members of our team in those early days were Lewis Bayman, Eric Howgego, M.S. Neck (our best player), M.A.V. Russell, Jimmy Small, Basil Vincent and myself”.
“World War II brought all this to an end and altered the course of my life. After working in Romania and Turkey for the Foreign Office during the war, I became an established member of what is now the Diplomatic Service in 1946 and spent many years abroad. When back home I usually attended O.B. dinners and would often motor down to Brentwood with my wife to have tea with the ever-welcoming Jimmy Hough and his two sisters Ethel and Edith - twice I remember joining them in their tent on the County Cricket ground during Essex Cricket week”.
“In July 1965, home on leave from Persia, I gave the prizes away on Speech Day ending my address by quoting from Housman's ‘A Shropshire Lad’:
’Say, lad, have you things to do?
Quick then while your day's at prime.’”
“I spent that night as the guest of Ralph and Rita Allison in Roden House where I had begun life at Brentwood in 1921”.
“After the War and for about ten years, Eric Leyland (1922-29) edited three editions of The Chronicle each year to a very high standard. His 'potted' history of the School 1851-1951 in a special Festival Number makes interesting reading. His assistant for many years, R.G. Woods (1937-39), took over the editorship in 1957. A.V. Greaves (1948-53) was editor in the 1960s, Graham Born did a good stint in the 1970s and then began the 17-year editorship of Michael King (1949-56) from 1979-1996. Two large issues were produced every year to a high professional standard during this period. In 1996 Godfrey Thomas retired from school mastering after 35 years at Brentwood and agreed to take on the editorship of The Chronicle. Ninety three years ago, the first Chronicle was edited by Robert Stoneham (1895-1900), who became Chairman of the Governors. He was encouraged by the Headmaster, Edwin Bean. Nothing really changes, just the names and the dates. The Chronicle has helped to keep us in contact with those whom we shared our early days, our years of development and where life really began at Brentwood School”.
Denis Wright