Rules & Regulations

Examples of offences

The list of reported serious offences was usually short, comprising a very small  number of boys guilty of stealing, absconding, being absent from work, and insubordination. Minor offences outside the schoolroom included pilfering (chiefly from the kitchen), a few cases of bullying, lying, smoking, disobedience, neglect of work, laziness and dirty habits. The schoolroom offences tended to be less numerous.

Boys who had behaved well during the week were allowed leave in the town on Saturday afternoon. This privilege was not often abused.

General Conduct

Overall, the behaviour of the pupils appears to have been generally very good. It couldn’t always have been easy. The boys were in a town school on a compact site where they were of necessity more “cooped up” than boys in a farm school, such as at Barnes’ Home in Heaton Mersey. Some were bound to give more trouble to those responsible for the administration. For this reason, it was important for the staff to stimulate good conduct by rewards as well as repressing bad conduct by punishment. 

Deaths of inmates

Although the food was good and plentiful and the school had regular visits and checks from the medical profession, illnesses did occur and deaths, sadly, ensued. Over the years there were a number of children who died at the school. Sometimes they died as a consequence of an inherited condition or something contracted before entering the school. In 1901 for instance, two boys died at the school: a very weakly boy who rapidly succumbed to an attack of pneumonia, while another died from syncope. It was always with regret when the Principal or Governor of the school wrote in his annual report that “we followed a boy to his grave”. Conversely, sometimes it was said that “this year we have not had to visit ‘God’s acre’ ” – a reference to the graveyard.