by Peter Caithness (M ’50)
ST. MARTIN’S HOUSE IN THE ’20’s
Most boys must have a certain feeling of trepidation on arriving at their public school for the first time, and I was no exception. My inferiority complex was not improved by the fact that the first person l met on entering the House from the private side was a large, well-dressed individual with such a self-assured manner that I assumed he must be a master. I soon discovered my mistake, he was in fact Bob Smallman, head of the House and far more important in my life than a mere master.
However, the next morning the school uniform of black coat, grey flannel trousers, stiff white collar and black tie separated the sheep, prefects and all, from the goats. New boys had their own distinguishing mark as all of us under 15 had to wear Eton collars, and a great day it was when these badges of servitude could be thrown away. A sartorial note which must have survived from Victorian days was the school rule which read: “Prefects may wear tall hats on Sundays”. I intended to take advantage of this when I became a school prefect by borrowing my father’s black topper, but somehow never got round to it.
An activity which loomed large in one’s first year was fagging. We had no personal chores to worry about as there was a team of maids in the House to do all the serving and waiting at meals, and to make beds and tidy our rooms. But each new boy was assigned to a prefect as his personal fag. The duties were comparatively simple but they had to be fitted into a busy working day. I fagged for a splendid character named Roly Nutt, and my duties in the main were confined to producing hot water for shaving in the morning, keeping his study tidy, helping with his maths. prep. (I was in a higher maths. set) and cleaning his rugger boots. Nutt was in the XV at a time when College rugger was very much in the ascendant. We had beaten Epsom, in our last game against them, 4|-nil, and Merchant Taylor’s 26-nil in the previous year, and in my first term we won all our school matches, beating King’s, Canterbury twice, Merchant Taylor’s, Mill Hill and Blundell’s and scoring 85 points to ll in the process. I like to think that the polish I imparted to Roly Nutt’s rugger boots contributed in some small way to those victories.
…AND IN THE FORTIES
By the Spring of 1946 St. Martin’s was back to normal. All the war damage repairs had been carried out and the “new” Prep Room with the latest style _“bunks” or ‘i‘toyes” had been built and seen to be practical as well as pleasant. True, the top floor had an appreciable sway when buffeted by themore ferocious Channel gales, but this was a hazard of the draw for bedrooms and did not constitute an actual threat to life or limb. The School as a whole had by then mainly recovered from its traumatic return home from temporary exile in Poltimore, Devon. Small in numbers, its character had remained constant, held together administratively and commercially by the sound leadership and business acumen of the then Headmaster, George Renwick.
At this time most of the more senior boys had joined Dover College at Poltimore. Their tales of terror and perhaps imagination endowed Poltimore and the men who had been there with an aura of legendary exploit and achievement which we mere boys who were new anyway and very young could never hope to emulate. I imagine it is the same today: the heroes of yesterday assume Arthurian proportions.
St. Martin’s at that time provided a fairly gentle introduction to Public School life. Our bodily needs were looked after by Anne-in-the-Kitchen under the eagle eye of gracious “DolIy” Ewart, whilst Matron, Miss Smith, ensured we got our sheets changed at suitable intervals. She was too experienced a campaigner to be upset by our uncouth ways and I hope she forgave our occasional ragging, which was never meant unkindly.
A determined effort was then under way to raise the scholastic standard of the School and St. Martin’s attracted its fair share of brains and brawn due to Major Ewart’s seniority in the School which enabled him to select boys of scholastic aptitude whilst not neglecting candidates who would help in winning the all-important House Matches. St. Martin’s was not, I think, “cock” house all the time, but it was a pretty close thing and we seemed to win most things that mattered.
In particular, I remember the Devon Home Guard Cup, which required an united effort on the part of every member of St. Martin’s to attain various standards of physical fitness. A similar success for St. Martin’s house effort was in the Sports Cup. One year, too, ifl remember right, the first three places in the School Steeplechase Cup were filled by “Martin’s”. But that might have been our spartan upbringing which resisted the ‘flu then ravaging the lesser houses.
This kind of success can be attributed to that indefinable quality of “House Spirit”, whereby every member really wanted to do his best for his house. This spirit was generated by the boys themselves of course but much was due to the encouragement given by their Housemaster. And this is where Allon Ewart, “the Mon”, excelled. Boys were given the encouragement (sometimes a prod) they needed to do something, anything, for the School, the House, themselves. Many a team list made out in that inimitable, neat but illegible writing, ended in a Gaelic exhortation or its equivalent to “go to it” with “Rattle and Bang”. And we did.
It was no bad training for life in the world outside the College Walls to follow Allon’s dictum. And it is to his eternal credit as Housemaster that we at Martin’s knew what it was in a Christian spirit to do everything “heartily, as unto the Lord …”
P. W. CAITHNESS (M ’50)
[These history articles all come from a publication celebrating the College's 100th Anniversary in 1971]
