Haileybury and Imperial Service College - History

History

The previous institution on the site was East India College, the training establishment founded in 1806 for "writers" (clerks) of the Honourable East India Company. The College was initially based in Hertford Castle, but the site at Hertford Heath was acquired for future occupation. William Wilkins, who had previously designed the buildings of Downing College, Cambridge, and would later design the National Gallery in London, was appointed principal architect. The buildings were completed and occupied in 1809. They comprise four ranges which enclose an area known as Quad, the largest academic quadrangle in the UK and one of the largest in the world. In the wake of the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the East India Company was wound up, and its College closed in January 1858.

Four years later, in 1864, the buildings were re-opened as a public school, Haileybury College.

The Chapel dome was added by Arthur Blomfield and completed in 1877. Further Victorian additions were designed by John William Simpson. The Memorial Dining Hall was opened by the future King George VI & Queen Elizabeth, and serves as a monument to former pupils who gave their lives in the First World War. During the past 40 years, its use has been extended to commemorate deaths in all military conflicts. The dining hall boasts one of the largest unsupported domes in Europe. Until the 1990s, the entire school of over 700 pupils dined there at a single sitting, all brought to silence for grace by the beating of a massive brass howitzer shell, captured from a German gun emplacement during World War I and then converted into a gong. A gilded plaster boss in the centre of this dome represents an oak tree being struck by lightning. Known as Little Lightning Oak this decoration represents the massive oak tree that stands on the lawn in front of Terrace, the promenade visible in this photograph. This tree was struck by lightning and all but destroyed but, miraculously, re-sprouted. The oak has been seen as a metaphor for the school, a valuable entity decimated by war, but nonetheless capable of regeneration.

As well as the dining hall, there are other impressive memorials to the school's 1,436 war casualties. The memorial on Terrace, originally built to commemorate those lost in World War I, was unveiled by General Sir Alexander Godley, KCB, KCMG on 7 July 1923. It was designed by former pupil Sir Reginald Blomfield. Known as the Cross of Sacrifice this simple stone structure serves as a prototype for war memorials found in every Commonwealth War Cemetery and other war memorials around the world.

Seventeen former pupils of Haileybury and its antecedents have received the Victoria Cross, and three the George Cross.

In 1942, Haileybury and the Imperial Service College (which had itself subsumed the United Services College) merged to become Haileybury and Imperial Service College, now known as Haileybury.

In the late twentieth century, reforming headmaster David Jewell took charge of Haileybury, bringing it out of its post-cold-war austerity. Stuart Westley, Master of Haileybury until July 2009, was responsible for making the school fully co-educational.