Stouts Hill Magazine 1957, 1958, 1965

I have recently scanned the 1957, 1958, and 1965 Stouts Hill Magazines, and added them to the collection accessible from the usual place.

Stouts Hill for sale...... again!

It looks as though since the building was last for sale, it has been transformed from the timeshare that it had been for many years in to a private house. Here is the link to the 'For Sale' page of Right Move: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/133017830#/?channel=RES_BUY

Rest in peace, John Flood

I've heard from Marian Wood that "John Flood died very suddenly at his home on 11th April. Private funeral in Uley 30th April."

If receive any more details, I can put them here.

John Flood was one of my teachers at the school. He had a wide range of interests that he was keen to share with the boys, and he used to take some of us sailing at Frampton on Sundays, which remains a happy memory. He must have been in his late 30s then; in his early 90s by now.

Rest in peace, Heneage Brooke

Marian Wood has got in touch to tell me of the unfortunate early death of Heneage Brooke (aged 64) on the 6th of March, 2021. I also heard about it earlier from Roger Knott-Fayle, without the details.

"Private funeral 12th April at 15:30 after drive through Uley. Donations to RAF Benevolent Fund. Undertakers Clutterbuck of Cam."

Heneage was at Stouts Hill from 1965 to 1970; he was two or three years younger than me, and I don't remember him from the 1960s, but I met him briefly at the 2010 reunion, and he appears in a couple of my photos of the event.

Key to visitors

Here are the people who've contributed to this blog so far, with whatever I know about their dates at the school, and links to their own Web sites, if any.

• Roger Dawson 1944-48
• Anthony Sweeting 1945-48
• David Woodall/Mackinley-Woodhall 1946-51
• John Corps 1945-52
• Derek Brian Hulme 1950-53 (approx)
• Nigel Cant 1949-55
• Christopher Ellis 1952-57
• Michael Langley-Smith 1952-57
• Ken Merron 1955-57
• David Dawson 1954-60
• Nick Benn 1955-60
• James Sillavan 1958-62
• Richard Guha 1959-62
• Jonathan Marler 1959-62
• Jeremy Blatchford 1961-63
• Mike Curtis 1959-64
• Jeremy Cape 1960-64
• Chris Hale 1961-64
• David Ireland 1959-65 (?)
• David Llewellyn 1960-65
• Julian Williams 1962-67
• Jonathan Palfrey 1963-67
• Emile Farhi 1963-68
• Charles Llewellyn 1962-68
• Robert St Maur Mills 1963-68
• David Povey 1963-68
• Peter Dawson 1965-69
• Andrew Porter 1966-69
• Jonathan Hely-Hutchinson 1968-69
• Roger Fayle/Knott-Fayle 1965-70
• Stephen Fry* 1965-70
• Richard Madley 1968-70
• Jonathan Tilney 1968-70
• Andrew Pike 1964-71
• Richard Leitch 1966-71
• Robin Kimmons 1967-71
• Ashoak Daryani 1965-72
• Bob Davidson 1968-72
• Michael Lawson 1968-72
• Laurence Robinson 1968-72
• A.J.G. (John) Morris 1968-73
• Colin Richards 1968-73
• William Greeves 1969-73
• David Clemes 1969-74
• Huw Warren 1972-74
• Jason Crossley-John 1973-75
• Justin Tugwell/Hunter 1970-77
• Andrew Gordon-Johnson 1973-?
• Robert Darell 1974-79
• Alan Davis 1974-79
• Richard Mechan 1974-79
• David Morris 1975-79
• Tim Ridley 1975-79
• Paul Reynolds 1975-79
• Giles Walker 1975-79
• Michael D. Walker —
• Sarah Cromie —

*Stephen Fry hasn't contributed to this blog, as far as I know, but I've occasionally referred to his autobiography Moab is my washpot (1997).

Any dates you may see elsewhere on the Web are unreliable: it seems that many people misremember their own dates. I take dates from the Stouts Hill Magazine whenever I can.

When people have changed their surnames since leaving the school, I've given both names like this: name-then/name-now.

Stouts Hill for sale!

Very suprised to see whilst reading this months edition of Cotswold Life that agents Knight Frank have Stouts Hill for sale. Further reading suggests that the time share company will cease trading and the site is for sale as a whole including the cottages that were built within the past twenty years. Price is listed as offers in excess of £2m. Here's the link:

http://www.knightfrank.co.uk/properties/residential/for-sale/uley-dursley-gloucestershire-gl11/cir160299

Alan Davis

School photo 1941

It seems worth mentioning that Laurence Robinson has contributed a school photo from about 1941 to my Stouts Hill collection on Flickr, as this is the earliest photo I've received so far (see the link to the photos on the right). We see the boys looking relatively cheerful, considering that their country was fighting a great war and not yet winning.

Rest in peace, Anthony Cromie

Kim Scott-Clark writes again:

"Sadly I have been asked to advise that Anthony Cromie passed away on Sunday 21st Feb. I feel embarrassed to find myself only emailing you with 'death notices' but I know that a posting by yourself on social media will be read by far more old boys than I can reach."

"Ant and Sue Cromie left Uley some years ago and moved to Llandrindod Wells in mid-Wales to be nearer their son Andrew and his family. I will be honest to say I am not sure of his exact age but over 80yrs. He had been ill for the past few months but am pleased to say that he remained at home where he was cared for both by his family and health workers - he passed away peacefully with his family beside him."

"Funeral arrangements are still being made but I understand that a cremation followed by a church service in Llandrindod is likely. Please do pass on my email to anyone if asked as I am more than happy to answer questions from anyone."

And so the last headmaster of Stouts Hill School goes to rest (deputy headmaster in my own time). I had a brief friendly correspondence with him in 2007, and met him at the 2009 reunion. Condolences to Sue and the rest of his family.

The following announcement has appeared at Telegraph.co.uk:

"Anthony Cromie passed away peacefully at home on 21st February 2016, aged 83. He will be sadly missed by all the family and friends. A service will be held at Hereford Crematorium on Saturday 5th March at 10.45am followed by a Thanksgiving Service at New Life Church, Llandrindod Wells at 2pm. Any donations can be made to The Bracken Trust." (Placed by Sarah Coates)

Two more photos

I've recently added to the collection on Flickr a school photo and a cricket team photo contributed by Charles Hamilton (SH 1946-53) from his time at the school.

Message from Kim Scott-Clark

"I am very sorry to say that my mother Paddy Scott-Clark passed away last Saturday. She died at Gloucester hospital ten days after undergoing emergency stomach surgery. Although her death was not sudden and her family were able to be with her it is obviously a shock to everyone that knew her. I realise that there are many old Stouts Hill pupils including yourself who will have fond memories of her and I would be extremely grateful if you could spread the word of her death. There will be a Thanksgiving service at St Giles Church, Uley, on Friday October 31st at 12.30pm and anyone will be very welcome."

I pass this on just as it comes, with my own regrets, having corresponded occasionally with Paddy in recent years.

Old boys list

In 1979 and 1980, Jeremy Lee-Browne compiled a list of Stouts Hill old boys, with their dates at the school and their addresses at the time. John Morris has removed the addresses—most probably out of date by now—and passed me the edited list as a PDF file (thanks to John for this effort).

The list is seriously incomplete. I suppose Jeremy included only those whose addresses he could find, so (for instance) I'm not included myself. Naturally, the early years are under-represented, although it does include some fairly senior old boys.

April 2009: I've now made my own list, compiled from information in the Stouts Hill Magazine. This list is also incomplete and there is more to be done with it, but I contribute it as a work in progress.

You can find both lists here.

June 2011: I've done more work on my list, which has gone from 12 to 19 pages, with a better representation of senior old boys, and also includes more dates previously missing. I hope to add more information later this summer.

December 2011: I've added old boys' info from the 1954 Magazine, and a few minor corrections from John Morris.

The Latin lesson

From Life of Brian: Romani ite domum.

Word verification

In July I turned on word verification for this blog, forcing people to type in a random word before adding comments.

The purpose of this is to prevent spammers from using programs to add automated comments to the blog, which has become a real nuisance.

I'm now turning word verification off again for a trial period, because Blogger has implemented a new spam-filtering system. I'll see how it goes.

27th of October: I've turned word verification back on, because the blog is receiving about 20 spam messages a day, and the spam filtering system doesn't reduce the nuisance much. I still get all of them arriving in my e-mail inbox, and still have to delete all of them. Much better if they don't get onto the blog in the first place. I'm sorry it means a little extra trouble for anyone wanting to post messages on the blog; blame the spammers.

Stouts Hill Reunion 2010 completed

The Stouts Hill Reunion 2010 was held as planned at Stouts Hill on the 15th of August, attended by at least 25 people, who all seemed to have a good time chatting and wandering around the house and grounds. The weather was dry and pleasant throughout.

Alan Davis and his sister Lesley arrived early with an abundant supply of good cold snacks and soft drinks. The bar (in the former headmaster's study) was unmanned but open; we could help ourselves to drinks and drop payment into a box.

I am gradually adding photos of the reunion to Flickr: click here. Please be patient: I have other things to do, and you can expect more photos to appear here over the coming weeks. You're welcome to contribute your own photos.

Although the reunion was a success, the turnout was lower than expected: quite a lot of people expressed interest but never appeared, including all of the eight people who originally requested a reunion in 2010; so Alan and Lesley brought too much food and had to take most of it away afterwards. Alan received advance notice from Emile Farhi, Charles Llewellyn, David Mackinley-Woodhall, Ian McKellan, and Miles Wachter that they would not be coming; and Derek Hulme left a note on this blog.

Anthony and Sue Cromie sent a brief letter to Alan that he read out at the reunion:

Sue and I are very disappointed that we are unable to attend this reunion. We are particularly impressed with your organisational skills and congratulate all on the great success last year.

If you feel it appropriate please ask the Old Boys to carry on setting the example in life of decency and fair play. And I refer to Kipling's poem 'If'. “If you can fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance, run etc...”

My own thanks again to Alan and Lesley for their efforts.

Stouts Hill 1960s video

From a correspondent who wishes to remain anonymous, I've received a video made from various pieces of cine film shot at Stouts Hill in the 1960s. The video is four and a quarter minutes long, and shows what seems to be a masters versus old boys football match (probably September/October 1962), plus some sports day races.

You can find the 30-MB MPEG-4 file here. To download:

• In Firefox for Windows, right-link the link and select Save Link As.
• In Internet Explorer for Windows, right-click the link and select Save Target As. IE changes the file extension to .htm, so you will have to change it back to .m4v manually in order to see the video. Thanks, Microsoft.
• If you have a Mac and can't right-click, control-click instead.

Considering the age of the film, the quality is good, although one section of it is damaged and double-exposed.

I haven't tried to put this on Flickr, because Flickr limits videos to 90 seconds.

Stouts Hill Reunion 2010

Following the successful event in August 2009, David Mackinley-Woodhall told me that he knew of a group of people interested in a reunion in the summer of 2010, some of whom were unable to come this year; and Alan Davis bravely volunteered to arrange another event.

Since then, others have expressed interest, and I hope to join in myself if I can make it to England at that time. If you think you might like to come, please leave a comment here or get in touch by e-mail, to give us an idea of numbers.

The reunion is now planned for the 15th of August 2010. Roll up, roll up for the mystery tour!

Later: I've now booked a flight to England in August, so I seem increasingly likely to be there.

Photos circa 1950

Recently Charles Hamilton (Stouts Hill 1946-53) has contributed 15 photos from his time at the school, and I've added them to Flickr as a new set: you can see them here.

More information about these photos would be welcome, if any of you can remember!

Later: he's also sent scans of the school play programme from 1947, and a photo of the wedding of Anthony and Susan Cromie (1960).

Stouts Hill Reunion, 16th August '09

Well, we did it! The first Stouts Hill reunion since the school closed just over thirty years ago. I can say that I was pleased with the way the day went and how much those of you who attended the event enjoyed it too. I think everybody considered it to have been a worthwhile exercise.

The planning over the past ten months or so had gone smoothly with Stouts Hill Resort being most helpful and letting us have the three rooms and a staffed bar for very reasonable rates. Thanks go to Maureen, the resort manageress, for making it happen. My biggest concern was parking, but with dry weather in the week running up to the 16th meant we could use the field and not inconvenience those in residence.

Shopping for the buffet was done the day before by myself and my sister Lesley and stored in the fridges and freezer at Stouts Hill meaning we didn't have to get up quite so early on the Sunday. Many of you sampled Richard Evans' very kind contribution of wines from the bar. I must also thank Richard for his wife's help in the kitchen in preparing the buffet.

First to arrive was Robin Duncan sporting his boyhood cap. In fact there was several other items of uniform on display including various straw boater hats, 'Old Boy' ties and a scarf. I had brought my tie but wasn't brave enough to put it on until realising I wouldn't look too daft in putting it on.

Arrivals were steady after midday with Sue and Anthony Cromie walking to the school to greet others as they arrived. Their daughter Sarah came along too. Other staff present were Paddy Scott Clark and her sister Jane, John and Christine Flood and a later visit by Chris Coley. Some of us only had a few miles to travel, but some hardy souls travelled from Yorkshire, London, West Wales and to show true commitment Miles Wachter and his wife came back from holiday in Devon for the day!

Sadly, quite a few who had said they would attend didn't make it for whatever reason. They missed a great day! I made an effort to try and record all who attended. Here is the 'register' for the 16th August. Sorry if I missed anybody out.

Justin Bodle
Jeremy Blatchford
Michael Cromie
Jason Crossley-John
Robert Darrel & elder brother (sorry, didn't get your first name!)
Alan Davis
Peter Dawson
Edward Dolby
Robin Duncan
Douglas Edwards (Jan '42 to July '47!)
Richard Evans
Robert Evans
Emile Farhi
Andrew Gordon-Johnson
Derek Hulme
Michael Lawson
Charles Llewellyn
David Mackinley-Woodhall
Digby Macpherson
Andrew Needham
Grant Needham
Jonathan Palfrey
John George Phillips
Jonathan Phippen
John Poulton
Michael Read
Laurence Robinson
James Sillivan
Miles Wachter
Julian Williams

Apologies: Christopher Clift, John Morris, Richard Madley, John Corps, Justin Tugwell and Tony Thomas (music teacher)

Also, there were wives, partners and a small collection of (well behaved) children who enjoyed the visit. I think the most popular observation was how pretty the location was and what a splendid building to have as a school. There was the opportunity to have a look around the grounds to see how the place has changed over the past thirty years.

One thing that pleased me more than anything was how most really made a day of it! I was expecting departures from 3 p.m. and as such made sure we had a group photograph. However, this proved to be only an interlude and everyone seemed to carry on reminiscing for a good couple of hours afterwards.

Needless to say, the question was raised as to when it was going to happen again. As I had only planned for this to happen just the once, I was slightly shocked, but the enthusiasm was certainly there. I think it could be a possibility in the summer of 2011.

Several very generous individuals did ask me to let them know if I was out of pocket in financing the reunion. I think I managed to collect from everybody a contribution, with some donating more. As such I managed to pay all expenses and was left with a small profit! As mentioned above, if we are to do this again sometime then I can simply 'carry over' the balance.

Thank you all once again for making this reunion the success it certainly was and to those who have sent e-mails and 'phone calls of thanks to me over the last few days.

Alan Davis

Mr Cromie

Anthony Cromie, known as Crinkles for some unknown reason, was a fairly young master and dangerously alert: the master mostly likely to materialize out of thin air and pounce on you.

I don't recall whether he ever taught me in class; but he was ever-present around the school. I also spent a short time (one or two terms?) in the dormitory located in his house, which Robert says was known as The Cottage.

Jonathan Marler thinks that Mr Cromie was already related to Mr Angus in some way before his marriage. Jonathan adds that he had “a good sense of humour and a certain charm”.

In his retirement letter to parents in July 1969 (copied to me by John), Mr Angus provided the following information about his successor as headmaster:

Anthony was educated at Wolborough Hill Preparatory School Newton Abbot and Sherborne School, Dorset, where he became Head boy and played Rugger for the 1st.XV and Hockey for the 1st.XI. He was called up for National Service, joined the Infantry and was commissioned in 1952 and later did two Overseas tours with the 1st.Battalion, the Devonshire Regiment - the first to North Africa at the time of the Negnib coup d'etat in Egypt and then saw action against the Mau Mau terrorists in the Aberdare forest in Kenya. He later went to Trinity College, Dublin, where he obtained a Second Class Honours degree in Modern History and Political Science.

Anthony is 36 years old, joined the School in 1955 and has had 10 years teaching experience. In 1960, he married my daughter, Susan, and they have a son, Andrew, and a daughter, Sarah.

Andrew Pike believes that Mr Cromie went on to work at the Old Ride School after Stouts Hill closed.

Anthony and Susan Cromie continued to live in Uley until about 2010.

In 2005 he published a slim volume of children's stories with attractive colour illustrations, called The Adventures of Jonathan Jackdaw. Copies were distributed at the 2009 Stouts Hill Reunion.

Announcement found at Telegraph.co.uk:

Anthony Cromie passed away peacefully at home on 21st February 2016, aged 83. He will be sadly missed by all the family and friends. A service will be held at Hereford Crematorium on Saturday 5th March at 10.45am followed by a Thanksgiving Service at New Life Church, Llandrindod Wells at 2pm. Any donations can be made to The Bracken Trust.

Jane Angus/Oldridge

Jane was the fourth of the Angus daughters, and a pupil at the school from 1947 to 1954. According to the 1973 Stouts Hill Magazine, she was married on the 12th of May 1973, to Mr. Robin Oldridge.

John Morris says:

Jane was a great swimmer and lovely in a swimsuit too. Jane blushed very readily, e.g. if she noticed that you had noticed that she looked lovely in a swimsuit.