Desford is a village and parish in west Leicestershire, seven miles west of the city of Leicester and five miles east of Market Bosworth.
Daily schools for poorer families in 1818 (population 729 in 1811)
There was one school which was funded by subscription and had 20 pupils. The teacher was paid £10.
John Fry, the Rector, stated: ‘The poor are without the means of having their children instructed, though very desirous of so doing.’
Daily schools in 1833 (population 971 in 1831)
There were six daily schools:
A National School, with 48 male and 12 female pupils, funded by an annual allowance of £5 from the National Society at Leicester, other subscriptions and payments from the children.
Another school with 10 male and 30 female pupils.
Another school with 8 female pupils.
A further school established in 1826, with 16 female pupils.
Another established in 1829, with 3 male and 9 female pupils.
A sixth school was established in 1833 and had 4 male and 8 female pupils.
With exception of the National School, the remaining five schools were funded at the expense of the parents.
Daily schools connected to the Anglican Church in 1846-7
One Anglican day school, described as ‘virtually secured’, with 20 male and 29 female pupils. The estimated annual expense of maintaining the school was £23, the cost of which was met by subscription. There was one Mistress, the Master had recently been dismissed, as the subscription and children’s pence were not enough to support him. A remark included in this entry reads: ‘The boys are nearly all attracted to a school supported entirely by Lady Byron situated at Newbold [Verdon], which is entirely disconnected with the Church of England, by portions of land being allotted to each boy, and the greater part are also provided with linen, &c.’
Read more about schools in Desford before 1870
Sunday schools
In 1818
It is unclear whether the school listed above was a Sunday or a daily school. No other schools are listed.
In 1833
There was one Sunday school with 91 male and 109 female pupils, which was funded by the Rector and by collections made at the annual sermon.
Anglican Sunday school in 1846-7
There was one Sunday school united to the National Society, which had 132 male and 147 female pupils, including those attending the day school mentioned above. The school was situated within part of the church and had 15 male and 18 female gratuitous teachers as well as 4 male and 2 female paid monitors. The school was funded by subscription.
In 1851 (population 1,013 )
The Rector stated that the Sunday school was held in the church and alternated between the mornings and the afternoons. The average attendance (in the nine months before the Census was taken in March 1851) at the Anglican Sunday school was 200 pupils in the afternoon and 170 in the evening, with no morning attendance figures listed.
Although there were two nonconformist denominations, the Particular Baptists and the Primitive Methodists, neither had a Sunday school.
Return to A History of Leicestershire Schools: A-Z
Sources
- Education of the Poor Digest, Parl. Papers 1819 (224)
- Education Enquiry, Parl. Papers 1835 (62)
- National Society for Promoting the Education of the Poor in the Principles of the Established Church, Result of the Returns to the General Inquiry made by the National Society, into the state and progress of schools for the education of the poor … during the years 1846-7, throughout England and Wales ( London, 1849).
- 1851 Ecclesiastical census