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I attended a prep school in England. A British prep school is different than an American prep school. It was a kind of private primary school for children 8-13 years of age. Now most have pre-preps for younger children. I did hate my British Prep school, but that was more to do with being seriously home sick. The conditions, especially for new boys, were probably rather more spartan than might have been absolutely necessary. There were often about 12 boys to a dormitory. Which can not create a feeling of home. Later I was in a dormitory of five boys. And that made the whole school experience much happier. Your site is opening up all sorts of memories and, actually, helping me feel a lot better about some of the hurts, real or imagined, of my childhood. I have been looking at old photographs and it is remarkable in how many I look happy. I think it is the few sad times we remember most. The food was not bad, there just wasn't enough of it. To this day I eat at maniacal speed. When they called for Second Helpings only boys who had eaten everything on their plates could go up for them. Like most prep schools we had a uniform. I left my prep school when I was 12. That was a year early.

British Prep Schools

I attended a prep school in England. A British prep school is different than an American prep school. It was a kind of private primary school for children 8-13 years of age. Now most have pre-preps for younger children.

My Experience

I did hate my British Prep school, but that was more to do with being seriously home sick. The conditions, especially for new boys, were probably rather more spartan than might have been absolutely necessary. There were often about 12 boys to a dormitory. Which can not create a feeling of home. Later I was in a dormitory of five boys. And that made the whole school experience much happier. Your site is opening up all sorts of memories and, actually, helping me feel a lot better about some of the hurts, real or imagined, of my childhood. I have been looking at old photographs and it is remarkable in how many I look happy. I think it is the few sad times we remember most.

Food

The food was not bad, there just wasn't enough of it. To this day I eat at maniacal speed. When they called for Second Helpings only boys who had eaten everything on their plates could go up for them. And when the Secoinds had been doled out that was it. I think that in those days of relative sparsity in Britain they probably did their best. But with hindsight I can see that a mistake they made was to try and make the food too wholesome. Roast Beef instead of hamburgers. Boiled potatoes in butter or parsley sauce instead of roast or fried. Fresh caught Plaice instead of fish fingers, smoked kippers for breakfast instead of fried eggs, etc. Boys do not necessarily appreciate the same food as adults.

Descipline

Corporal punishment of children - THE DREADED CANE - strangely enough referred to by a teacher in my Swiss school as the Englischer Krankenheit - The English sickness, was always feared. I was never caned at my Prep school. It was not used very often, perhaps only about once a month on some boy who had done something really bad. It was carried out on the boy fully clothed, not on the naked bottom as in some schools, and the stripes it left were not very severe looking and faded in a day or two. So it was definitely a deterrent rather than a painfrul punishment at our school. And, because it was used so rarely it really was a deterrent. Nobody wanted to be the occasional examplaire victim. We all went in fear of it. Boys at other schools where the cane was used more frequently and more severely seemed to have no great fear of it.

Sports

We played sports against teams from other Prep schools. They either came to our school or we went to theirs. Afterwards we showered with them, in the winter, or in the summer we swam, nude bathing was the rule at our school. So I did see some signs of very severe beatings. I remember a cricket game when afterwards in the swimming pool we all noticed that not a single boy on our team showed any signs of beating, while all their team had caning welts across their bottoms, some were beginning to heal but quite a few were recent wicked yellow and black bruises, the like of which we had never seen at our school. Of course we talked about it. The other boys said the Masters in their school believed every boy should be beaten at least once a month, or preferably once a week to keep him on the straight and narrow. Canings were a daily occurance at their school. They envied us but thought that we were softies. They were, it almost goes without saying, some of the nastiest and most badly behaved boys I have ever met.

Americans at Our School

It was probably one of the least hard Prep schools. There quite a few American kids there and I picked up an American accent, which annoyed my dad. Every day, in a rather touching little ceremony at the end of morning assembly, one of the Masters led the American boys in their Pledge of Allegiance. We Englisch could join in or just watch.

Nearby School

Incidentally, on one of those trips to play sports at another school we went to a Prep school where most of the boys wore kilts. We were rather envious, I think. It presented a colorful lack of uniformity. The school was in the South of England, not Scotland, but where it was and what it was called I can not think. It was another school where the entire team came to the showers with unbruised bottoms as smooth and untouched by a cane as ours were. They were nice happy boys.

Uniform

Like most prep schools we had a uniform. Our uniform was relatively ordinary, except that the school did state a preference that boys of any age should wear long trousers in the winter terms, with shorts being retained for the summer uniform, together with open neck Aertex shirts. Even so only about a third of 10/11 year olds wore longs, though most 12 year olds did. And our school caps had, by the standards of the day, enormous peaks or bills. In shape they were much more like baseball caps. There was no rule about wearing them and so we wore them when it was cold or we wanted to keep the rain off our heads or the sun out of our eyes on the cricket or (and here is another difference) the softball pitch. The rest of the time we went bareheaded. Leaving Early

I left my prep school when I was 12. That was a year early.

Created: 7:56 AM 9/9/2009
Last updated: 7:57 AM 9/9/2009