Letter from Donald Bancroft
On Donald Bancroft [Heath 1924–1931] wrote a letter to the headmaster reporting the death of Lazarus Corney and providing a tribute to him. He continued about his time at Heath:
Heath was a one form entry school. Each ‘year’ consisted of about twenty-five boys, of whom half were scholarship boys, presumably the dozen brightest lads of their age in Halifax and district — very élitist, though such a term was unknown to us. It was during my years at the school that the change from soccer to rugger occurred. I recall playing for the school at rugger, cricket and lives. We had a fives match against the monks at Mirfield, I recall. There was little attention paid to music or drama, and no school societies apart from the occasional debate. Our literary efforts appears in ‘The Heathen’ from time to time. Boys, on the whole, behaved reasonably, and I recall no vandalism or scandal. One or two of the masters were sadistically inclined and terrified us in the lower forms. The gym was a cheerless, cold place with dark and noisome changing rooms. The library was housed in a room on the first floor and is quite unmemorable. One depended largely on the public libraries at Belle Vue and Bankfield. The only time that parents went to the school was on the annual Speech Day. There was no school uniform, except the red cap (invariable) and red blazer (optional). This must be very different now, but I trust that the tradition of scholarship is maintained.
Just for the record, you may like to have a brief account of my own career. After coming down from Oxford I taught at King’s School, Rochester until 1941, when I went into the army, finishing up at Bletchley Park, working on the Ultra project. In 1946 I went to Lancing College and retired from there in 1978 (Second Master and Head of the English Department). I have a minor reputation as a contributor to B.B.C. radio programmes. If you are interested in literary programmes, you can hear me presenting four of my Radio 3 efforts on May 10th, 13th, 17th and 20th. The programmes are entitled ‘A Day in the Life of’ and are broadcast in the interval of Symphony concerts etc. Also, since retiring I have taken up writing short stories and have had fourteen of them broadcast on Morning Story in Radio 4.
I am in touch from time to time with two of Corney’s old pupils, Alex Dakin who taught at Kingswood for many years and owns the KIngsley Bookshop in Bath, and Ronald Lewin, the most distinguished of us all. Doubtless you are familiar with his many books on military history. I hear that he has been invited to write the official history of World War 2.
Editor’s note: it is interesting that he mentions the lack of extra-curricula activities in the twenties; in the thirties there were two scout troops, a model railway club and trips abroad. Perhaps this reflects the arrival in 1930 and 1931 of a group of masters who would remain at the school into the fifties and sixties.