Walter Ronald Swale: – [Headmaster 1946–1971]
Unfortunately, we do not have a formal obituary for this most notable Headmaster of Heath Grammar School — possibly because the Association was going through something of a hiatus at the time of his death or possibly because no-one has felt up to the task!.
However, as a rather lame substitute, we have a short summary of his life from the November 1998 Newsletter, some detective work undertaken by Richard Taylor [Heath 1969–1976] and the order of service for the Service of Thanksgiving for his life held at Heath United Reformed Church on :
Walter Ronald Swale was born in London but grew up and was educated in Tonbridge, Kent. In 1929 he married Lucy Vera Stroud in Bedford. They had three sons. Mrs Swale died on .
He joined the Territorial Army in 1939 as a driver in the Royal Army Service Corps and was commissioned later that year. As an RASC staff officer he held posts at various formation headquarters and at the War Office before the Normandy landings, where he was Deputy Assistant Quartermaster General at Caen and afterwards in Antwerp. Towards the end of his career he transferred to the Army Educational Corps where his duties included helping to rebuild the German education service.
He was appointed Headmaster of Heath Grammar School in 1946 and retired in July 1971. He had previously been senior English master at King Edward VI Grammar School, Birmingham.
In Halifax he was a former president of the Round Table and former Chairman of the Halifax Royal Infirmary House Committee. He helped set up and became chairman of the Halifax Marriage Guidance Council. In 1962 he was the first teachers’ representative to be elected to the Halifax Education Committee, a position he held for several years.
He attended Birmingham University and, in 1925, he had a student placement at King Edward VI School in Birmingham, presumably as part of teacher training, and was appointed in 1931 to succeed the English master on his retirement. Richard Taylor found an image of him probably from soon after this in a King Edward VI Grammar School photo. Select the one in the bottom row labelled ‘Five Ways’ and double click on it to see the whole photo. There is an option to enlarge the size of the photo. He is seated towards the left of the row of masters.
As noted above, he spent most of World War II away from the school and chose to apply for the post at Heath Grammar School not long after his return from active service. There is a fulsome tribute to him on pp. 7–8 of the July 1946 edition of The Five Ways Magazine mentioning, among other things, his work as a teacher, in the Dramatic Society and in the Library, his strenuous walking holidays and cycle trips and his Army service during the War.
The Five Ways Magazine
Reading through The Five Ways Magazine, we get a picture of W.R. Swale somewhat different from the one we saw at Heath. The first mention comes in No. 28 Summer 1926 when, as a student teacher, he is credited with producing School for Scandal by Sheridan along with others.
Following his arrival at King Edward VI Grammar School in 1931, he is credited with being involved in the production of Julius Cesar in Britain, an Operetta in 3 Acts (1932), the Christmas Entertainment (1932), The Taming of the Shrew (no date), The Rivals (1935), a School Entertainment (1936), H.M.S. Pinafore (1937), King Henry the Fourth, Part I (1938) and The Mikado in which Mr Swale played the Mikado (1939)
in the traditional Savoy manner; complete with a fine make-up, a commanding presence, a sardonic smile that would not come off, an unusual dexterity in the manipulation of his expressive fan, the sinister gloating with which he desired to make the punishment fit the crime, he portrayed the pseudo-philanthropic monarch to the life,
a performance which was being recalled in 1998.
The last mention of his involvement in dramatics comes in 1945:
Last September one or two very amusing evenings were spent in dramatic exercises, in which boys learnt to eat imaginary meals (a useful knack in these days), put on imaginary coats and answer imaginary telephones. These were continued by Mr Swale in his acting classes.
Following his departure a ‘Swale’ Prize for work with the Dramatic Society was established.
On his arrival he also took over responsibility for the library. Over the Summer Term of 1933 he arranged for many books not in circulation to be re-bound. On his departure it was said, ‘He re-created the Library.’
He quickly became involved with the Literary and Debating Society for which he organised mock trials (1931, 1933, 1934), lectures on hypnotism (1933, 1938) and a lantern lectures (1933: ‘Shakespeare and two of his plays’).
Issue No. 49 Summer 1933 offers congratulations on his obtaining his M.A. Degree from Birmingham University.
He also became involved with the Photographic Society, giving lectures on ‘How to use your camera’ (1933), lantern slide making (1937) and another with no title (1938).
When the Gramophone Society was formed in 1934 he gave the first lecture.
In 1934 he was involved in the first of many walking tours, this one to Shropshire and Wales and the following year to Denmark. In 1938 the tour was nicknamed ‘Round Ulster as the fly crawls.’ To this he added cycling tours, to the Netherlands in 1936 and to Denmark in 1937.
In 1935 he became involved with the Fencing Club and in 1937, in a match with the Lucas Club, the report says;
This time we presented teams of five and included for the first time a master, Mr Swale, who had been an ardent member of the club for nearly three years. We completely turned the tables in this match and won quite comfortably.
However, in the Autumn of 1938, the club reports that ‘Mr Fletcher and Mr Swale have been unable to attend owing to the rehearsals of the “Mikado.”’
In 1936 he took a small party of Community Service Corps members to the Council House to attend the meeting of the City Council and to hear a debate on Birmingham’s housing problem.
However, perhaps the most significant involvement was with the League of Nations Union Junior Branch. He had become Secretary of the Birmingham and District Branch of the League of Nations Union in 1932 and for the Junior Branch organised exhibitions (1934, 1937), a debate with Holly Lodge High School, Smethwick (1935), a discussion at George Dixon's Secondary School on ‘Causes of War’ (1937), a lecture on the advantages of foreign travel abroad:
- One makes new and foreign acquaintances and is so able to foster international co-opera-tion;
- One appreciates the change;
- One can use one's knowledge of languages (and ‘language’);
- One sees places, people and things of historical and other interest (1937) and
a lecture on the ‘The Danish-German Problem’ (1938) in which
Mr Swale expressed his sympathy with the Danes whom he described as a peace-loving, friendly nation, with an army, navy, and air force which were mere toys by the side of the German war machine.
A report in the Summer of 1937 states that
Mr Swale, our assistant House Master, and C. B. Benson, Secretary of the L.N.U. Junior Branch, have done much to keep the movement in front of the School at a time when opposition and criticisms have been forthcoming.
However, by 1939 the League of Nations Union Junior Branch had been superseded by the Foreign Affairs Society at whose first meeting on February 15th Mr Swale opened the debate proposing that ‘This Society prefers Democracy to Dictatorship.’ A fortnight later he gave a lantern lecture, entitled ‘Foreign Youth Hostels,’ saying that
in his opinion the finest way to promote co-operation and friendship amongst the young people of Europe was by means of the various Youth Hostel Associations.
By Christmas 1939 Mr Swale had enlisted and sent in a report on the four members of staff who had joined the 34th Anti-Aircraft Brigade Company of the R.A.S.C. stationed at Smethwick. A separate note mentioned that
A self-willed car, in the care of Lieutenant Swale, violently assaulted a traffic island some time ago. The car, for its folly, suffered some damage but Mr Swale luckily escaped from his ordeal unharmed … We learn, however, that Mr Swale does not care to discuss this in the concrete.
By Spring 1940 he had been appointed Brigade Supply Officer; by the summer he had, beginning as a Second Lieutenant and rising to Lieutenant, now become a Captain.
Issue No. 75 Spring 1943 reported: ‘Staff Capt. W. R. Swale has been leading physical activities compared with which his pre-war hikes over wild crags in Northern Ireland pale into insignificance.’
In 1945 he was Mentioned in Dispatches. The tributes to him on his departure in 1946 mentions that ‘As a Staff Officer he worked tirelessly for months to help plan D-Day and, that successfully achieved, he was seconded to the Army Education Corps, where he was 2nd i/c of the Education of the B.L.A. At the same time he seems to have visited every town in Liberated Europe.’
Much later in November 1983, the King Edward VI Grammar School Newsletter reports:
He could not come to the dinner as he says that he will be in Kent in Mid-October. He still, at 79, goes walking over the hills and says that his cataract is moving about as fast as a Swiss glacier. His ‘eye-man’ says he'll operate ‘when he's older!’ He can still read and watch T.V. in tolerable comfort and has a cast-iron excuse for not recognising people encountered in the street. Same old Ron!
In the January 1989 Newsletter we hear that:
These days Mr Swale admits to being ‘feeble of foot and rheumatic of shoulder.’ He is recovering from an eye operation and trying to cultivate patience. ‘Difficult,’ he says, at eighty four.
Finally, a bit of humour in the July 1996 Newsletter when Trevor W.B. Cull [1924–32] remembers Mr Swale arriving in 1932:
I remember him asking 5A ‘Why do you think Coleridge did not finish Kubla Khan?' There was complete silence; whereupon Mr Swale said, ‘The gas man called to read the meter.’
He also gave an amusing talk:
about Wordsworth getting up tight about his sister having an affair with a junkie called Coleridge.
Thanks to Richard Taylor for his work bringing this additional information to our notice.
Two observations
- Mr Swale’s involvement in the development of extra-curricular activities at King Edward VI Grammar School during the 1930s parallels that of the masters who joined Heath in the early 1930s; he may have been pleased on becoming Head that Heath was so well-endowed in that area.
- His ardent pacifism may have been dealt a serious blow by the outbreak of war and seeing the consequences of war in Europe after the war had ended and most of the combat troops had been withdrawn may have had a significant effect on him which he found difficult to talk about, not least because his staff included men who had been in active conflict which he had not.
Order of service
which can also be viewed or downloaded in PDF format.
Among the memorabilia kindly given to us by Jerry Fearnley [Heath 1962–1970] are letters sent by an old boy and a former teacher to Alan Swale following the death of W.R. Swale.
Both can be viewed or downloaded in PDF format though the letter from Brian Evans has faded in places:
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