Hampton School

History

In 1557, Robert Hammond, a wealthy brewer who had acquired property in Hampton, left in his will provision for the maintenance of a "free scole" and to build a small schoolhouse "with seates in yt" in the churchyard of Hampton Church .

Although Hampton School was founded in 1557, there was provision in the will that the school would only continue as long as the vicar, churchwardens and parishioners carried out his requests. If not, then the properties would revert to his heirs. It seems that the school did not survive beyond 1568, or possibly earlier, and the properties reverted to the heirs.

Subsequently, however, the school re-opened in 1612. This was as a result of a Commission established to enquire into the fate of Tudor charities that had disappeared for various reasons. The "learned counsell on bothe sides" reached deadlock at the Commissioners. However, in the spirit of compromise and through the generosity of the then legal owner of the properties, Nicholas Pigeon, the school was re-endowed.

The early school was on the site of St Mary's Church by the River Thames. It moved to a site on Upper Sunbury Road in 1880. The new school buildings cost £8,000 and were built in the Elizabethan Tudor style to accommodate 125 day boys and 25 boarders. The school moved to its present site on Hanworth Road in 1939. The new 28 acre site allowed for expansion and the potential to provide for 600-650 boys. The foundation stone was laid on 5 July 1938 and a year later the school was opened.

The School converted from voluntary aided status to become a fee-paying independent school in 1975 after changes to the administration of secondary education in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. It is next to The Lady Eleanor Holles School for girls, with which it co-operates in a number of co-curricular activities and shares several classes, clubs, facilities and a coach service. Headmaster Barry Martin retired in July 2013 after 16 years of service. He was succeeded by Kevin Knibbs.

Founders' Day is celebrated by the school towards the end of each academic year. The occasion is marked by a procession of boys walking from the school to St. Mary's Church.

Campus

The School buildings include an assembly hall, sports hall, performing arts centre, classrooms, a Sixth Form centre and specialist facilities for the Sciences, Technology, ICT, Art, Music, Drama and Modern Languages. The site of 29 acres (120,000 m2) accommodates playing fields comprising four rugby pitches, seven football pitches, six cricket squares, three astroturf and three acrylic tennis courts, a 3G Astroturf multi-purpose football/rugby pitch, athletics facilities, two rock walls and the Old Hamptonians' Pavilion.

Charity

Through the Form Charity programme the whole school community helps raise money and awareness for good causes locally (e.g.Princess Alice Hospice, Barnardos, Home-Start and the Shooting Star Trust), nationally (e.g. Jeans for Genes Day and Breakthrough Breast Cancer), and internationally (e.g. Opportunity International, the African Medical and Research Foundation, Pahamune House). In 2012/13, over £25,000 was raised by Form Charity.

Results

A Level Results for 2012-2013 : 31% of the mainstream grades were A*s (2012: 30%), 74.23% were at A*-A (2012: 74%) and 94.6% were at A*-B (2012: 96%). Thirty boys sat the Pre-U Exam in Physics, 18 of whom were graded D2, the equivalent of an A*, and 10 of whom received the even higher D1 rating. Nearly all leavers secured places at an elite university and thirty one Oxbridge offers were confirmed. The School’s results are significantly above the national figures and almost all Fifth Formers stay on in the Sixth Form. These are results for GCSE in 2012-13: 89.64% of the grades were A*s and As (2012: 91%), while the percentage of A* grades was 57.29% (2012: 56%). The national figure for A* grades for boys in 2013 was 5.3%. One boy achieved 11 A* grades, twenty achieved 10 and 14 achieved 9. A* grades accounted for over 57% of all grades awarded. There was a 99.89% A*-C grade pass rate. In Mathematics, Geography, Physics and Biology boys follow the more rigorous IGCSE courses. As well as GCSEs and IGCSEs, 94 boys sat the OCR Free Standing Mathematics Qualification. There is no A* grade for this qualification, but 85 boys received A grades.

International aid

Hampton School has for some years financed a link with Kiira College Butiki, a secondary school in Uganda. As well as regularly supporting international organisations as part of its general charity programme, it supports a safe haven for children at Senga Bay in Malawi. Hampton boys have regularly spent some of their gap years at either Kiira College or the Safe Haven.

Rugby union

Rugby Union at Hampton School is taken seriously, and former pupils include England sevens captain Simon Amor, Bath, England 'A' player Andy Beattie, Seb Jewell (Harlequins) and Alex Lundberg (Wasps). In the 2012-2013 season, the 1st XV reached the semi-final of the Daily Mail Cup, the furthest it has ever progressed, but narrowly lost 11–5 to Dulwich College. It also won the Jack Chester Memorial Cup. It was named Evening Standard Team of the Month in December 2012 and Rugby World Team of the Month in April 2013. In 2014 & 2015 the Hampton 1st XV reached the quarter finals of the Natwest cup only to lose out to RGS High Wycombe and Dulwich College respectively. The school has close links with Premiership Academies such as London Irish, Harlequins and London Wasps as well as 4 current pupils having played at England U16 schoolboy level. The current Director of Rugby is Mr Sean Thompson.

Football

Football is a very popular sport at Hampton, with a number of competitive teams in each year group and a 'Social League' for boys in the 5th Form and above. The school regularly takes part in national competitions, winning the Boodles ISFA Cup in 1999, 2007 and 2012 and reaching the final in 2005, 2009 and 2015. The U15 Team won the Investec ISFA Cup in 2012 played at the Burton Albion FC Stadium, and also the ISFA Fair Play Award ISFA Cup in 2012.

Cricket

Cricket is a major sport at Hampton and there are several teams at all levels. The 1st XI frequently tours overseas countries such as Sri Lanka and India. In England the 1st XI has regularly won the 50/40 League cup, a competition played amongst schools in London and surrounding areas, as well as having regularly reached the final stages of the National Twenty20 competition. Age group teams have consistently won the Middlesex Cup and competed in later rounds of the Nationals. A handful of recent leavers have gone on to play first-class cricket and two Old Boys currently play at first-class counties: Toby Roland-Jones (Middlesex) and Zafar Ansari (Surrey). The school is also represented by the Old Hamptonians in the Cricketers Cup/Trophy; a prestigious Old Boys competition played to a high standard exclusively by leavers of the top cricketing schools in the country in a knockout format.

Rowing

Hampton School Boat Club is one of the top school rowing clubs in the country and each year produces a 1st VIII that competes at Championship level in national school events . The boat club is based at the Millennium boathouse which it shares with the Lady Eleanor Holles School. Rowing at Hampton is open to boys in the third year and above and the boat club competes at many races both at home and abroad. Hampton has produced three treble winning 1st VIIIs in its history and has been strongly represented at the Junior World Rowing Championships. Martin Cross, a history teacher there, is a gold medalist from the 1984 Olympics and won bronze in 1980. Many Old Hamptonians have gone on to compete at higher levels such as The Boat Race, the World Rowing Championships and the Olympic Games, with Greg Searle and Jonny Searle perhaps the most famous of those, winning gold in the coxed pair in Barcelona in 1992. In 2004 Hampton won 1st, 2nd and 3rd VIIIs at the Schools' Head of the River Race. In 2013, at the same race, they came first in the following categories; Championship VIII's, 2nd VIII's, 3rd VIII's, J16 Championship VIII's, J16 2nd VIII's, J15 2nd VIII's, and J15 3rd VIII's, winning a total of 63 gold medals.In 2012-13, Hampton was the top-performing school in both the School’s Head of the River Race and the National Schools’ Rowing Regatta, where all of the senior squad rowers won medals.

Music

In addition to class music, nearly 400 boys receive instrumental tuition from visiting teachers. Guitarist Brian May of rock band Queen was a pupil at the school. One pipe organ pupil at the school, Timothy Burke of The Mules, served as Organ Scholar at Exeter College, Oxford from 2001–2004. More recently, Lawrence Thain FRCO became Organ Scholar of New College, Oxford in 2008. There is a full Symphony Orchestra, as well as a String Orchestra, a Chamber Orchestra, Wind Band and two Jazz Bands. There are about thirty different music groups playing regularly. Frequent concerts provide performing opportunities for these groups, and for soloists and chamber groups.

Drama

Dramatic productions also range widely: a typical year might see a Shakespearean or classical play, many studio presentations including pupils' own work, a musical, and evenings of junior drama, with each Form in an entire year group putting on a play, or a whole year group involved in a major production, an excellent example being the "450th Musical," a work designed to commemorate the schools 450th anniversary, which involved contributions from every year of the school, and was devised entirely by the 5th and 6th Forms. Part of it was shown to Prince Edward when he came to lay the foundation stone for the new 450th Performing Arts Centre, and he was said "to have laughed all the way through." A Hampton School Theatre Company, "In Human Form", took its own plays The London Thing, which was well reviewed in both the Scotsman and the Times Educational Supplement, to the Edinburgh Festival in August 2000, and returned there in August 2001 with their play Lucky. A newly formed Theatre Company, "About Turn", took its first production to the Edinburgh Festival in August 2002 and returned in 2004. A new Sixth Form drama The Dating Game, including a number of girls from Lady Eleanor Holles School, was shortlisted for the National Student Drama Festival in Scarborough in 2006 and was taken to the 2007 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, to highly positive reviews.

In 2008, the school (in association with Lady Eleanor Holles) performed Stephen Sondheim's "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street". The staging was highly elaborate, including props (such as chairs and razors) from original productions at the National Theatre. In August 2009 the group, as Artfelt Theatre Company, took this production (albeit in shortened, reduced orchestration form) to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Hampton School hosted its very first annual Playwrights Festival in March 2014. This event consisted of the plays "Luther and Severus" (Aca Delic and Oliver Cook), "All There Is" (Thomas Millward), and "Forecast". All three were written and directed by 5th and 6th formers, and performed by 4th to 6th formers from both LEH and Hampton. The event was organised by Lauren Bensted, and were performed in the 450 hall or Drama hall.

Boys from Hampton School have also a long history of being heavily involved in the production of the newspaper of the National Student Drama Festival (Noises Off). Current alumni on the staff there are John Winterburn (Office Manager), Henry Ellis, Euan Forsyth and Ben Lander.

Debating

A range of topics is addressed and boys of all ages are encouraged to participate, either as a main speaker or from the floor. Debates are held with the Lady Eleanor Holles School and teams are entered in national events, notably the Schools' Mace and the Oxford Union competition.

Writing

The School Magazine, The Lion, which is distributed free and is produced by an editorial team of pupils, led by a teacher. It is produced at the School on its own desktop publishing equipment and supplied for printing on disc. This magazine includes boys' creative and original writing. Boys, on their own initiative, also produce several student magazines, which offer much scope for creativity, and amusing insights into life at Hampton. An arts magazine called The Literary Lions is also issued on a regular basis.

Talk!

In September 2000 a lecture series "Talk!" was inaugurated. Since then over one hundred distinguished visiting speakers from the worlds of art, business, the media, politics and science have spoken and answered questions from large audiences.

Art

Hampton School encourages Art as a part of the curriculum. The Art Club provides facilities for work in a range of media with competitions for those interested. In 2000, new facilities for Art were opened: these consist of four art studios (one for the Sixth Form) including a suite of 15 iMacs; a kiln for production of ceramics; and a gallery for student and external exhibitions. In 2004 a further studio was added.

Old Hamptonians

in alphabetical order

Notable teachers past and present