The former Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School in

Crediton Crediton is a town and civil parish in the Mid Devon district of Devon in England. It stands on the A377 Exeter to Barnstaple road at the junction with the A3072 road to Tiverton, about north west of Exeter and around from the M5 motorway ...

, Devon, England was founded (as The Kyng's Newe Gramer Scole of Credyton) in 1547 by

Edward VI Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. Edward was the son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour and the first E ...

and re-endowed and renamed in 1559 by

Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". El ...

History

Foundation

In 1547 the

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented secondary school ...

was founded and endowed by

. In 1559 it was "further endowed by Queen Elizabeth, who by her charter vested the patronage in the twelve governors of the church, directing them to elect four boys, under the name of Queen Elizabeth's Grammar Scholars, to each of whom 40s. are annually given: there are three

exhibition An exhibition, in the most general sense, is an organized presentation and display of a selection of items. In practice, exhibitions usually occur within a cultural or educational setting such as a museum, art gallery, park, library, exhibition ...

s, of £6. 13s 4d each, to either of the universities, tenable for five years. " Teaching began in 1572 in the Lady Chapel of the parish church with 10 pupils In 1861 it moved into new premises (at St Martins Lane). In 1911 it absorbed Dunn's School. It was noted in

Hansard ''Hansard'' is the traditional name of the transcripts of parliamentary debates in Britain and many Commonwealth countries. It is named after Thomas Curson Hansard (1776–1833), a London printer and publisher, who was the first official print ...

in 1952 as a maintained secondary school which provided boarding.

Merger in 1966

In 1966 the boys grammar school (between St Martins Lane and Western Road) incorporated the Crediton High School For Girls (which had been founded in 1911 on the adjoining site to the west). To accommodate the merger, a new multistorey block was built (aligned north-south) on the slope between the former schools.

Comprehensive

In 1973 it merged with The Shelley Secondary Modern school at Barnfield, Crediton. It now forms the Western Road campus (the upper school) of the Queen Elizabeth's School, which is (in 2016) a state run

academy An academy ( Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy ...

, with some

boarding Boarding may refer to: *Boarding, used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals as in a: ** Boarding house **Boarding school *Boarding (horses) (also known as a livery yard, livery stable, or boarding stable), is a stable where ho ...

students. The lower and upper schools are split across two sites in Crediton.

Notable former pupils

John Griffith Bowen John Griffith Bowen (5 November 1924 – 18 April 2019) was a British playwright and novelist. Early life John Bowen was born in Calcutta, India, to Ethel (née Cook) and Hugh Bowen; his father was the manager of the Shalimar Print Works in Goba ...

, novelist * Henry Callaway, missionary * Bill Giles, former BBC weatherman * Sir

Neville Simms Sir Neville Ian Simms (born 11 September 1944) is a British businessman and civil engineer who was CEO of Tarmac plc from 1992 to 1999. Career Simms was born in 1944 in Glasgow, Scotland, the son of naval officer Arthur Neville Simms MBE and ...

, chief executive of

Tarmac Tarmac may refer to: Engineered surfaces * Tarmacadam, a mainly historical tar-based material for macadamising road surfaces, patented in 1902 * Asphalt concrete, a macadamising material using asphalt instead of tar which has largely superseded ta ...

from 1992 to 1999 *

Robert Orchard Robert Orchard is a freelance British journalist and lecturer. One of three children born to a Devonshire farmer and a Welsh nurse, he was educated at a grammar school in mid-Devon and read Politics, Philosophy and Economics (PPE) at Corpus ...

, BBC parliamentary correspondent. QES 1964–72 * Major Rupert Guy Turrall, Intelligence Corps recipient of MC and DSO in WWII, operations officer with the

Chindits The Chindits, officially as Long Range Penetration Groups, were special operations units of the British and Indian armies which saw action in 1943–1944 during the Burma Campaign of World War II. The British Army Brigadier Orde Wingate form ...

School records

Some of the school records were transferred to the

Devon Record Office There are three local archives covering the historic county of Devon, England. The Devon Heritage Centre in Exeter is the main archive. It has a branch office, the North Devon Record Office in Barnstaple (established in 1988), which is the r ...

in 2006. Copies of the 1547 and 1559 charters are held at the Devon Record Office (ref 2065M/SS6/4).The National Archives , Access to Archives
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References

External links

Queen Elizabeth's Community college

Old QES

Old grammar school
{{authority control 1547 establishments in England Defunct schools in Devon Defunct grammar schools in England Educational institutions established in the 1540s Educational institutions disestablished in 1973 1973 disestablishments in England Schools with a royal charter Crediton