1947 Boxing

Sports day 1942

The ubiquitous flower pot race is that one where you use two pots on string as stepping stones.

1915 Sports day

Report of the first ever school sports day in 1915.

Sports day 1958

David Lewis wins scholarship

1947 Speech day

Roll of Honour: Lionel Lewis

Flight Lieutenant L. M. Lewis

Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve

64331

Died on active service, 7 September 1944, England. Aged 44.

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Lionel Lewis was a well known sportsman in Woking and lived at Fourth Bay, Westfield Road. He was captain of the Constitution Hill Hockey Club for 10 years and played regularly for the Old Boys Association cricket team.

Lionel was born in about 1900 in Aberdeen. His grandfather, Joseph Lewis was for many years manager of Woking Public Hall which staged theatrical events. Lionel’s father James Henry Lewis, and his mother Violet Aileen Lewis (who was from Cork in Ireland) were both locally renowned actors. By 1911 the family were living at Sunnyside, Royal Oak in Woking. Lionel had at least two younger brothers, George and Gerald. Gerald died in South Africa in 1938.

One of the first boys at the newly opened County School, Lionel left aged 17 and enlisted with a Rifle Regiment late in the First World War although it is unlikely that he saw active service. After the war he worked briefly for Harrods in London and then for 12 years with North Light Ltd. a company that imported eggs from Denmark.

In February 1939 Lionel volunteered for the RAFVR doing his training in the evenings after work. When war broke out he was called up to the Balloon Barrage and served in England and Scotland. He was later commissioned as Technical and Defence Officer. Such was his enthusiasm for the service that he undertook commando training at the age of 41.

Lionel relinquished his commission due to ill health in July 1944 and died at home 7 September. His well attended funeral was held at Brookwood Cemetery the following week. At the service Mr. F. Dixon, headmaster of Ripley CE School and a team mate at the hockey club read the following tribute in the euphemistic style of the day:

The game’s not lost,

Although the whistle’s gone,

The first half is completed

And the second half begun.

You played against the slope and the sun,

In that, you had no choice,

And when the final whistle sounds

You’ll hear the umpire’s voice

Well done!

Lionel Lewis is buried in Brookwood Cemetery, near Woking (grave 209599). He is also remembered on the Woking County Grammar School roll of honour located in Christ Church, Woking and the Woking library World War Two book of remembrance.

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Last updated 21 December 2009

Sources

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Woking News and Mail

Woking County School magazine

Open scholarships

Lower 6 Arts 2 1966/67

The first 48

When the school opened in September 1914 the first intake was of 48 boys.

1.  Alfred Beharrel - Son of a railway agent. Born in Hornsey, Middlesex. Served in the Merchant Navy. In WW2 served as Temporary Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve. Died in Rhuddlan, Wales in 1974 aged 73.

Alfred Beharrel's Second Mate Certificate dated 1921

2.     Jack Bond - Son of a temperance hotel keeper. Born in Woking, lived in Commercial Road.
3.     Leslie Goulding - Son of a stationery shop manager. Born in Woking, lived in Chertsey Road.
4.     Arthur Hampton - Son of a gardener. Born in Chobham, lived in Horsell.
5.     Frederick Kemp - Son of a builder. Born in Woking, lived in West Hall.
6.     Henry Ledbrooke - Son of an engineer's pattern maker. Born in Castlethorpe, Bucks, lived in Marlborough Road.
7.     Lionel Lewis - Son of an actor. Born in Aberdeen, lived in Royal Oak Road. Served in both world wars, died on active service in 1946.
8.     John Mallard - Son of a master tailor. Born in Woking, lived in Chertsey Road.
9.     Raymond Cecil Mathis - Son of a railway clerk. Born in Woking, lived in Lavender Cottages, West Byfleet.
10. Douglas McKay - Son of a railway agent. Born in Stockport, lived in Goldsworth Hill.
11. Dennis Rowden Newsam - Son of a railway clerk. Born in Norbiton, Surrey, lived in Kingsway.
12. Frank Pearson - Born in Woking, lived at Lady Grove Farm, Guildford.
13. Mervyn Marwood Rowland - Born in Chertsey. Died in Newport, Gwent in 1976 aged 75.
14. Charles Henry Rudkin - Son of a plumber. Born in Woking, lived in Walton Road.
15. John Walter Sarvis - Son of an architect. Born in Clapham, lived in Maybury Hill.
16. Richard William Saunders - Son of a school headmaster. Born in Woking, lived at Maybury School House.
17. William G. Smith -
18. Wilfred Edward Threadgold - Son of a colliery agent. Born in Twickenham, lived in Ferndale Road.
19. Robert Wasley - Possibly William Wasley who lived in Woking.
20. Stanley W. Atkins -
21. Frank William Beal - Son of a gardener. Born and lived in Bisley. Died in 1980.
22. Richard T. Currie - Son of a carrier. Born in Houghton, Norfolk, lived in Ottershaw.
23. Charles Alexander Gingell - Son of a farmer. Born in Woodford, Essex, lived at St Georges Hill, Weybridge.
24. Cyril Ralph Holbourn - Son of an Army Major. Born in St. Helier, Jersey, lived at Inkerman Barracks. Enlisted in WW1 but died of pneumonia while training in 1918, the schools only old boy to die in WW1.
25. Edward Howell -
26. Percival J. Huggins - Born in Dalham, Suffolk, lived in Station Road, Addlestone.
27. Charles F. Kent -
28. Albert Henry Martin - Son of a farmer. Born in Pirbright, lived at Manor Farm, Pirbright.
29. George H. Maslin - Son of a railway worker.
30. William Harry G. Pearce - Son of a gardener. Born in Streatham, lived in Esher.
31. Roy Newling Rawes - Son of a school headmaster. Born in Send, lived at The School House, Send.
32. Harold C. Renshaw - Son of a dairyman. Born in Woking, lived in Goldsworth Road.
33. John Field Sanders - Son of a butcher. Born in Streatham, lived in Woodbridge Hill, Guildford.
34. Basil Ernest Stephenson - Son of an accountant. Born in Bosley, Oxfordshire, lived in Chobham Road.
35. Dudley Thomas Threadgold - Born in Woking, younger brother of Wilfred Threadgold (qv).
36. Wilfred Tuddenham - Son of a works manager. Born in Wolverton, Bucks, lived in Maybury Road.
37. Harold Russell Weller - Son of a waterworks chief clerk. Born in Frimley, lived in Farnborough.
38. Sydney Arthur Weston - Son of a house painter. Born in Woking, lived in Hermitage Road, Knaphill.
39. Frederick Joseph Yeardsley - Son of a gardener. Born in Woolton, Lancashire, lived in Lyne, Chertsey.
40. Albert Daborn -
41. Stanley Theadore Dark - Son of a hairdresser. Born in Woking, lived in Chobham Road.
42. William Alexander Hart - Son of a printers reader. Born in Woking, lived in Kingsway.
43. William Ernest Inder - Died 1992.
44. Gordon Ernest Maxwell - His father owned E H Maxwell and Sons the music shop in Heathside Crescent. Born in Woking, lived in Guildford Road.
45. Charles Miller - Son of a railway carrier. Born in Pirbright, lived in Pinewood, Pirbright.
46. Hector Wallace Reid - Son of a post office overseer. Born in Battersea, lived in Maybury Hill.
47. Leonard Talbot - Son of a coal merchant. Born in Woking, lived in Maybury Road.
48. Leonard Walters - 

Swimming gala 1945

School swimming gala 1945.

First World War

As the school was only officially opened in September 1914 there were few boys old enough to serve in WW1, however a few masters either with the school, or to join later did see service.

BOYS

HOLBOURN, Cyril Ralph

Private 14086, ‘A’ Company, Inns of Court Officer Training Corps. Born 1900 in St. Helier, Jersey. Son of Major William and Frances Holbourn of ‘Redstacks’, Goldsworth Road, Woking. He enlisted in Woking and died of pneumonia at the OTC Training Camp at Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire on 1 November 1918 just 10 days before the armistice was signed. He was 18 years old and is buried in Brookwood cemetery.

LEWIS, Lionel Morley

Attended the County School 1914-1915. First enlisted with 20th Battalion London Regiment before transferring to the Royal Flying Corps but probably did not see active service. Died on active service in WW2. The only Old Boy to enlist in both wars. He was the son of Henry Lewis (a bank manager) and Jessie Lewis of Luton and was born about 1900.

MASLIN, George H.

Enlisted but did not see active service. Later held the post of Honorary Auditor for the Old Boys Association. He was born about 1898 in Woking, the son of James Maslin, a railway labourer.

PALMER, ?

Signaller. Royal West Kent Regiment. Badly gassed in France, October 1918. The only Old Boy to see active service in WW1.

MASTERS

ALLCOTT, Arnold

BSc, trained at University of Manchester Training College. Held Board of Education Certificate. Before the war he taught science at Hunter’s Bar Council School and Broomhill Council School in Sheffield, Chippenhan County Secondary School and Yeovil County Secondary School.

He saw military service from 1914-1919 and spent time as Chemical Advisor to First Army in France.

He was chemistry master at Woking County School (1919-1926) and later taught at Lord Wadsworth Agricultural College in Basingstoke and Borough Polytechnic.

CAMPBELL, Arthur Duncan ‘Tich’

Before the war taught at Netherthorpe Grammar School in Derby.

Served on the Western Front with the Sherwood Foresters. Taken prisoner by the Germans in February 1917, acted as an interpreter in the prison camp. Released after the armistice. Later taught Geography and was Deputy Headmaster for many years. Would often tell stories to the boys, always starting with the line ‘When I was a prisoner of war on the Hanover State Railway in Germany...’.

During the war the boys of the school sent a weekly food parcel valued at 'six shillings and sixpence".

DARLOW, David John

Trained at University of London. Appointed master at Woking in September 1915. Later during the war served as a drill instructor with the Royal Garrison Artillery for two and a half years. Later appointed Second Master. Emigrated to South Africa in 1921.

Worked with Arnold Allcott at Chippenham.

HOLGATE, Percy Henry

Taught in France before the war.

Served as a machine gun officer (Second Lieutenant) in France and Italy. French master, left Woking in 1918 to teach at Farnworth Grammar School in Lancashire.
OBITUARY

MOORE, Thomas Ivor

Born about 1859. Killed aboard a train in London on 13 June 1917 by a German bomb in the first daylight raid on England. Fourteen Gotha bombers carried out the raid at around noon. 162 people were killed and a further 432 injured mostly in the areas around Moorgate, Liverpool Street and the Barbican. Moore was a JP and chairman of the governors from the schools opening. He was remembered on a memorial plaque in the school hall.

JONES, Arthur Henry

Master 1919-1939. Active with the school rifle club and Old Boys association. Joined Royal Naval Air Service as a mechanic in 1917. At the school speech day in 1918 it was announced he was serving in Lincolnshire with the RAF. He survived the war.

ROOTS, H. S.

Served in both World Wars. Studied at Exeter College, Oxford. Appointed History and English master in 1921. Later sports master.

SHARPE, H.

Army.