97 Montpelier Road (Part 1)
- Ninka Willcock
- Nov 29, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: May 15
Thomas Rickard (c. 1788 - 1847)
Henry Stein Turrell (1815 – 1863)
Thomas Rickard
From at least 1822, Thomas Rickard kept a boys’ boarding school at 35 West Street. In 1823, he purchased from Thomas Read Kemp a large stretch of land to the east of Montpelier Road and immediately north of Lady Gosford’s house and garden (where Waitrose stands today), and moved his school there.
A plan dated 1825 names “Mr Rickard’s school” but there is no sign of a building. Pigot Smith’s map dated 1826, however, shows it clearly, abutting 96 Montpelier Road. Rickard's school became known as Montpellier House.
Beyond the typically opaque 1841 Census document, few details about Montpellier House under Rickard have as yet come to light but a brief spotlight on one outstanding pupil possibly indicates the target market. Theodore Ford, listed in the 1841 Census as an 11 year-old pupil at Montpellier House, was to end a distinguished career in Law as Chief Justice of the Straits Settlements, with a knighthood and a road named after him in Singapore.
Henry Stein Turrell
Henry Stein Turrell, a modern languages specialist, had been the first “Head Master” of Brighton Proprietary Grammar School. The school had been established in the old town in 1836 by a group of local tradesmen seeking a more challenging education for their sons than the basic provision of the National Schools. Or, indeed, of the private boarding schools, where fees were beyond their means. They required a local day school providing a high quality academic curriculum that also included more down to earth vocational elements such as book keeping.
Turrell was a fine scholar and teacher but, frustrated by interference from the proprietors, he resigned after three years to start his own school. By 1841, this was based at 70 Grand Parade.
Thomas Rickard was godfather to one of Turrell’s daughters, Mary Rebecca, and it must have been around the time of her birth in 1844 that Rickard relinquished Montpellier House to Turrell. Although school principals tended to die in harness at this period, it is probable that failing health prevented him from carrying on to the end. In 1847, he died in the London Hospital aged 59, the death certificate recording that he had been living with cancer for “2 or 3 years”.
Montpellier House rebranded as Western College
The 1845 Brighton Directory evidences two schools occupying Montpellier House - Miss Roberts’ ‘ladies’ boarding school’ as well as Turrell’s ‘preparatory school’, relocated from Grand Parade. The ladies’ school was gone within a year while Turrell led the boys’ school - soon rebranded as the all-through “Western College” until his sudden death in 1863. By this time, the school had flourished on the site for nearly two decades.
A stellar pupil at Western College during the Turrell era was Hove-born Henry Radcliffe Crocker (1846–1909). Rather than join his father’s pharmacy business in Western Road, he decided to study medicine in much greater depth. Determined throughout his career as a physician to broaden and deepen his clinical experience, he spent the last twenty years specialising in dermatology. As such he is known for making a significant contribution to diagnosing the rare skin condition suffered by Joseph Merrick, otherwise known as “the Elephant Man”.
An all-round educational reformer
I will now digress to note how much Turrell achieved as an educational reformer in a relatively short life - not only for children but also for adults and across class divides.
In 1841, with others he inaugurated the Brighton Royal Literary and Scientific Institution (BRLSI), which became the force behind the principal adult education enterprises for Brighton’s working classes, including the Brighton Working Men’s Institute. When the BRLSI closed after 28 years, along with its fine library – an amalgamation of various collections - the books were donated to Brighton Corporation to form the basis of Brighton’s first public reference library.
The country’s first professional body for teachers, the College of Preceptors, also stemmed from the BRLSI, with Turrell leading the way. Founded in 1846, it was granted a Royal Charter in 1849, the same year that women were admitted for the first time. The College aimed to raise standards in private schools, not just locally but throughout country, through objective evidence that both teaching and learning was sound. To this end, examinations were promptly introduced in the theory and practice of education for teachers and in subject knowledge for scholars.
The College continues to thrive today as the Chartered College of Teaching. The supplemental Charter, sealed in 2017, begins by acknowledging Henry Stein Turrell's key role in its foundation and incorporation three years later.
Towards the end of the 1850s, the BRLSI was instrumental in introducing the then new Oxford and Cambridge local examinations to Brighton. Once again this was at Turrell’s instigation, and a special meeting was held at Western College to move the proposal forward. The first exam was held on December 14th 1858 in Brighton and seven other towns and cities. To simplify, these exams were the forerunner of what we know now as ‘O’ and ‘A’ level GCSEs. Initially only for boys, they became available to girls in 1867 (Cambridge) and 1870 (Oxford).
A further legacy to education at a local level was the Turrell Memorial Prize. Following his death aged 47 in 1863 until November 2020, this medal was awarded annually to a high achieving local pupil. The Latin inscription Transeat in exemplum means "Let it stand as an example" .
Mysteriously and alarmingly, the Turrell Memorial Prize disappeared from both the Brighton & Hove City Council and Charity Commission websites during the Covid pandemic.
Postscript
See Montpelier And Clifton Hill: Introduction for an explanation of the the alternative spellings - 'Montpellier' and 'Montpelier'.
Does anyone know why the Turrell Memorial Prize has ceased to be?
Two of Turrell's daughters, Maria and Sophie, followed him to Cambridge. Maria, the eldest, studied at Newnham College from 1875, the year its first building opened. Like her father, she went on to become a pioneering and committed teacher, serving as a staff member at Birmingham's first girls' independent secondary school, Egbaston High School for Girls, (established 1876) for 27 years. She died in 1929.
