Logo of Colfe's School

Colfe’s is a co-educational independent day school in Lee, London. It teaches children between the ages of 3 and 18. The headmaster of Colfe’s is Richard Russell, and the school is a member of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference. The official Visitor to the school is HRH Prince Michael of Kent. Image File history File links Colfeslogo. ... Coeducation is the integrated education of men and women. ... Lee is a place in the London Borough of Lewisham in south-east London. ... The Headmasters and Headmistresses Conference (HMC) is an association of the headmasters or headmistressess of 242 leading day and boarding independent boys and coeducational schools in the United Kingdom, Crown dependencies and the Republic of Ireland. ... Prince Michael of Kent, GCVO (Michael George Charles Franklin Windsor; born 4 July 1942) is a member of the British Royal Family, a grandson of King George V and Queen Mary. ...

History

Colfe's is one of the oldest schools in London. The parish priest of Lewisham taught the local children from the time of Richard Walker’s chantry, founded in 1494, until the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII. Rev. John Glyn re-established the school in 1568 and it was granted a Charter by Elizabeth I in 1574. Abraham Colfe became a Governor in 1613 and the school was re-founded bearing his name in 1652. Lewisham is a district in south-east London, England and the principal settlement of the London Borough of Lewisham. ... Chantry is a term for the English establishment of a shrine or chapel on private land where monks or priests would say (or chant) prayers on a fixed schedule, usually for someone who had died. ... dissolution see Dissolution. ... Henry VIII (28 June 1491 – 28 January 1547) was King of England and Lord of Ireland (later King of Ireland) from 22 April 1509 until his death. ... Elizabeth I (7 September 1533 – 24 March 1603 ) was Queen of England and Queen of Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. ... Abraham Colfe, who was the Vicar of Lewisham from 1610 to 1657, founded Colfes School, a reading (primary)or Latin school and six almshouses for the inhabitants of Lewisham. ...

Colfe declared that the aim of the school was to provide an education for the boys from “the hundred of Blackheath”. He invited the Leathersellers' Company, one of London's livery companies, to be the trustee of his will. Links between the school and the Leathersellers' remain strong. Blackheath is a suburb of London, divided between the London Borough of Lewisham and the London Borough of Greenwich. ... The Worshipful Company of Leathersellers is one of the Livery Companies of the City of London. ... Livery Companies are trade associations based in the City of London. ...

The school moved to its current site in the 1960s and since then there has been much change, and money has been spent improving facilities, such as an all-weather pitch and new performing arts centre as well as renovating the Leathersellers' sports ground to make it the home of senior sport (rugby football and cricket) and also last year it was the site of the 6th form leavers' ball.

Having been a voluntary aided grammar school, Colfe’s became independent again in 1977. Although founded as a school for boys, girls have been admitted to the Sixth Form for over twenty years. In 1997, it was decided to allow girls throughout the school, and there are now girls in every year group. As of the 2005/2006 academic year, Colfe's first Head Girl was Chris Turont. The 2006/2007 Head Boy is Graham Chapman, and his deputies are Samantha Sholder and Johnnie McCormick Haystam In a voluntary aided school (many of which are church schools) the governing body, as opposed to the Local Education Authority, employs the staff, and decide admission arrangements but the school is nevertheless funded by the state and does not charge fees. ... A grammar school is a school that may, depending on regional usage as exemplified below, provide either secondary education or, a much less common usage, primary education (also known as elementary). Grammar schools trace their origins back to medieval Europe, as schools in which university preparatory subjects, such as Latin... England, Wales, Northern Ireland The sixth form, in the English, Welsh and Northern Irish education systems, is the term used to refer to the final two years of secondary schooling (when students are about sixteen to eighteen years of age), during which students normally prepare for their GCE A-level...

The school today

Colfe's is an independent, co-educational school for boys and girls aged 3-18, located in Lee, London. It celebrated its 350th anniversary in 2002. There is a Preparatory school for children aged 3-11 and a Senior School for 11-18. The school has an excellent academic reputation, performing well at A-Level, GCSE and SATS. A new all weather playing field (funded in part by donations from parents and former pupils) was opened in 2006. The school also has a new Performing arts centre, a Sports Complex complete with a 25m swimming pool, 2 gyms and a Sports Hall, excellent IT and Music facilities and over 30 acres of playing fields. Lee is a place in the London Borough of Lewisham in south-east London. ... A preparatory school, or prep school in the United Kingdom, and previously in the British Empire and so the Commonwealth in current English usage, is an independent school designed to prepare a student for fee-paying, secondary independent school (public school). ... The A-level, short for Advanced Level, is a General Certificate of Education qualification in the United Kingdom, usually taken by students in the final two years of secondary education (commonly called the Sixth Form), or in College (not to be mistaken with the college term some countries such as... GCSE is an acronym that can refer to: General Certificate of Secondary Education global common subexpression elimination - an optimisation technique used by some compilers This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... A performing arts center, often abbreviated PAC, is a multi-use performance space that can be adapted for use by various types of the performing arts, including dance, music and theatre. ... This article needs additional references or sources for verification. ... Information and communication technology spending in 2005 Information technology (IT), as defined by the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), is the study, design, development, implementation, support or management of computer-based information systems, particularly software applications and computer hardware. ... // Music is an art form consisting of sound and silence expressed through time. ...

Colfe's School is proud to be in the minority of schools which boasts a Combined Cadet Force (CCF). Pupils from year 8 for boys and year 9 for girls learn valuable life skills such as leadership, organisation, and have the chance to earn their Gold Duke of Edunburghs award, a much highly looked upon achievement. Commanding Officer Major Chris Cherry leads the unit and is currently working towards the final parade for this academic year, the 'passing out parade' on July 7th when all new recruits become fully fledged members of the unit. WO2 Jack Stump says "The CCF has changed my life indefinately and has given me opportunities that have helped me 'rise above the rest'" he concludes with a smile, referring to the RAF slogan of the same wording. Colfe's organises various events throughout the year in which pupils raise money for a variety of charities.

In collaboration with various shops and services in Blackheath, Colfe's hosts an annual fashion show to raise money for Cancer Research UK. Blackheath is a suburb of London, divided between the London Borough of Lewisham and the London Borough of Greenwich. ...

Over the past three years, Colfe's Sixth Form students and teachers have helped to build, decorate and stock a library in a now-annual trip to the Gambia. This project is led by Dr. RP Thompson, an English teacher at the school. The latest project is to raise fun hard sports for the pupils.

The current head of Colfe's is Russell Richard

Notable Colfeians

include:

• Eric Ambler OBE was born on 28 June 1909 in London and died there aged 89, on 23 October, 1998. The novelist and critic Anthony Burgess coined the word, 'Amblerian', to describe Ambler's qualities. Among the best-known of Ambler's 21 published books are 'Epitaph for a Spy' in 1938, 'The Mask of Dimitrios' in 1939, 'Journey into Fear' in 1940, and 'Topkapi' in 1962. Ambler served in the British army between 1940-1946 and was awarded the American Bronze Star.^[1]
• Professor Henry Armstrong FRS (1848-1937) Chemist (see further Biographical Database of the British Chemical Community, 1880-1970) ^[2]
• Sir John Bennett (1814-1897), Politician and watchmaker. His portrait hangs in the National Portrait Gallery ^[3]
• Geoffrey Branch, axe-murderer of Edward Dobson ^[4]
• Sir Antonio Brady (1811-1881) Admiralty official, naturalist, and social reformer. ^[5]
• Sir Richard Madox Bromley(1813–1865), civil servant (biography by M. C. Curthoys, ‘Bromley, Sir Richard Madox (1813–1865)’, first published Sept 2004, 410 words)
• Garry Bushell, journalist
• Richard Clinton, professional cricketer^[6]
• Bill Cooper, England Cricket's Bugler
• Roger Coleman (1929-2002), publisher who oversaw the creation of the Revised English Bible . Obituary The Independent15 May 2002 ^[7]
• Brian Fahey was one of Britain’s foremost arrangers and composers of big-band music. He worked with many of the country’s leading show-business stars, including Dame Shirley Bassey, whose musical director he was from 1967 to 1972. He was also a friend of Ella Fitzgerald. His most famous and commercially successful work was At The Sign Of The Swingin’ Cymbal — adopted by the late Alan Freeman as the theme tune for his Pick Of The Pops programme. See Times Obituary 17 May 2007^[8]. The Scotsman Obituary 20 April 2007 noted that during World War II Fahey then a Lance Bombardier with the RA was one of the few survivors from the infamous Wormhoudt massacre by German SS troops of British soldiers captured at Dunkirk. As the bullets tore into his chest he recalled "half remembered sights and sounds of the cricket nets at Colfe's...". He was one of only six out of 120 to survive ^[9] See also The Herald Obituary 30 June 2007 ^[10]. For a fuller extract of Fahey's account of the massacre see ^[11]
• Sir Alan Goodison, Diplomat, British Ambassador to Dublin was appointed CMG in 1975, CVO in 1980 and KCMG in 1985. See Telegraph Obituary 14 July 2006 ^[12]] and Times Obituary 13 July 2006 ^[13]
• Chris "Cruddy" Cornell, Musician with Bexely-Heath based jazz-goth band, "The Stinkers". Died due to inverted erection.
• Professor Kenneth Grayston, Bristol University's first theology professor (see Guardian Obituary 30 June 2005) ^[14]
• Thomas Gregory, swimmer. In 1988 Gregory became the youngest solo swimmer to cross the English Channel. He was aged 11 years 11 months and crossed in a time of 11.54 hours. The record is likely to remain with Gregory for since 1994 the rules forbid solo attempts by swimmers under the age of 14.
• Malcolm Hardee, comedy club proprietor
• John Henry Hayes, Tory politician
• Professor Jeff Hearn, Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration in Helsinki.
• Sheku Kamara, football player
• Robert Key, England cricketer
• Geoffrey Masters (Lieut-Colonel RA) MC and Bar in World War II (see Telegraph Obituary 25 May 2006)Lieutenant-Colonel Geoffrey Masters
• Edmund Nelson was a talented painter whose portraits of leading Cambridge intellectuals, including G.M. Trevelyan and E.M. Forster, were complemented by those of cricketers (his C.B. Fry now hangs in the Committee Room at Lord's) and artists. His moving portrait of his wife won the prize for the best portrait in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition of 1947. (see Independent Obituary 13 February 2007) ^[15]
• David Mossom, minister of St. Peter's Church in Virginia. Born 1689. He presided over both marriages of Martha Dandridge whose second marriage was to George Washington. He was educated at St. John's College in Cambridge, England
• Tony Reeves Rock bass player. Played variously with Greenslade, Curved Air and Colosseum.^[16]
• Jack Ryder, Eastenders Actor
• Professor George Say, MSc, PhD, DSc, DIC, CEng, HonFIEE, FIERE, FGCLI. Professor 'Dick' Say, Head of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the Heriot-Watt College, Edinburgh, for thirty years, died on 14th November 1992, aged 90. His books included Performance and Design of AC Machines (Pitman) 1936; AC Machines (Pitman) 5th edn 1983; Unified Theory of Electromagnetic Machines (Pitman) 1971; Electrical Engineer's Reference Book (Newnes-Butterworths) 1st edn 1945 ... 15th edn 1993. Obituary^[17]
• Professor William Alexander Campbell Stewart (1915-1997), educationist and university administrator.(see The Independent Obituary 13 May 1997) [12]
• Dennis Main Wilson, died aged 72, was an outstanding producer of television and radio comedy, best known for Till Death Us Do Part. In a career spanning 50 years he was also responsible for such series as The Goon Show, Hancock's Half Hour, Citizen Smith, and The Marty Feldman Show. He could claim to have played a large part in promoting the careers of Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan, Kenneth Williams, Barry Humphries, Stephen Fry, and many others.(see Telegraph Obituary 25 January 1997^[18]. During World War II, he was one of the few soldiers to survive the landing at Juno Beach on D-Day.
• Henry Williamson, author of Tarka the Otter and fascist
• Victor Maslin Yeates, often abbreviated to VM Yeates, school friend of Henry Williamson with 5 confirmed kills whilst serving in the RFC and RAF he was an English fighter ace in World War I, author of Winged Victory

Eric Ambler (28 June 1909 - 22 October 1998) was an influential English writer of spy novels who brought a level of realism to the field that had generally been absent in earlier works. ... The Bronze Star Medal is a United States Armed Forces individual military decoration and is the fourth highest award for bravery, heroism or meritorious service. ... FRS is an abbreviation which can stand for various phrases: Family Radio Service, a personal radio service utilizing the UHF band Fellow of the Royal Society, a title awarded to distinguished scientists who are British, Commonwealth or Republic of Ireland citizens Fisheries Research Services, an agency of the Scottish Executive... Garry Bushell Garry Bushell (born May 13, 1955 in Charlton , South East London) is an English television critic, television presenter, and newspaper columnist. ... Richard Selvey Clinton (born September 1, 1981) is an English cricketer. ... Categories: Stub ... Malcolm Hardee (born Lewisham, London, 5th January 1950 - died London, 31st January 2005) was an anarchic British comedian, author, club proprietor and compere. ... John Henry Hayes (born 23 June 1958) is a politician in the United Kingdom. ... Jeff(ery) Richard Hearn (born August 5, 1947 ) is a British sociologist and one of the founders of Critical studies on men. ... Sheku Kamara (Born November 15, 1987) is a defender who plays for Watford 18 Year old Kamara, born in Lambeth, signed professional forms for Watford in June 2006 from Charlton Athletic after a trial spell. ... Robert William Trevor Key (born East Dulwich, London on 12 May 1979) is an English cricketer who plays for the England cricket team and Kent County Cricket Club. ... Jack as Jamie Mitchell in EastEnders. ... Dennis Main Wilson (born 1924, died 1997) was producer of The Goons and Hancocks Half Hour for BBC radio and Till Death Us Do Part for BBC television. ... The Goon Show was a popular and influential British radio comedy programme, originally produced and broadcast by the BBC from 1951 to 1960 on the BBC Home Service. ... Hancocks Half Hour was a famous BBC radio comedy series of the 1950s starring Tony Hancock. ... Richard Henry Peter Sellers, CBE (8 September 1925 – 24 July 1980) was an English comedian, actor, and performer, who came to prominence on the BBC radio series The Goon Show and later became a film star. ... Terence Alan Milligan, KBE, (16 April 1918–27 February 2002), known as Spike Milligan, was an Irish writer, artist, musician, humanitarian, comedian, and poet. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... John Barry Humphries, AO, CBE (born 17 February 1934 in Camberwell, Melbourne, Victoria) is an Australian comedian, satirist and character actor best known for his on-stage and television alter egos Dame Edna Everage, a Melbourne housewife, and Sir Les Patterson, Australias foul-mouthed cultural attaché to Britain. ... This article or section cites very few or no references or sources. ... This article is about the beach codenamed in WWII. For other uses, see Juno Beach (disambiguation) Combatants Canada Germany Commanders Major-General R.F.L. Keller, 3rd Canadian Infantry Division Generalleutnant Wilhelm Richter, German 716th Static Infantry Division Strength 15,000[1] 7,771 Casualties 340 dead, 739 other casualties... Land on Normandy In military parlance, D-Day is a term often used to denote the day on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated. ... Henry Williamson (December 1, 1895 - August 13, 1977), prolific English author known for his natural and social history novels. ... Tarka the Otter: His Joyful Water-Life and Death in the Country of the Two Rivers is a novel by Henry Williamson. ... Victor Maslin Yeates (30 September 1897 — 15 December 1934), often abbreviated to VM Yeates, was an English RAF fighter pilot in World War I. Yeates, who was born at Dulwich, joined the Inns of Court O.T.C. in 1916 and transferred to the Royal Flying Corps (later the Royal... Henry Williamson (December 1, 1895 - August 13, 1977), prolific English author known for his natural and social history novels. ... For Wikipedia requests for checkuser, see WP:RFCU. // RFC, a three letter initialism, may refer to: Returned for Collection, a billing term indicating insufficient funds for an account ReliabilityFirst Corporation Reconstruction Finance Corporation, a former United States Government agency Royal Flying Corps, a branch of the British military during World... RAF is an three letter acronym for: Royal Air Force -- the Air Force of the United Kingdom (see also Air Ministry) Red Army Faction (Rote Armee Fraktion) -- a German terror organisation Rigas Autobusu Fabrika -- a factory making buses in Riga, Latvia Rapid Action Force in India Računarski Fakultet RAF... Fighter Ace is an online multiplayer computer game in which one flies World War II fighter and bomber planes in combat against other players and virtual pilots. ... Winged Victory is a now out of print, 1934 novel by an English World War I fighter pilot named V.M. Yeates. ...

References

1. ^ Dead link
2. ^ ARMSTRONG, Henry Edward
3. ^ Sir John Bennett (1814-1897), Politician and watchmaker
4. ^ The Times (London), Saturday, 17 July, 1971; p. 2 col. C
5. ^ Brady, Sir Antonio (1811–1881), Admiralty official, naturalist, and social reformer
6. ^ [1]
7. ^ [2]
8. ^ [3]
9. ^ [4]
10. ^ [5]
11. ^ [6]
12. ^ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/07/14/db1402.xml
13. ^ [7]
14. ^ [8]
15. ^ Edmund Nelson: Uncompromising portrait painter
16. ^ [9]
17. ^ [10]
18. ^ [11]

External links

• Colfe's School website