SCHOOL’S OUT SCHOOL MEMORIES
Hanford
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Tree-climbing, ponies and apple blossom...
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Author Santa Montefi ore remembers her halcyon days at Hanford, a boarding girl’s
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P prep school in Dorset’s rolling hills, where ponies and plays dominated the curriculum
S
ome of the happiest the summer by every girl in the
memories I have are of
“How many people lull
school beneath another enormous
my years at Hanford, a
little girls’ boarding prep
themselves to sleep on
cedar tree at the bottom of
the lawn. The costumes were
school in Dorset where I spent my
the memories of their
wonderful and he always included
terms between the ages of eight
and twelve. I remember walking
boarding school?
the ponies and dogs. We didn’t
do much studying that term as we
down the path to the netball
Hanford girls do”
concentrated on rehearsals.
court, my favourite sport then, I remember swimming where
smelling the wild onion in the we’d change on the lawn and run
grass. We’d pick it and use it for up and down with our towels
pies in our camps in the avenue fl apping behind us to get dry.
of chestnut trees, called Chestnut They can’t do that now. And the
Village. I’d pick elderfl ower loos didn’t have doors on them.
berries, too, in the September There was no point. We were
term, and apple blossom in spring. all very immodest, as children
I remember the excitement should be.
of being chosen to go riding I remember, with great
across Ham and Hod hills in the fondness, Mr Pole, my English
early morning before breakfast. teacher whom we called Mr P. He
One of the ‘galloping matrons’ read a lot of PG Wodehouse out
who looked after us at night loud and encouraged my essay
and the ponies by day, would writing, which was the only thing
tap my shoulder and wake me, I did well besides sport.
whispering the name of my pony Of course I missed my home
in my ear. It was usually ‘Tic-tac’, and my parents; the fi rst morning
a rather slow grey mare, but I back was always hard, waking
loved rising with the sun and up in the uncomfortable bed.
running down to the old stable But there was “chain-he” to play
block in my jodhpurs. on the lawn at sunset, “cops and
I remember the Box Garden robbers” before bed, pies to be
where four girls who were very made out of blossom and daisies
good were given the privilege of and dogs to look after while
sleeping the entire summer term Mr Sharp tested us on our
in a stone shed that didn’t have a times tables…
front wall. I was always in a ‘dorm’ Above all, Hanford allowed
where we’d chat after lights out and share forbidden sweets. The house me to be creative and to be a child. It fi red my imagination and gave
is an old Jacobean mansion with a grey stone chapel and picturesque me the space to develop in my own unique way, without forcing me
stable block. Beside the chapel is a giant cedar tree, in my day we to fi t into a box. How many people lull themselves to sleep on the
climbed every branch, which had names like Cubby Hole and Cruisies. memories of their boarding school? Hanford girls do. %
Now, due to health and safety, they’ve cut down the best ones.
Mr Sharp, the eccentric headmaster who taught maths with his Santa Montefi ore’s latest novel, T_h e Aff air, is published on 18 February by
Jack Russell on his lap, wrote the school play which was performed in Hodder & Stoughton, £17.99
82 FIRST ELEVEN SPRING 2010 WWW.FIRSTELEVENMAGAZINE.CO.UK
pp82FE_SPR10 BackPg FINAL.indd 82 29/1/10 12:25:59
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