Palgrave Academy was an early

dissenting academy The dissenting academies were schools, colleges and seminaries (often institutions with aspects of all three) run by English Dissenters, that is, Protestants who did not conform to the Church of England. They formed a significant part of educatio ...

, that is, a school or college set up by

English Dissenters English Dissenters or English Separatists were Protestants who separated from the Church of England in the 17th and 18th centuries. English Dissenters opposed state interference in religious matters and founded their own churches, educationa ...

. It was run from 1774 to 1785 in

Palgrave, Suffolk Palgrave is a village and civil parish in the Mid Suffolk district of Suffolk in eastern England. It is located on the south bank of the River Waveney, opposite Diss, Norfolk, Diss in Norfolk and adjacent to the Great Eastern Main Line. Palgrav ...

- on the border of

Norfolk Norfolk ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in England, located in East Anglia and officially part of the East of England region. It borders Lincolnshire and The Wash to the north-west, the North Sea to the north and eas ...

- by the married couple

Anna Laetitia Barbauld Anna Laetitia Barbauld (, by herself possibly , as in French, Aikin; 20 June 1743 – 9 March 1825) was a prominent English poet, essayist, literary critic, editor, and author of children's literature. A prominent member of the Blue Stockings ...

and her husband Rochemont Barbauld, a minister. The academy attracted parents who wished an alternative to traditional education for their sons.

Beginnings

Anna Laetitia Barbauld was born into the tradition of the so-called dissenting academies, as her father

John Aikin John Aikin (15 January 1747 – 7 December 1822) was an English medical doctor and surgeon. Later in life he devoted himself wholly to biography and writing in periodicals. Life He was born at Kibworth Harcourt, Leicestershire, England, son of ...

taught first at

Kibworth Kibworth is an area of the Harborough District, Harborough district of Leicestershire, England, that contains two civil parishes in England, civil parishes: the villages of Kibworth Beauchamp and Kibworth Harcourt . At the 2011 census, Kibwor ...

Academy, where she received a better education than most girls and women of the day, and then at the renowned Warrington Academy, known as "the Athens of the North" for its stimulating intellectual atmosphere. Rochemont Barbauld, the grandson of a

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , ; ) are a Religious denomination, religious group of French people, French Protestants who held to the Reformed (Calvinist) tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, ...

(French Dissenter), had been a pupil there; the couple married in 1774 and moved to

Suffolk Suffolk ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It is bordered by Norfolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Essex to the south, and Cambridgeshire to the west. Ipswich is the largest settlement and the county ...

, near where Rochemont had been offered a congregation and this school for boys. The couple spent eleven years teaching at Palgrave Academy. Early on, Anna Laetitia Barbauld was not only responsible for running her own household but also the school's—she was accountant, maid, and housekeeper. The school opened with only eight boys, but when the Barbaulds left in 1785, around forty were enrolled, a testament to the excellent reputation the school had acquired. The Barbaulds' educational philosophy attracted

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

s as well as Dissenters. Palgrave replaced the strict discipline of traditional schools such as Eton, which often used

corporal punishment A corporal punishment or a physical punishment is a punishment which is intended to cause physical pain to a person. When it is inflicted on Minor (law), minors, especially in home and school settings, its methods may include spanking or Padd ...

, with a system of "fines and jobations" and even, it seems likely, "juvenile trials", that is trials run by and for the pupils themselves. Moreover, instead of the traditional classical studies, the school offered a practical curriculum that stressed science and the modern languages. Mrs Barbauld taught the foundation subjects of reading and religion to the youngest boys and geography, history, composition, rhetoric, and science to the older boys. She also produced a "weekly chronicle" for the school and wrote theatrical pieces for the pupils to perform.

Alumni

A number of distinguished parents enrolled their boys at Palgrave, including the nephew of Lady Jane McCarthy, daughter of Prime Minister

John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (; 25 May 1713 – 10 March 1792), styled Lord Mount Stuart between 1713 and 1723, was a British Tory statesman who served as the Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1762 to 1763 under George III. He became the ...

, King George III's favourite. Pupils who later distinguished themselves include

Lord Chief Justice The Lord or Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales is the head of the judiciary of England and Wales and the president of the courts of England and Wales. Until 2005 the lord chief justice was the second-most senior judge of the English a ...

Thomas Denman, 1st Baron Denman, scholar and translator William Taylor, settler of early Canada

Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk FRS FRSE (20 June 1771 – 8 April 1820) was a Scottish landowner and philanthropist. He was noteworthy as a Scottish philanthropist who sponsored immigrant settlements in Canada at the Red River Colony. E ...

, and archaeologist Sir William Gell. Barbauld had a profound effect on many of her students; Taylor, a preeminent scholar of

German literature German literature () comprises those literature, literary texts written in the German language. This includes literature written in Germany, Austria, the German parts of Switzerland and Belgium, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, South Tyrol in Italy ...

, referred to her as "the mother of my mind". Supporting the school was

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...

matriarch Sarah Martineau (née Meadows) (1725-1800) whose youngest son, Thomas Martineau (1764–1826), was one of the earliest boys enrolled at the academy. Sarah's brother, Philip Meadows (1719–83), a solicitor from nearby Diss provided financial support for the school.

References

{{authority control Anna Laetitia Barbauld Defunct schools in Suffolk Dissenting academies Educational institutions established in 1774 1774 establishments in England 1785 disestablishments in England Educational institutions disestablished in the 1780s

Beginnings

Alumni

See also

References