The fact that I was never caned at Grammar School is a debt I owe to one man, Norman Lucas the Headmaster at Midhurst. By being my Headmaster that man saved me from setting some sort of record for beatings.
“Luke” as he was affectionately, and I mean that sincerely, known was determined that corporal punishment would be used only in the most extreme cases and as a last resort short of expulsion if suspension had failed.
Don’t, however get the idea that Luke didn’t believe in discipline he was just much more creative than a lot of Headmasters. The school had a very strong prefect system and very little went unnoticed.
Many of us lived in remote villages, although few quite as remote as Lurgashall and detention, always on the day and on a tariff of one period per infraction could be a big problem as I was to find out. Walking 7 miles through hilly country lanes wasn’t a pleasant prospect.
By and large the deterrent worked and I tried to minimise the detentions I suffered. Unfortunately being an argumentative and very opinionated child meant that I fell foul of authority on many more occasions and the older I got the less the “but I live miles away, Sir” ploy worked. I had to walk home, politely refusing any offers of a lift.
When we finally got a phone at home I could at least warn Mum that I’d be late but in keeping with the ethos of the punishment Dad was never despatched to pick me up regardless of the weather.
There was a perfectly logical reason for evening detention, the school had boy’s and girl’s boarding houses with several resident Masters and Mistresses. It was much simpler, logistically to extend an errant child’s day by as long as necessary.
When I served detention I did so in the company of the boarders in my year who were doing their prep, so my punishment was visible to at least some of my peers. I wasn’t allowed to do my prep I was given a special essay to write so by the time I got home I still had that to do as well as my violin practice.
I suspect that Luke also understood how most boys were dealt with at home and knew that suspension for a serious offence would be met with severe punishment from parents.
Knowing what you do about me can you imagine what would have happened if I’d arrived home one evening to tell my Mum that I’d been suspended for a week? I’d have probably considered caning at school a kindness.
Talking about school days with many of the people I’ve met over the years has made me aware of just how unusual and forward thinking Luke was. Until his retirement, at the end of my Third Form days his beliefs seemed to work for the most part.
Given that I’ve said already I was a victim of bullying some may question the system that Luke operated but that’s not really a fair criterion.
Bullying is, in essence a form of abuse and most victims suffer in exactly the same silence. I was certain that reporting any of the incidents would end up with me as a bloody smear on the floor of the boy’s toilet as retribution for squealing.
Luke was an astonishing man in many ways but he’d have been mortified to learn that he was, in part responsible for my early unpopularity.
By spotting me from my rather blatant hair colour, deducing who I was and addressing a First Former of less than 2 weeks by name “Mr McLachlan” he marked me out.
By telling me how much he expected of me, given my 11 Plus marks and reports from my primary school he marked me as different. I’m sure he thought he was being kind but that almost pants-wetting moment when he stopped me didn’t get my Grammar School days off to a good start.
I will always remember Luke, and his wonderful wife with the greatest fondness, perhaps if he’d been my Headmaster for longer things could have been different.
That’s something nobody will ever know.
Love
So even Head Masters could buck the system and it’s some years later that you, grateful at the time that your hide was spared, wonder whether perhaps his stance on minimising use of the cane might have been a factor in leading to you being bullied quite so much.
My own bully did many minor kinds of nasty things to several of us First Years (‘Sherrings’ (small fish) we were called) but he tried it on once too often, was caught, caned and brought back to apologise to several of us. He didn’t do it again.
Not saying that Luke got it wrong – simply that there was a certain currency at that time – and in school, for most boys, that included the cane.
You make a perfectly fair point, it may well be that the absence of the cane increased my personal peril. The trouble is it’s hard to be that objective when you’re 11 or 12, simply not getting caned yourself is a bonus, especially when you’re getting your hide tanned so often at home.
One thing Luke would have done, had he known, would have been to enforce an apology, that was very much his style.
I do have to question my own belief that the prefect system was working, in retrospect they must have been looking the other way.