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We
pay tribute to Elsie
Day a pioneer of girls' education and the first headmistress of The
Grey Coat Hospital (now a successful girls' comprehensive).
Elsie Day (1849?
- 1915) :
Headmistress of 'The
Grey Coat Hospital' from 1874 to 1910
On
June 3rd 1874, aged 25, Elsie Day was appointed as the first headmistress
of ‘The Grey Coat Hospital’ a former charity school that
was in the process of becoming a day school for girls.
During her first year, due to an oversight, the
school continued to take boarders, known as Foundationers, and it was in this
area that Elsie Day first made her mark.
She soon realised that, despite its former status
as a charity school, the children were ill-treated as a matter of course. She
described the prevailing attitude as ‘anything was good enough for the
Foundationers and nothing too good for those who should have cherished them’.
When she informed a supplier that she couldn’t afford cream and chickens
for the staff, she was told that it was usually put down in the accounts as
milk for the children.
Before her arrival, pupils had been known by
their numbers. She called them by their names, a change that cost nothing but
must have meant a great deal to the children. In turn she told them to call
her 'Madam'.
She increased their comfort in many other ways.
Much to the dismay of the cook, she insisted that the children should be served
the same food as the headmistress and staff. She further antagonised the cook,
a tall strong woman, by forbidding her to use the girls as kitchen maids.
Although the school employed a laundry maid,
it is difficult to know what she did before the new regime for she was reluctant
to do any laundry. The bedding in the dormitories was filthy but was covered
by spotless counterpanes whenever there was a governors’
inspection.
Worse still the girls’ stays and black
petticoats were passed down from child to child without ever being washed.
The laundry maid was shocked when asked to wash them insisting that they’d
never been washed in the seven years that she’d been in the school and
she threatened to resign.
As in so many cases, Elsie Day’s quiet
authority and refusal to compromise on standards won the day. Despite their
threats to resign, both the laundry maid and the cook did as they were asked
and both remained at the school.
The following year the boarders left and the
Grey Coat Hospital became a girls’ day school. The first Grey Coat girl
passed the Cambridge local examination in 1875. By 1880 the governors had been persuaded to
allow girls to stay on at the school beyond the age of 15 and in 1891
the first Grey Coat girl passed the London Matriculation.
Elsie Day must
have been very proud of her girls’ academic achievements for she recorded
examination successes on large wooden boards placed on the walls of the hall.
She was tireless in her service to the school
and has been described as one of the pioneers of girls’ education. In
1899 she became President of the Headmistresses Association and in 1902 she
wrote ‘An Old Westminster Endowment’, a history of the school (now
out of print).
For Elsie Day it was significant that the school’s
initials (GCH) also stood for Generosity, Courtesy and Honour. How far she
was successful in developing these characteristics in her pupils we’ll
never know, but it’s clear that she possessed them in abundance.
She
retired in 1910 having served as headmistress for 32 years. During
her time at the school an outsider had remarked that the Grey Coat
Hospital was ‘Not a school, but a large family’. When it’s
remembered how dreadful the conditions were before she arrived, it
is little wonder that 'Madam' was remembered with affection by her
former pupils.
*Very
little is known about the early life of Elsie Day. If anyone has any
information they are
willing to share please email: contact @ her- stories .co . uk[lsend without gaps in address]
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