A Comprehensive History of Norwich

by A. D. Bayne

The Church Pastoral Aid Society was instituted in the year 1835, for the purpose of supplying assistance to the incumbents of large and populous parishes, to enable them to obtain the help of additional curates and lay agents. Aid is now afforded to 548 incumbents, and the grants of the society, when all occupied, are for 502 curates and 181 lay assistants. Meetings are held here every year in support of the parent institution. The total receipts for the year ending March 31st, 1868, were £57,019 16s. 7d., and the expenditure £64,065 16s. 3d.

The Norwich Diocesan Church Association was established in 1862. Its object was to combine, as far as possible, Churchmen of every shade of political and religious opinion in the support of the established church, particularly as regards all questions affecting its welfare, likely to become the subject of legislation, and generally in the promotion of measures calculated to increase its stability and usefulness; but points of doctrine are never brought under discussion. Annual meetings are held every year on the second Thursday after Easter, when reports are read, and the officers and committee elected. This society comprises 800 members, one half of whom are laymen.

The Norwich Diocesan Church Building Association was established on October 20th, 1836. It is in union with the Incorporated Society for promoting the enlargement, building, and repairing of churches and chapels in England and Wales. The patron is the Earl of Leicester, and the president the Lord Bishop of the diocese. Grants have been made to many parishes in this county.

The Norfolk Book Hawking Association was established in December, 1855, for the sale, throughout the county of Norfolk, by the agency of licensed hawkers, of bibles, prayer books, tracts, and prints of a religious and instructive character. In the year ending August 31st, 1868, the number of bibles, testaments, prayer books, church services, tracts, and prints sold, amounted to 11,449, the receipts being £523 1s. 11½d. The receipts for the year (including a balance of £56 2s. 5d.,) were £759 18s. 4d., and the expenditure amounted to £722 9s. 1½d., leaving a balance in hand of £37 9s. 2½d. President, the Lord Bishop of the diocese.

The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge was founded in the year 1698. The Norwich Auxiliary is of later date. During the year 1868 the committee forwarded to the Parent Society contributions amounting to £154, in addition to donations of £30 from the local fund; and the sale of books at the depository realised £350, viz., for bibles and testaments, 1,489; prayer books, 3,731; other books, 16,993; total, 22,213. By the rules of this society all its members must be of the established church. Its principal object is the distribution of the Holy Scriptures at home and abroad, and other religious books which are calculated to diffuse christian knowledge.

The Norwich Churchman’s Club was instituted in the early part of the year 1868, mainly through the exertions of the Rev. F. Meyrick, for the moral and mental improvement of young men in the city. For these purposes a reading room has been established, supplied with books, periodicals, and newspapers. Lectures are delivered and classes have been formed for secular and religious instruction. About 100 honorary, and 200 reading-room members have been enrolled.

Annual meetings have also been held here on behalf of the London Missionary Society, which is chiefly supported by Independents; on behalf of the Baptist Missions, the Wesleyan Missions, and other missions to the heathen; the Society for Promoting Christianity amongst the Jews; and also on behalf of the Norwich City Mission, a society which has been of great benefit in improving the spiritual condition of the poor. A full account of the operations of this mission would exhibit the social state of the city far better than any elaborate description.

Turning our attention now to the question of Education, it will not be too much to say that Norwich has always been the head quarters of education in the eastern counties, on account both of the number and the character of the schools, some of which have produced very eminent men. The Grammar School is a far-famed ancient institution. It was originally founded and endowed by the bishops of the See who collated the masters, and the archdeacon of Norwich inducted them. The Singing and Grammar Schools belonging to the Convent were kept in the Almonry, the masters of which were frequently collated by the bishop on the Convent’s nomination, and as soon as inducted they generally published the bishop’s inhibition, prohibiting all other persons from teaching grammar or singing in the city. At the Reformation they were dissolved; and the present Free Grammar School was appointed, and took the name of Edward VI. It is divided into the upper and lower schools, has considerable endowments, and an interest in fifteen scholarships at Cambridge. It has afforded instruction to many distinguished scholars, including Archbishop Parker, Bishops Cousin, T. Green, Maltby, and Monk, Dr. Caius, the founder of Caius College at Cambridge, Wild, the learned tailor, Admiral Lord Nelson, Coke, Rajah Brooke, and many others. The Commercial School, in Bridge Street, shares the same endowments, and affords instruction to more than 200 boys.

The report of the Schools Inquiry Commission, which was issued in March, 1868, and is the most comprehensive on the subject of the education of the upper and middle classes that has yet appeared, is very favourable as regards the Norwich Grammar and Commercial Schools, but quite the reverse respecting the schools in the county. Norwich Grammar School is stated to have been established in 1547. The gross income of the charity is £1558. The endowment of the school is £662. The course of instruction is classical, under a head master and competent teachers. This is no doubt the best school for the classics, but the Commercial School is the most useful to the citizens.

Mr. Hammond, the assistant commissioner, in the report upon endowed schools says, that no education, preparatory to the University, is supplied in Norfolk, except at the Grammar Schools of Norwich, Holt, and King’s Lynn, in none of which does it, except in Norwich, “engross very much of the teacher’s time and attention, nor is it anywhere carried out to the same perfection as at such schools as Marlborough College and the City of London School. In Norfolk, Latin, so far as it went, was in the endowed schools generally satisfactory. But hardly any boy could have been set to write five consecutive lines of Latin, not taken from the exercise book. It is fair to add that Norwich sacrifices nothing to it. In mathematics, modern languages, and general literature, the school has few equals; and certainly none superior in the county. French is in Norfolk a recognised study in classical schools, as well as in most of the semi-classical schools; is very good, and in all but one satisfactory. In the non-classical schools, French, when attempted, is worthless. Arithmetic is in the great majority of Norfolk schools practically, and perhaps educationally, the most important subject taught, and a large portion of time and attention is assigned to it.”