AT THE BEGINNING of April in 1878, seven boys from the same family enrolled for lessons at the Star Lane Board School in Bourne. 

They were the sons of Thomas Glendening who had just been posted to Bourne from Peterborough by the Midland and Great Northern Railway Company after being promoted stationmaster. The town was then an important part of the company's freight and passenger operations and the Red Hall was used as the railway booking office with accommodation for the stationmaster and so he and his family had moved into one of the grandest houses in the town where he soon became highly regarded. 

They had a large family, Mr Glendening having married a second time when his first wife died, and between them they had thirteen children, four girls and nine boys, seven of whom all turned up for lessons within the first few days. 

The school in Star Lane [now Abbey Road] had been opened for less than a year and although there was room for 480 pupils, there were only 200 on the roll. Large families were quite normal at that time but it must have caused a stir to have seven brothers among them. They were Leicester Glendening, aged 13, twins Thomas and James, aged 11, Percy, aged 9, Arthur, aged 8, Seymour, aged 7, and Harry, aged 6, and as a result all of their names appear in sequence in entries for the school’s Admission Register on the 1st and 8th of April. 

The register is one of the most detailed documents in the old school archives recently handed over to the Heritage Centre in Bourne, a large but tattered volume bound in shagreen, measuring 11 x 17 inches with gold lettering on the cover, and containing the names of all boys listed as pupils at the Star Lane Board School [now the Abbey CE Primary Academy] from when it opened in July 1877 until January 1916. 

The register has seen better days and although attempts have been made to repair it with brown adhesive paper, it is now falling apart but should be preserved as part of the town's history because within these pages are the familiar names from our past, each carefully entered in neat handwriting by the headmaster together with their date of admission, the name of their parent or guardian, address, date of birth, last school attended and date of leaving. 

In this register can be found those names which have for many years been associated with Bourne that recur throughout our history, Baldock, Bannister, Barsby and Buckberry, Daff, Darnes and Drakard, Eldred, Flatters, Gelsthorpe and Hudson, Kettle and Lunn, Moisey and Michelson, North and Nowell, Ogsthorpe and Osborn, Rodgers, Stubley and Summerfield, Tabor, Tipler and Tory, Walls and Worsdale, and many, many more. 

One column in the register also records the previous school that pupils attended and so provides an indication of the movement of families at a time when no one in England went very far except in extreme circumstances, usually to find work. We therefore get children arriving from other parts of the country such as Wisbech, Spalding and Peterborough, and even as far afield as Leicester, Bradford and Sheffield. 

There are also many entries relating to temporary admissions for children from touring theatrical companies which are sometimes recorded as “actor’s lad” and other entertainments such as circuses and menageries whose address is given as the Bull Paddock, land behind the Bull Hotel [now the Burghley Arms]. One entry also refers to a gypsy family because the boy’s address is given as “travelling van”. 

There is also a column headed “Remarks” in which the headmaster recorded the pupil’s progress and employment opportunities on leaving. Other more dramatic details are entered here such as that for Arthur Young, aged 13, one of the pupils from the workhouse who “died in school when a blood vessel in his lungs broke” and Harold Hardy, who lived in “the fen” died of consumption. In 1913, William Rix, aged 12, of Union Road, was “drowned in brickfields’ pit”. 

The departure of school leavers is recorded with the words “At work”, many boys leaving for employment on the railways, with the police force and post office, “at Coventry cycle works”, and in bricklaying, carpentry, hairdressing, “on the farm”, and apprentice to a chemist. Dozens became errand boys, telegraph messenger boys and grocer’s lads while others became a coach builder, blacksmith, fishmonger, painter, printer, saddler and tailor and one lad, Malachi Dexter, of Star Lane [now Abbey Road], even trained as a jockey, riding with some success during a race meeting in Paris in 1909.  

There is also an intriguing entry which tells us that Bertie Eldred, son of Charles Eldred, of North Road, died in Galveston [Texas], United States, in October 1897, of yellow fever at the age of 17. Another records that James Meyer, from Amsterdam, “spoke only Dutch” on entering school in 1906 but “learnt English well”. 

Other entries refer to boys who joined the Royal Navy and the army, several serving in the various conflicts and the headmaster recorded with some pride that John H Pick of Eastgate had been “mentioned twice in dispatches during the Boer War and held out against a surprise attack and repelled the enemy before riding 98 miles through Boer country”. Harry Hodgkin, of North Street, also enlisted and saw service in South Africa and was later commissioned captain in the Cheshire Regiment in 1915, an event that thrilled the headmaster so much that he made the entry in red ink. 

Educational successes are also recorded with examinations passed, scholarships awarded and certificates gained, in shorthand, then a popular subject, music, physical training and a variety of technical qualifications. 

The register, a remarkable social document, is split into two parts, the first merely giving the names of boys in alphabetical order and a reference number to the second section which contains more detailed entries for each pupil. A total of some 2,500 names are listed in this way, thus giving us a detailed record for future generations to consult when seeking information to complete their family tree.