EDUCATION.
A schoolmaster of New Shoreham
was recorded in 1302. (fn. 37) From 1714 to 1721 a school
at New Shoreham called a charity school was
taught by the vicar. (fn. 38) The bequest in the will of
John Gray (d. 1751), rector of Southwick, towards a
charity school for Old Shoreham and Southwick
never took effect; (fn. 39) that Gray made no bequest for
New Shoreham may suggest that the school there
continued, and c. 1798 New Shoreham had both a
schoolmaster and a schoolmistress. (fn. 40) A schoolmaster was recorded there c. 1805, (fn. 41) and there was a
National school by 1818, (fn. 42) held in its early years in
the south transept of the parish church. (fn. 43) By 1833
it was held in a neat building beside the churchyard
in East Street, (fn. 44) and had on its books 115 children
each paying 2d. a week. (fn. 45) The boys' and girls'
National day and Sunday schools and the infants'
day and Sunday school recorded in 1847 as in New
and Old Shoreham, for a total of 204 children, were
presumably all in New Shoreham. (fn. 46) A school board
for New Shoreham parish was formed voluntarily
in 1872; (fn. 47) it took over the National school buildings
but replaced them with a new school opened in 1875
in Ham Road for an estimated attendance of 240.
From c. 1876 the school included a Ragged school. (fn. 48)
By 1904 attendance was 557, in three departments, (fn. 49)
to which a junior mixed department was added in
1913. The school was reorganized, in partly new
buildings, in 1915, the older children going to
Victoria Upper Council school, (fn. 50) and was closed in
1938, when there was an attendance of 551 in
junior mixed and infant departments, to be replaced
by schools in Victoria Road. (fn. 51)
In 1818 there were said to be several common day
schools and a school supported by dissenters. (fn. 52) In
1833, when there were seven day schools with a
total of 157 children educated at their parents'
expense and with no expressed denominational
connexion, the Wesleyans and Independents each
had a Sunday school. (fn. 53) The Independent school
may have been one of two unspecified dissenting
schools that existed in 1871, (fn. 54) when the Wesleyan
school, founded in 1829 and enlarged in 1866, had
an attendance of 68. (fn. 55) It is likely that the denominational schools were closed on or soon after the
formation of the school board in 1872.
At Old Shoreham a Sunday school supported by
the vicar was started in 1828, but in 1833 the
children went to day schools at New Shoreham, (fn. 56)
as apparently in 1847. (fn. 57) A Church school for Old
Shoreham was built on the glebe before 1871, when
it had an attendance of 23. (fn. 58) The buildings were
enlarged in or after 1879, and attendance had risen
to 95 by 1906. The school moved into new buildings
in 1914, (fn. 59) and in 1938, after a period of overcrowding, had an attendance of 78 in junior mixed
and infant departments. (fn. 60) The school, called St.
Nicolas's, closed in 1971, being replaced by St.
Nicolas and St. Mary C. of E. school in Eastern
Avenue, which in 1976 had nearly 300 boys and
girls aged from five to twelve. (fn. 61)
St. Peter's Roman Catholic school at New
Shoreham, which had been held at least as a Sunday
school from 1870, was established in new buildings
in West Street in 1876, with a certificated teacher and
an average attendance of 26. (fn. 62) By 1893 the school
had been enlarged and had an attendance of 88. (fn. 63)
The school was divided between mixed and infant
departments by 1903, (fn. 64) and in the twenties and
thirties had an attendance of a little over 100. (fn. 65) It
moved to new buildings in Sullington Way,
Kingston, in 1962.
The Victoria Upper Council school, on the site of
the Swiss Gardens in Victoria Road, was opened in
1915, and had an average attendance of 200 in
1919. (fn. 66) In 1937 the senior boys were transferred to
the Shoreham and Southwick Senior Boys' Council
school in Middle Road, Kingston by Sea, and the
senior girls to the sister school in Southwick, (fn. 67) the
three parishes forming a single area for educational
purposes. The buildings in Victoria Road were
extended and became the Shoreham County Junior
and Shoreham County Infant schools in 1938. The
junior school was closed in 1974 and the children
were transferred to the enlarged Buckingham County
Junior (later Middle) school in Buckingham Road,
originally opened in 1958. The infant school
survived in 1976 as Shoreham County First school,
occupying the whole of the Victoria Road buildings. (fn. 68)
The history of the Woodard schools in Sussex
has been given elsewhere; the three schools all
began, in 1847, 1849, and 1858, at Shoreham, where
Nathaniel Woodard was curate, and were moved
respectively to Lancing (in 1857), Hurstpierpoint
(in 1850), and Ardingly (in 1870). (fn. 69) The first school
was originally started for the sons of ships' captains. (fn. 70)
A private school called the Protestant Grammar
School was founded in 1842 (fn. 71) and moved from its
buildings in North Street (fn. 72) to Worthing in 1965,
moving afterwards to Kingston by Sea in 1968. (fn. 73)
Other private schools in Shoreham, which numbered
two in 1867 and five in 1938, included one in High
Street run by the Sisters of Mercy from 1922 or
earlier until 1938 or later. (fn. 74)