EDUCATION.

Although no school existed in the early 18th century, George Keith, rector 1705-16, claimed that all the children in his parish could read and write, evidently as a result of his own informal instruction. (fn. 11) In 1758 the children of the poor were kept at school by means of the offertory money, from which 2s. a week was paid by one of the parish officers to the keeper of a dame school. (fn. 12) There were two day schools, with 30 boys and girls in all, in 1819, supported by the rector and by parental contributions; the rector's attempts to unite them had not been supported by the richer parishioners. A winter evening school was then held, attended by c. 10 pupils, (fn. 13) and the rector also kept a school in the rectory for his family and others. (fn. 14)

A new school was built in the modern Fulking parish c. 1842, with help from Col. George Wyndham, lord of Truleigh manor. (fn. 15) Children from Edburton continued to attend it after the division of Sussex into separate administrative counties in 1889, until its closure following the Hadow report in 1930, when they were transferred to schools at Small Dole in Upper Beeding and at Henfield. In 1958 juniors went to school in Upper Beeding and seniors to Steyning secondary modern school and Steyning grammar school. (fn. 16)

Footnotes