Gallery Three

An era when the cane reigned supreme

In the late 1950s the Illustrated London News, a rather staid publication read mainly by the professional classes, began a series of photographic feature articles on individual schools entitled 'The Education of British Youth.' However, the magazine's roving cameraman did not venture into the types of schools attended by the vast majority of British youth, but instead confined his visits to public schools and the more exclusive grammar schools.

This was an era when the cane ruled supreme in these schools, maintaining an unchallenged position at the apex of the disciplinary system. In many such establishments prefects and well as masters were empowered to administer corporal punishment and in a number of the ILN photographs these senior boys look old beyond their years - perhaps weighed down by their burden of responsibility.

Many English boarding schools were renowned for their regime of 'corps and corporal punishment': in other words, there was invariably a compulsory cadet corps and the cane and slipper were applied liberally for all sorts of offences against school discipline. Nowadays, after a period of decline, school cadet corps are making a comeback but the cane and slipper are to be forbidden by law in the dwindling band of traditionalist schools which retained corporal punishment.

This selection of photographs from the ILN series serves to evoke a past era when public schools were much more spartan and authoritarian places than they are today: a time of compulsory chapel, cold showers, cross country runs, endless afternoons of team games, and tedious corps parades on windswept parade grounds.

Headmaster and senior prefects Malvern College

A dose of medicine from the school nurse Elizabeth College, Guernsey

Combined Cadet Force training Pocklington School

The school dining hall King William's College, Isle of Man

Off to the sports field Colston's School, Bristol

In the gymnasium Emanuel School, London

Lining up for pocket money King William's College, Isle of Man

A popular schoolboy hobby Royal Grammar School, Guildford