Tim Chavasse looks back…..

I was sent to Durlston Court in September 1939 shortly after the outbreak of war. What I remember most about that time was going down to the cellars just before an air-raid, having our photographs taken wearing our gas masks and watching dog fights between our own and enemy aircraft.
 
It always seems to happen when one is young summer days are long sunny and warm. However, one summer term there happened to be a long hot spell which was broken by a violent thunder storm, and that night our entire dormitory lent out of the window watching the forked lightening, when suddenly there was a massive purple flash instantly followed by what sounded like a crack-of-doom, and a large oak tree about 200 yards away was struck by a bolt of lightning. We all scuttled back to our beds terrified out of our wits. Next morning, all that remained of the tree was a blackened stump.

I was one of the many boys who developed a great interest in Lepidoptera and Ornithology which I have kept up throughout my life, although these days, living in Portugal, I do not kill butterflies after catching them, but release them when I have discovered what species they are. Nor do I collect bird’s eggs. To this day I do not know how boys were able to walk into a chemist and buy as much Cyanide, as we required. From this cyanide we made killing bottles simply by pouring plaster-of-Paris over the cyanide and, putting a cork bung into the neck of the bottle.

By the end of the summer term, the cyanide had become rather weak and butterflies flapped about for days on end before they died, probably from starvation. We also tried killing butterflies in a jar with crushed laurel leaves, but the butterflies took even longer to die than in weak cyanide.

Earnshill was a wonderful place for boys to grow up and learn to appreciate nature, for not only was there a wonderful variety of butterflies and moths (it was before the days of chemical fertilizers) and there was a huge variety of birds, reptiles and wild animals. I remember one day walking through a field with Michael Lushington, when up got a couple of hares which proceeded to run in a circle around us. Our thoughts immediately turned to food, but seeing nothing to throw at them, we threw our shoes, one of which hit a hare and stunned it. It took no time to kill it, either by hitting it hard on the head or by strangling it; I forget which. We took it to our hut in an old pollarded elm where we cooked it in a saucepan over a "Tommy's Cooker" (a small metal container filled with solid paraffin and used by Soldiers) and then ate it. I do not remember if we enjoyed it, but we did enjoy puffing on our pipes afterwards.

Both Anthony Dix and Sir Rowland Whitehead have a very much better memory of the staff than I. I do, however, remember Miss Dawson; who doesn’t? and what a wonderful teacher of French she was. Thanks to her, I can ‘get by’ if I go to France. Of course I remember 'Cockeye' and 'Eli' with affection even though I was beaten by both on a number of occasions.

What wonderful men they were, and I never ceased to be amazed as to how they managed to run the school during, those war years. I remember Miss St. Croix, the music teacher. I must have been the bane of her life as I did not have a note of music in my head. At the end of each summer term all boys had to play a piece of music that we had been taught during the year on a piano, on the stage and in front of the whole school and staff. Everybody was brilliant, except me, as I could not remember my piece. By the time that my turn came l was in a cold sweat of panic, so in desperation gave the school a rendering of "'God Save the King" and was severely reprimanded by Mr. Cox afterwards.

There were a lot of moles in the school grounds. Anthony Dix and I somehow succeeded in catching one and we decided to have it stuffed by a taxidermist. We found an advertisement for a taxidermist in a book, put the mole into a box, and sent it off by post. About three weeks later we were summoned to Mr. Cox's study, and there on his desk was our parcel which, to put it mildly stank. The taxidermist to whom we had sent the mole (guts and all) had gone out of business in the 1920's. We were told to get rid of the parcel and its contents.

I have so many happy memories of Durlston Court, some at Swanage, but most at Earnshill, and so much that I learnt there both academically and during our free time has stood me in good stead. Although Durlston has changed without recognition from those war years, the boys and girls of to day will look back in sixty years time with many happy memories like the boys of my day.