Grove County Primary School With Rear Boundary Wall

Grove County Primary School with Rear Boundary Wall

School. Opened September 2nd 1872, probably designed by Captain Edmund du Cane, RE, who also designed St. Peter's Church. A richly detailed and confidently handled Romanesque Revival building constructed in Portland ashlar with slate roofs.

The building has a cruciform plan with lofty two-storey gabled units to the north, east and west, and a lower single-storey hall unit to the south. Boys' and girls' entrances to the left and right respectively gave access to a long, narrow full-depth hall on two floors, with the infants' hall to the right. Single-storey units occupy the re-entrant angles, and a further extension was added in 1898 to the left, partly rebuilt in the late 20th century.

The exterior is richly ornamented with round-arched windows set to single or paired shafts and responds. The high gables contain paired lights under an oculus with a sunk panel within the containing arch. The steeply pitched roofs have coped gables and small-scale Lombard bands at the eaves, concealing ventilation openings to the halls. There are one large and two smaller heavily modelled eaves stacks. The complex fenestration includes groups of three lights to an outer shafted screen under the three main gables, and three paired lights similarly to the lower hall. The lean-to entrance lobby has four simpler arched windows. Deep glacis-like sloping cills and various string and lintel bands complete the detailed exterior treatment. To the left of the main gable to the street is a plank door in an arched entry; the corresponding entry to the right is now blocked.

Interior: A stone open-well cantilevered stair in the left-hand lobby gives access to the boys' hall at first floor, simply detailed with iron handrail and alternate twisted iron balusters. The upper hall has a five-bay arch-braced roof; the lower hall has a moulded cornice. Off the left-hand side of each hall is a large classroom in the north wing, and to the right at ground floor the long former infants' hall. This has a series of sealed ventilators at eaves level on each side, and a large classroom opens off to the left.

A lofty stone wall divides the playground at the rear of the building. Substantial remains of former privy blocks are set back against the outer boundary wall. The boundary walls to The Grove are important to the setting of the school.

The school log books and punishment book are retained, along with an architect's development drawing in pencil dated 22nd June 1863 (unsigned). This shows an earlier version of the building with three lofty dormers to the infants' wing. The log book records for 2nd September 1872 note: "This day we opened the new School, 71 in attendance. Addresses were made ..... Rev. G. Taylor exhorting the boys to perseverance, diligence, and to careful attention to the School's ordinary work ....." Edward W. Moore was Master at that time.

The building is a very lively and carefully articulated design, little altered internally, and with its supporting documents forms an important survival of 19th-century social history. It forms part of a major group of buildings developed as a result of the establishment of the prison here in 1848, comprising Church, Vicarage, School House, School and Alma Terrace.