Countess Spencer has come out against the “whole madness of sending children away at eight” as her husband, Earl Spencer, prepares to publish a book on the subject of boarding school. A Very Private School will combine recollections of this “common trauma” with historical analysis, and is due out next year.
Lady Spencer said the research and writing has “made for a challenging five years”, as her husband Charles Spencer relived the “culture of cruelty” at boarding school.
Earl Spencer once said he had wanted to go to state school, rather than a boarding school where they beat boys “with a cane on bare buttocks”. Nevertheless he was packed off to Maidwell Hall in Northamptonshire aged eight, followed by Eton.
We wonder how the Spencers’ in-laws, the royal family, feel about the boarding school question. Royal children have traditionally boarded — as Prince William and Prince Harry did. Like Charles Spencer, they went to a prep boarding school aged eight, and then Eton.
While William reportedly enjoyed boarding, Harry shared his unhappy experience in Spare, his memoir. He wrote that while Eton was “heaven for brilliant boys,” it was “purgatory for one very unbrilliant boy.” Harry earned the catchy nickname “Prince Thicko” after he was accused of cheating in his art A-level. He also described Eton’s uniform, comprising a black tail coat, a black waistcoat and pinstriped trousers, as “funereal”.
So what of the current royal children? While all three are still day pupils, Prince William and Kate took a nine-year-old George to visit Eton earlier this year. But perhaps another family memoir on the turmoil of boarding school will make them think twice.
