Bad things you didnt get caught doing (Sausage in Communion)

[michael scuffil]

Recently it has seemed to me that for most of us who came from relatively poor or even difficult backgrounds - once we had navigated the higher education system, we were left floundering with no social support networks that exist for the truly middle or upper class kids.

Hear, hear! If you were bright, CH's objective was to make sure you got an Oxbridge scholarship. That was not seen as a means to an end, but an end in itself. And if you came from a working-class family, okay, CH had taught you the elements of middle-class behaviour and given you the intellectual background to cope at Oxbridge (as long as you avoided the Etonians, Wykehamists and Harrovians), but there was no one to help you work out what you were actually there for. If your parents were factory workers, they couldn't really give much inside info on the relative merits of being a barrister, company executive, doctor or don.

[jhopgood]

Recently it has seemed to me that for most of us who came from relatively poor or even difficult backgrounds - once we had navigated the higher education system, we were left floundering with no social support networks that exist for the truly middle or upper class kids.

Hear, hear! If you were bright, CH's objective was to make sure you got an Oxbridge scholarship. That was not seen as a means to an end, but an end in itself. And if you came from a working-class family, okay, CH had taught you the elements of middle-class behaviour and given you the intellectual background to cope at Oxbridge (as long as you avoided the Etonians, Wykehamists and Harrovians), but there was no one to help you work out what you were actually there for. If your parents were factory workers, they couldn't really give much inside info on the relative merits of being a barrister, company executive, doctor or don.

True but didn´t stop a lot of Old Blues being very successful in life.

[Angela Woodford]

Laprimacenerentola, I'm shocked! I remember you being one of the awe-inspiring UVI when I started as a very green 10 year old, far too responsible to do anything so wicked. Or so I thought

Clorinda, I'm absolutely with Jo on this one - although I'm a bit ( ) older than she.

You see, I used to look up to you as somebody naturally beautiful and good. I saw you as rather like one of those Renaissance beauties, shown in portraits as lovely and serene. Weren't you prominent as one of the stars of the first Sopranos? I thought Annabelle was very lucky to have this wonderful sister for guidance in the ways of righteousness.

The thought of you having a surreptious fag, or getting your kit off at Foxholes...

Yes, I'm shocked!

By the way - who caught you smoking?

[michael scuffil]

Recently it has seemed to me that for most of us who came from relatively poor or even difficult backgrounds - once we had navigated the higher education system, we were left floundering with no social support networks that exist for the truly middle or upper class kids.

Hear, hear! If you were bright, CH's objective was to make sure you got an Oxbridge scholarship. That was not seen as a means to an end, but an end in itself. And if you came from a working-class family, okay, CH had taught you the elements of middle-class behaviour and given you the intellectual background to cope at Oxbridge (as long as you avoided the Etonians, Wykehamists and Harrovians), but there was no one to help you work out what you were actually there for. If your parents were factory workers, they couldn't really give much inside info on the relative merits of being a barrister, company executive, doctor or don.

True but didn´t stop a lot of Old Blues being very successful in life.

Including me, in the end, I suppose. It's just that as I came to the end of my undergraduate days, I realized I knew nothing about middle-class life outside academia, and it took me years to find out. Careers advice for those who leftafter O Level or A Level was probably quite good, but for us button grecians, getting your scholarship was the be-all and end-all.

[Katharine]

Careers advice for those who leftafter O Level or A Level was probably quite good, but for us button grecians, getting your scholarship was the be-all and end-all.

I am not sure that there was much careers information for anyone at Hertford in my day, but the decision about Oxbridge was much the same there. Very few stood up to DR and said they would not stay on to SVI to take the exams if DR wanted them to do so. In my year the Clarke twins both did so, I wonder whether they felt they could do so because there were two of them? I wanted to go to Oxford so no problem there, but did I want it because I was told so often that I should try to do so?

[NEILL THE NOTORIOUS]

I have read through all of the latest Posts about unhappiness at CH.

It would seem that the Hertford OBs seem to have had more to worry about, or are Girls, naturally, more sensitive than Boys ?

I find it sad, when anyone doesn't look back on their days at CH with affection.

I wasn't "Pushed" in any Career Direction --- it was useless -I was headed (From about the age of 6) for the Army.
Just like the Services, there were good and bad times, but always a "New Dawn". --- I suppose it goes back to my first supposition -------- Any Female OBs who have been in the Services ?

[Fjgrogan]

Does the WRNR count, Neill? I spent a couple of years in the reserve - basically I left when I could no longer get into my uniform prior to the birth of Maria. I found annual training very much like being back in school at Hertford, except that we wouldn't have been allowed Radio 1 in the dorm!

[Kim2s70-77]

I wasn't "Pushed" in any Career Direction --- it was useless -

That was the problem I encountered - a total lack of guidance about anything. The one thing that I had wanted to do from the ages of 4 - 16 (medicine) was out of the question by then, because I lacked the belief in myself or my abilities to even apply for medical school. Some kind of careers advice would have been nice. I guess some girls had parental support in their University applications etc - my parents were "otherwise engaged" emotionally at that time. In spite of this - I really do have very fond memories of CH! I just have some old shrapnel that 'twinges' every now and then. It did take me years and years to stop having bad dreams after I left, though - and it has taken this forum to make me think that I could hold my head up again with peers. For the past 30+ years, I felt that I had 'failed' the good start I had been given somehow. Isn't that rather pathetic for a grown woman to admit!

[sejintenej]

My experience was that CH offered absolutely no guidance whatsoever on anything and there was nobody to ask. Certainly nothing about careers and even less about further education. Given that we were not allowed access to the outside world I knew little about the land outside the perimeter fence.

So far as universities were concerned so far as I knew at that time you had to pay full price for tuition, for accommodation, for books and for everything else. To do that you had to get one of the very few scholarships (restricted to Oxbridge) or have rich parents to support you so that concept wasa a no-no.

As for so-called home, I had no parents and no legal guardians - just a place to sleep and eat from the time I started work on A levels , and no access to advice (if any were available in those days).

There was not even any information about leaving; I simply got sent without prior warning to the Headmaster's office and there I was given my bible so from that one fact I knew that I would not be going back. ( I had arranged a berth on the Tall Ships Race which was banned by the school and then later on an expedition which left before term end which they graciously allowed). It was only last year that I discovered that the CH office only had a 3 removes out-of-date address and phone number (the one valid when I went at the age of 9)

[anniexf]

There were a few girls at Hertford who appeared to have been dumped and forgotten. One was my "Ward Mother", who as far as I can recall received no letters or visits. It must have been dreadful trying to cope with the outside world after years of isolation, loneliness and ignorance.

[michael scuffil]

I have read through all of the latest Posts about unhappiness at CH.

I find it sad, when anyone doesn't look back on their days at CH with affection.

Actually I was happy at CH (from about the age of 14). It's just that I fear it may have been a fools' paradise in the sense I outlined above. (Don't get me wrong, that's my only major criticism.)

Of course Hertford was different: gender expectations in those days were wildly divergent. And the regime there, I thought even at the time from the reports we got, was oppressive.

[NEILL THE NOTORIOUS]

I would not DARE to say that the WRNS doesn't count as "The Services" !

The point I was making was, that One was moved about a bit "Good Colonel -- Bad Colonel, and of course there were wonderful places to be sent, in my time.

I travelled by Rail and Paddle Steamer, up the Nile, from Cairo to Khartoum (Very" Four Feathers" )
and realised that my Grandfather had travelled the same route pulling Guns, over the Cataracts for the relief of Khartoum, and the battle of Omdurman ------ a REAL Soldier !!

I was also able to travel to GHAT -- the geographical centre of the Sahara --- Oasis, with mud buildings and two signs in Arabic ------ Coca Cola and Bata Shoes --- Salesmanship !

A silly old Buffer like me can look back on that sort of experience with nostalgia, and the "Rose Tinted Specs" effect --- I suspect the same applies to CH experiences, during the War ?
I can't say I enjoyed being beaten at CH, nor being shot at-- and wounded, but on balance ----- -

[postwarblue]

Wot's Career Guidance? In my case it was already known that I wanted to join the Navy (it's one of those things one knows instinctively). In UF or so I was sent to Bill Armistead who was Head of the RMS. He opened a fooscap mark book at the back. Virgin page. In his tiny neat hand he wrote Navy. Drew a neat ruled line under that. Below that wrote my name. Closed the book. However I was sent to the doc to do a colour vision test (passed) so that was a help.

[englishangel]

Isn't it funny the little things you remember! I suppose that note on a pristne page set your life on its course so was up there in the memory file.

[Requested Removal 18]

I figured out the external code for the internal phone system (not particularly difficult - I think I just watched someone do it) then a whole gang of us broke into Big School to use the phone in there one Friday night (it was during the exams). I rang loads of my friends in London, Glasgow, the Midlands and at home and we never got caught.

I also sabotaged the assault course in the lag just before field day by cutting down the rope swing and rope bridge. As a result we had swimming instead on Field Day which was much more fun!!