A Girl's School from Outside

[lonely_wolf]

Did you check out CH Horsham as well? The Hertford FR pages were begun some time after the general CH one (which I subscribed to, as did other Hertfordites). Good luck with your search.
Caroline

Probably not, I'd never understood the relationship between Horsham and Hertford. It was to sort this out that I looked on wikipedia last week, where I found the link to this forum. Friends Reunited simply doesn't work with my browser at the moment, so good of Jo to tell what it says. Thanks for all the other detail too Jo, you've been awesome, and thanks to everyone, I really appreciate it, I'm overwhelmed by how nice you've been to me.

[englishangel]

Nice of you to say so. I think we are making up for lost time,if you read some of this we were sometimes horrible to each other at school.

[lonely_wolf]

In case this is as close as I get, a message for Sophie should she ever pass this way ...

The way your hair hangs down, it hides away your face
For you it's perfect but it seems like such a waste
And when I see you gliding past, I make my plans
And then my plans slip through my fingers just like sand

I wish that life could be just like a photograph
One moment captured as you laugh your perfect laugh
But that's a daydream, things could never be so right
There's so much more to think about than black and white

(Lyrics of "Like A Daydream" by Ride)

[Jo]

No, thanks to you, lonely_wolf, for setting so many memories running!

[icomefromalanddownunder]

If that was the film version of The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe ).

Hi Jo

We have a copy of the BBC version - the later one where Aslan actually looks like a lion, albeit computer generated, rather than the earlier version where he was a man in a suit.

xx

[lonely_wolf]

Oh, sorry, I've thought of another question. I suppose the doors looking onto the avenue were the ones used? I'd had an idea the entrance to 3s was on the 4's side, but found on Sat that it obviously wasn't, though there was some sort of door on the 2s side. If you're wondering why I need to know this, so am I!

[Vonny]

The doors facing onto the main avenue were only used by sixth formers and staff generally, although we did use them when we marched to sunday lunch or trooped to chapel. Us mere mortals used the side door which for houses 1-4 was on the right hand side as you faced the house from the avenue. So 1's door was on the 2's side, 2's on the 3's side, 3's on the 4's side and 4's was on the side nearest to the cloisters near the dining hall.

[lonely_wolf]

That's interesting, either those side doors have gone or I didn't look as carefully as I thought I had.

[Katharine]

The doors facing onto the main avenue were only used by sixth formers and staff generally, although we did use them when we marched to sunday lunch or [b]trooped to chapel[/b].

I never knew that you used the front door to go to chapel! We lined up outside facing the field, I don't think I ever thought what you would do on the other side of the square!

[Vonny]

We had to line up in two lines to walk (I wouldn't say we marched) to chapel - we were always in house number order so you would pretty much always sit next to the same person. We would be led out from the house through the main door by a sixth former as far as I can remember.

[Katharine]

We lined up in two lines beside the house, 5s side. The two most senior girls, not in the choir, were at the front, the next two in seniority were at the back. Each term a list went up of the order we would sit in, so we were moved about and not in numerical order, but we had no choice who we sat with. I presume it was one of the House Mons who prepared the list.

[Jo]

The side doors have gone now - I noticed that on recent visits to Hertford. There were two side doors; one on the kitchen, and then the back/cloakroom door which as Vonny said was the main entrance for everyone below the 6th form. I'm not sure how they've done such a good job of doing an "invisible mend" - they must have taken down the loos and possibly the cloakrooms too. There is also a new door on each house on the other side, below the stair window, which seems to be an emergency exit. I suppose it is at the top of the cellar steps inside.

[icomefromalanddownunder]

That's interesting, either those side doors have gone or I didn't look as carefully as I thought I had.

We discovered, in April, that 6's side door (between 5s and 6s) is no longer, but a door (fire escape) has been built into the opposite side of the building (between 6s and 7s), so your observation skills are very probably fine

[lonely_wolf]

Managed to look on FR using a friend's computer, and surprised to see Sophie as leaving 1976, with previous school leaving 1969.

1969-76? I could believe I'd been wrong in thinking it was her final year when our paths crossed, though it's giving me a strange feeling, but in the Latin story you say she was in your year Jo, yet you are 1967-75.

[Jo]

I can only assume Sophie has got her dates wrong. I'm pretty sure she started in 1968, the year after me (I started when I was 10, and repeated my second year), although there were always a few people who joined at 12 and sent straight into the second year. But I think that's unlikely for Sophie as she already had an older sister at the school and the late joiners I think were usually people who had only just found out about CH (or at least that's what I always assumed).

She left the same year as me, 1975, unless she stayed on to retake her A levels or something, which I probably wouldn't have been aware of after I'd left. But I never remember that being mentioned. I am sure she must have made a mistake.