The Churchill Schoolboy Myth
A myth that Churchill fostered later in his life was that he was a poor student ... even the school dunce. This of course was highly unlikely and there is not much other evidence to support such a view apart from brief passages in "My Early Life".
John Bartlett, the very last Brunswick headmaster, was widely reported in the press in 1975 as noting that records supported another view. His insights "in the role of child psychologist" were headlined in The Times of Nov 29th 1975, that Churchill was "no dunce".
The Churchill Archives Centre at Churchill College, Cambridge (Churchill's Brunswick Days) paint a clear picture of his schoolboy days and contain his letters from school at that time and can be read at the bottom of this page. The letters from Churchill point to the relationship that he had with his famous and "successful" father that may have made him feel more than inadequate as a schoolboy. This complex relationship with his father that was hardly ever there for him, and from whom he often even requested autographs to give to his friends, perhaps go some way to explain the schoolboy dunce myth he perpetuated.
The Times of Nov 29th 1975
Churchill "no dunce at school" by Philip Howard
The really great man is the man who makes every man feel great. Sir Winston Churchill had the additional merit of making dunces and all schoolboys who could not get the hang of their quadratic equations feel great also; he assiduously cultivated the impression that he was bad at his lessons.
The headmaster of his old preparatory school Stoke Brunswick in Sussex, yesterday exposed that as myth. Mr John Bartlett, quoted- old school reports, class lists, and letters to prove that, on the contrary, young Winston was regularly top of the form and a prize winner while be was at the school from 1884 to 1888.
The locus classicus for the picture of young Winston as dunce is his description of his Latin prose entrance paper to Harrow: “I wrote my name at the top of the page. I wrote down the number of the question 1. After much reflection, I put a bracket round it thus (1). But thereafter I could not think of anything connected with it that was either relevant or true. It was from these slender indications of scholarship that Mr Weldon drew the conclusion that I was worthy to pass into Harrow. It is very much to his credit.”
Me Bartlett produced records from Winston’s headmistress at Stoke Brunswick to show what went wrong in that Latin prose:
"All that happened was that he had a very bad attack of exam nerves.”
The headmaster in his role of child psychologist argued that young Winston pretended to be hopeless at lessons to impress his unsympathetic father when he was successful at anything.
“ It gave Sir Winston some amusement to pretend in his later life that he had always been bottom of his class, but it was certainly nor true. Our contemporary records show that he worked hard, and in his last year was top in every subject except geography, in which he came second.” .
The occasion for this report on the school’s most famous old boy was the presentation of 34 volumes of his collected works by the Library of Imperial History and the present generation of schoolboys showed considerable enthusiasm at the news that the day would thereafter be called Churchill Day, and would he commemorated by a half holiday.
Daily Express
Churchill the school dunce - some dunce! by Michael O'Flaherty
Even in his finest hour, Sir Winston Churchill proudly mained that he was a dunce at school.
And through the decades parents of children who were slow to learn have been able to console themselves with "Winnie's" example.
But was he really the backward pupil and wayward child he chose to project?
"Most definitely not, said the present-day headmaster of Churchill's prep school yesterday.
"It was all a great myth he chose to perpetrate - he was a bright little boy in reality" said 47 year old Mr John Bartlett.
Mr Bartlett, head of Stoke Brunswick School, East Grinstead, Sussex (Motto: To Do My Duty), will make public his view of the schoolboy Churchill today.
Fees
The occassion is the presentation to head boy William Rydon, 13, on behalf of the school fo Churchill's collected works.
Mr Bartlett has made a special study of Churchill's self-denigrated early schooldays for his speech at the £365-a-term establishment which Churchill attended from 1884-1888 before going to Harrow.
In those days the prep school's fees were just £21-a-term and the school was based in Brighton. The name at that time was plain Brunswick.
Mr Winston Churchill, Sir Winston's Tory MP grandson said yesterday: "What the head master says is absolutely true. It is also true, I think, that my grandfather fostered the image when he left school."