AMPLEFORTH COLLEGE Boys entering the School 1803-95

These lists are taken from those printed in the Ampleforth Diary of 1888-92 by Fr Hildebrand Bradley, and continued in the Ampleforth Journal of 1895, assembled by Fr Bernard Hutchison, who derived them (probably) from a list made from memory by Fr Bede Smith about 1850, giving 207 names, and also - we may guess - from oral memory for the details of their later lives. We have added 35 names form the Flinn list [ca 1830]. Much of this information is oral history (in some cases literally from longstanding memory) and should be treated with caution. Please point out to the editors any corrections needed.

BOYS ARRIVING 1803-30   A

The first boys arrived in April 1803. Most of them came with the President of the Congregation, Fr Beded Brewerhe Prussians in January. A few moved over in the next year or two from the school at Parbold, which continued for two or three years. The details are often elusive.

BOYS ARRIVING 1831-65   B

The second list covers the period after about thirty boys went with the Prior and others to join Bishop Augustine Baines' new College at Prior Park at Bath, and so reflects the rather weakened period which followed. Those who became monks (marked OSB) can be followed in their obituaries

BOYS ARRIVING 1866-95   C

From 1865 there are rather better school records, but the process of checking is likely to remain an ongoing task. More information is discoverable (and will be added) about their subsequent careers.

ALPHABETICAL INDEX 1803-95

We have made up this list as an index to show which list, A, B or C includes a particular name. It includes 1709 names, so it too is a long file, and slow to load.

ADDITIONAL LINKS

Those boys who became monks, and died after 1850, should be looked for in the EBC History site, under Monks & Nuns. Earlier ones have been included in the book by Fr Athanasius Allanson, Biography of the English Benedictines, 1999   [ISBN  0 9518173 4 5 – not available on the Internet]

THE FLINN LIST

In 1927-28 there came to the Archives (there is no current record of where from) a list of the boys who were in the School from its opening in 1802 until 1829. On the outside sheet there is the inscription "G. H. Flinn's Catalogue of Students" ; the writer later became Dom Henry George Flinn and was one of the few who remained at Ampleforth when the exodus to Prior Park took place in May 1830. It is described in Ampleforth Journal 34 (1928) 251-53

The importance of this Flinn list is that when in 1830 Prior Burgess and others left to join Bishop Baines at Prior Park they took with them much of the records - such as they were - and (perhaps because of the fire there in 1836) few of them have survived, so that we cannot check against entries of payment in the account ledgers, or other sources.

The Diary gave the names of 246 boys, 38 of which are not contained in Flinn and the latter gives the names of 247 boys, 35 of which are not in the Diary. Taking both lists together, we arrive at a total of 281 or 285 boys for the first twenty-eight years of our existence here.

The list that follows gives the names, and dates of arrival when mentioned in Flinn, of all those boys who are in Flinn but do not figure in the Diary lists.