king charles i school
Worcestershire.
We are proud of our school; it has a very long heritage and a very bright
future. The foundation of our school is an old one. We are the only secondary
school, in the United Kingdom, to bear the name of King Charles I. Although he
gave us our charter in 1636, the foundation was established by Thomas Blount,
esq., Lord of the Manor of Kidderminster, some 70 years earlier. A document
dated 1609 describes the origins of the school. Various lands acquired by the
Parish Church of St. Mary and All Saints as investments were confiscated by the
State during the Protestant Reformation and early in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth I, Roger Maunsell of Pedmore purchased them. He levied penal rents and
following an appeal from the tenants to the Lord of the Manor, Thomas Blount
bought the lands and arranged in 1566 that the rents should be used to endow a
free grammar school in Kidderminster “for the instruction of youth in good
letters and manners”. In the 1630s an inquiry was held into the administration
of the endowments and as a result of this the charter was granted by King
Charles I in 1636. This charter which was part of one given to the town, laid
down the manner in which the school should be run and lasted over 200 years.
From 1566 to 1848 the School was carried out in the Chantry of the Parish church
of St Mary and All Saints although it was not a chantry school. In 1848 the
school moved to the site known as Woodfield on Bewdley Road. In the
mid-nineteenth century King Charles I School, like most other ancient schools in
England, was reorganised under schemes devised by the endowed schools
commissioners and the charity commissioners to meet an increasing demand for
secondary education in which england seemed to have fallen woefully behind other
european countries. In 1902 the school became ‘grant aided’ within
Worcestershire County Council; this status was continued as ‘voluntary aided’
until after 1944. In order to provide finance for accommodation thought
necessary in the late 1950’s the school became ‘voluntary controlled’ in 1958
and remained as such up to April, 2012 when it became an academy.
