Throughout 1851–1852 pupils were enrolled as more ships arrived, and departed as families moved over the Bridle Path into various parts of Canterbury. It is when the School itself moves to Christchurch that more details become available. 15 Even getting to Christchurch was an adventure. Benjamin’s brother, Charles Thornton Dudley (21), wrote of his first day at College in April 1853 – walking down Ferry Road where a big drain was being formed to enable boats and schooners to travel from Lyttelton carrying goods to Christchurch. “We walked on top of [the] earth thrown out of drain from the ditch. Sat down for a spell & took swags off mine carefully rolled into drain. Luckily flax bush handy & Ben recovered swag as it was sailing down the drain. My introduction to the other boarders was ‘this fellow dropped his swag into Ferry Road ditch’.” 16 Dudley’s enrolment information (Figure 2) is in the Form Book and repeated in the Attendance and Behaviour Book and is dated 6 July 1852. Dudley and Robert Simeon Jackson became boarders with Reverend Henry Jacobs, the Headmaster 17 and he was placed with Joseph Brittan 18 in the first class. 19 The Summary for the Half Year in 1853 (Figure 3) indicates that the number of boarders had increased. Dudley was joined by Henry Bowler (22), Thomas Selby Tancred (25), Walter Selby Cookson (20) George Dye Draper (17), Charles Collwyn Prichard (1), and his younger brother, Charles Thornton (21). 20 It is distinctly possible that not all of these boys were living with the Jacobs family, for by August 1852 an assistant master Spencer Perceval, was also advertising for boarders. 21
Figure 2 – Dudley’s enrolment information.
Figure 3 – Summary for the Half Year ending June 1853, showing Boarders and Dayboys. See Page 72 for explanation of Weekly Results and Bad Conduct Marks Form Book, Register of Places and Exercises, Christ’s College Archives.
College Issue 41 2021
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