In 1806 the Honourable East India Company commissioned William E Wilkins (later the designer of the National Gallery, of Downing College, Cambridge, and much of the University of London) to plan the buildings for its new training college for civil servants for India.
On an area of empty heath, not far from the manor of Hailey, Wilkins created his buildings in a neo-classical style round a large grass quadrangle (still said to be the largest academic quadrangle in the land) and here the East India College flourished for 50 years.
It was one of the country’s most distinguished centres of scholarship and teaching and the training ground for generations of those destined to govern British India.
Four years after its closure in 1858, Haileybury opened its gates once again, this time as a public school, under the headmastership of the Reverend A G Butler. By the middle 1870s, the number of boys was close to 500. In 1874, a Haileybury housemaster was appointed the first headmaster of the United Services College at Westward Ho!, which later moved to Windsor and became the Imperial Service College.
In 1942, Haileybury and the ISC combined to become “Haileybury and Imperial Service College”, now known as Haileybury.
Today, Haileybury is a co-educational day and boarding school for pupils aged 11 to 18. See the school’s website for much more information and details of the archives www.haileybury.com
You will also find lots more historical information and some lovely old pictures at www.hertfordshire-genealogy.co.uk
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