“The Saint”

For OBs by OBs

EXCERPT Rome, April 1955

by Chris Swindon OB 1957

I have a few recollections of happenings at various times during my time at BGS, but one that has stuck in my memory was a trip to Rome in April 1955 when about thirty of us classicists travelled there and back by coach. Our route went down through France via Paris and Dijon, the Mont Cenis tunnel under the Alps, then on to Milan, Sirmione, Verona, and Florence to Rome and returning up the west coast of Italy via Pisa and Nice, then back up through France to Calais. We visited lots of Roman remains

EXCERPT Memories of BGS

by Paul Stickland OB 1950

https://linktr.ee on our way south and in Rome. One highlight was joining the hundreds of thousands in St. Peter’s Square in Rome on Easter Sunday morning for the Pope’s address to the crowd at midday, but he was visible only as a tiny white dot at the window.

The Great Hall was (and is) very impressive, and when I first saw it, it had wooden-railed daises and desks in front of the masters’ seats that remain in the wainscoting. It was lit by eight or so large gas lamps suspended from the ceiling by long pipes: each lamp contained eight or ten gas mantles. To light them, a traditional lamplighter’s pole was used, first to hook the hanging eyes on the end of the control lever of the gas cock and then to insert the pilot flame of the pole. Later on, electric lamps were fitted near the tops of the masonry columns where they met the wooden roof beams, and painted coats of arms appeared near them. The walls had full-length portraits of past headmasters.

The group of us in the photo above, including Messrs. Langford, Booker, Lucas and Martin, was photographed outside the school just before boarding the coach and departing on our trip on 1st April 1955. I can unfortunately remember very few of the names, though many faces are familiar, but would be interested to hear news of any of my VI Classical colleagues.

The full article can be found online, scan the QR code on the right.

My father, John Goss, was taught by the Saint for all four subdivisions of Latin and Greek after his entry into the classical sixth at the age of 15. I rather think that he would have regarded teaching junior forms to be infra dig. A friendship developed between them so that they remained in touch for the rest of S.T. Collins’ life.

When I was about four, S.T. Collins was living in a first floor flat of a large Victorian house on Durdham Downs not far from our home. I remember calling there once or twice with my father who was no doubt lending or borrowing a book. I was intrigued to discover that the flat could only be accessed by a very slow and old lift. There were no stairs at all. He had a black cat and always wore black buttoned boots.

I think the masters’ desks and daises were removed when the SE end of the hall was converted for school dinners, with a servery behind a screen and dining tables. I was once privileged to go up the crawling ladders on the roof, accessed by a spiral staircase at the side of the main entrance that passed a door into the prefects’ room. These ladders were used in the early part of the war by senior boys who spent nights at school fire-watching – with ‘stirrup pumps’ they could, with difficulty, put out incendiary bombs.

(Note: Night air raids commonly lasted throughout the hours of darkness. If the ‘All Clear’ was later than 6am, you were excused school that day).

The full article can be found online, scan the QR code on the right. ↩

Sometimes he would visit us. When I was 11 and had just started learning Latin, he turned suddenly to me to ask if I knew what “gallina” meant. Although a first declension noun, I had not encountered it, but have remembered it ever since.

My father always referred to him as “S.T. Collins”, a mode of address he never used for anyone else. He was the first fully fledged classicist I had met and struck me as very academic, august, steeped in both classical languages and one who would not take fools gladly! Years later I realised that he was the product of a bygone era. The linguistic simplicity of today’s GCSE Latin would have horrified him. ––

Lynda Goss

for tobogganing. But in my last year at BGS in 1957-58 I had my most memorable winter weather experience, on a ski trip to Mjolfjell, Norway. This was a life influencing experience. Before leaving our group was shown a training movie of a US Army ski patrol in which one of the skiers was Alan Ladd (“Shane” 1953 movie). We were a large group pictured at Temple Meads station before we left. Standing tall on the right is trip leader. I’m barely visible in the back row wearing glasses.