it occupied the same house, but in its very spirit. In that same house in Culver Street, with the like small number of scholars, the Free Grammar School at Colchester was typical of the many almost medieval institutions which one might have found in England at that time, but like the others it could not escape the changes which transformed the country in the century then starting.
CHAPTER 4
The century which witnessed the emergence of the School into its modern form opened quietly enough. Hewitt resigned in 1806, and was succeeded by Edward Crosse, who, as Cromwell hastens to assure us, was "elected unanimously." We know that Crosse was curate of St. Runwald's in 1825, but whether he already held this post when he was elected master is not clear; at any rate he does not seem to have been disqualified under item 21 of the Statutes prohibiting a master from accepting an appointment in the ministry. On account of " various repairs . . . made in and aboute the house" the School was not reopened under Crosse until January 26th, 1807.
In 1810 the endowment was broken for the first time when some of the land in St. Mary's Parish was sold to the Waterworks Company. By an "Act for supplying the inhabitants of this Borough with Water" (48 Geo. III), trustees for charities were enabled to convey to the Company properties which they held in trust. If, however, the price exceeded £200 the proprietors of the Waterworks Company were required to pay the money into the Bank of England, when it was to be invested by the Accountant—General of the Court of Chancery in 3 per cent annuities until it could be used to replace the property, the interest meanwhile being paid to the original owners, the trustees. Under this Act a garden plot in St. Mary's Parish, two roods and two perches in extent, was conveyed to the Company in return for the sum of £270 (Fig. 2). Instead of being paid into the bank this money was invested in a mortgage by the solicitor to the trustees, the interest being assigned to the schoolmaster, Crosse, until shortly before his death. This was not the only irregularity, as was revealed by the enquiry of the Charity Commissioners in 1838, for in addition the trustees were found to have resolved to divert this purchase-money to defray the expenses incurred in connection with researches in the Court of Chancery into the conditions of conveying the trust. What is more, the mortgage deeds could not be found, and the Commissioners expressed the opinion that the solicitor's executor should reimburse the trustees with the sum invested.
The School boasts a scholar of great fame who was entered at this time, and who, when he died in 1892, was world-famous as Sir George Biddell Airy, K.C.B., M.A., LL.D., D.C.L., F.R.S., F.R.A.S., and ex-Astronomer-Royal. He was admitted to the School in 1814,
