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School History
Little Faringdon School
The
villages of Langford and Little
Faringdon lie two miles
apart, in the
far south-west of Oxfordshire. Until
the middle of the
nineteenth
century they were in the ancient
county of Berkshire,
part of
Faringdon Union. Little Faringdon was
an estate village,
owned by a
single landlord, the epitome of
a 'close' village. The
chief
landowner at Langford was the
Ecclesiastical Commission, and
its standing
as on 'open' village was confirmed by
the presence of
three non-
conformist chapels, several pubs, and
a more varied
pattern of
houses and cottages. The combined
population of the
villages,
according to the Post Office Directory
of 1841, totalled
630: by the
time of the 1891 census it had sunk to
490, a decline of
more than 20%,
as the farming recession bit deeper
and people moved
away in search
of employment.
The village
schools of Langford and Little
Faringdon are
particularly
rich in records. Their Log Books and
School Admission
Registers are
complete from the date of their
adoption by the
Department of
Education following Forster's
Education Act of 1870;
for records
earlier than this the census returns
from 1851 enumerate
the 'scholars'
among the children of the parishes,
while Directories
for
Oxfordshire, Berkshire and
Buckinghamshire list the schools and
the teachers
for the years that they were
published.
Little
Faringdon's school and school house
were 'built by W
Vizard Esq.,
supported entirely by his lady, Mrs
Vizard' in 1847;
the date is
confirmed by its incision over the
door of the school.
It was to
accommodate 40 children, though the
average attendance in
1895 was 20..
After their purchase of the estate in
1864 Lord and
Lady de Mauley
in their turn 'entirely supported 'the
school.
Little Faringdon school before
alterations
School House
Medal won by Kathrine Swinford
for never being absent and never late
1911
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