Going to Eton College in the Regency

Regency Life

10 Sept

Ideallised image of Eton boys in the very early 1800s

Eton College is surely the most well known of England’s private schools–where the sons of royalty and aristocracy are educated.

It’s also one of England’s oldest schools. Founded in 1440 by Henry VI, it opened a couple of years later in purpose-built facilities. According to early charters, the school was to admit up to 70 scholars:

They were to be poor and in need of help, not less than eight or more than ten years old, not of servile birth or illegitimate.

Priority was given to local boys, and they were to remain at the college until aged 18. Their education was free, paid for by income from estates granted by the king.

Henry’s successor, Edward IV, stripped Eton of much of its wealth. The school survived and, in the following centuries, became renowned as a school for sons of the wealthy. Arthur Wellesley, later the Duke of Wellington, attended in the early 1780s and sent his sons there.

The current Prince of Wales, William, was educated at Eton College and his son, Prince George, enrolled there in September 2026.

Attending Eton College in the Regency

Late in his life, clergyman William Hill Tucker wrote an account of his days at Eton. It begins:

In the Spring of 1811 I was landed from Thumwood’s Coach at the “Christopher,” and duly entered the next morning in Keate’s Chambers as an Oppidan; was introduced to my Dame, Hawtrey, in Weston’s Yard, and left to make my with some last encouraging words and a farewell pouch. I was just eight and a half years old, and very slender of my age.

The author remained a student at the college until 1822. His time coincided with the autocratic reign of John Keate, headmaster from 1809 to 1834.

He had an iron will, and the stoutest in his staff of Masters bent under it. He was Lord Paramount in his time, and whatever Eton drew of good or ill it drew from Keate. There are many controversies about him; there is no controversy on his absolute rule.

Eton College from across the Thames by Canaletto (1754)

The language of Eton

This opening sentence of Tucker’s account is packed with names and terms we could explore and explain. What was Thumwood’s Coach? Does the “Christoper” still exist? What is an Oppidan or a Dame?

Some of these terms are still used today and the Eton College website provides a helpful glossary. A Dame:

The Dame assists the House Master in running their boarding House, working in partnership to ensure the overall welfare and wellbeing of boys in the House.

Perhaps less usefulfully, an Oppidan:

Any boy who is not a Colleger.

And a Colleger is?

One of the 70 King’s Scholars: Collegers have KS after their surname in School lists.

There have been 70 places for King’s Scholars at Eton since it was founded. For most of the school’s history, boys awarded a scholarship did not pay for their education.

Tucker joined Eton as an Oppidans. In later years the school list marks his name KS, indicating he became King’s Scholar.

It’s also worth noting that Eton College is referred to as a public school. In England, that term is used to describe private, fee-paying, schools.

Early days at Eton

Tucker’s account describes many of the traditions of the school, some of which had ended by the time he was writing. He also gives us some account of his early experiences, including the entrance exam.

‘The initial examination was not hard; suited to our tender years, and every one was passed… In point of fact, the examination was nothing. The only trouble was to get by heart the correct Latin answers to the place of our birth.’

Uniform was important at Eton.

It was a law, most rigidly enforced in those days, that no Collager should wear trousers… I returned after the holidays with three or four pairs of smartish trousers in blue and other tints. They remained unharmed for a day or two until the tailor had leisure to transform them into shorts, one after the other, by the simple process of cutting off the legs, and tying broad ferret strings correspondent in colour at the knee, with three or four gilt buttons.

His choice of accommodation was the Long Chamber, where he was given:

A thin flock mattress which lasted through my eleven succeeding years; three blankets, thin also; sheets, bolster–no pillow; and a woolled horse rug woven in long worsted strings for counterpane.

The Long Chamber had about 50 beds.

Eton College from the playing fields (1821)

Fagging at Eton

It wasn’t long before Tucker was ‘pounced upon by a big, tall fellow’ who made him his fag. There followed four years of ‘fagdom’.

An Eton fag is a servant to their Master. Fags were punished for making mistakes, often physically. Tucker describes having his hands struck with a sharp flick from the end of a wet towel.

Looking back, he regarded the system as being harsh on young boys, but:

Probably we thought nothing about it. We were somewhat hardy; and whatever came was mostly received as a matter of course; we simply inherited.

He wrote that in later life he encountered his Master (now a clergyman) and they became fast friends. ‘But that’s Eton all over.’

It was usual for the newer boys to become fags to the older students. Tucker records an exception, when a boy joined Eton in his mid-teens, having previously served in the Navy as a midshipman.

Many in the school felt tradition required him to become someone’s fag. But his ‘tall, muscular figure’ stood him apart from his peers. He was invited to become another boy’s fag, but declined.

A crowd of boys were keen to force him into becoming a fag. At one point he barricaded himself in his room to escape a huge crowd of them. Eventually he was persuaded to accept the responsibility of being a fag, and that was the end of the matter. According to Tucker, no one actually gave him a task to do.

John Keate Headmaster at Eton

Tucker gives over several pages of his account to describing John Keate, the autocratic and controversial headmaster from 1809 to 1834.

Any one can, popularly, imitate Keate by the simple iteration on iteration of the phrase, “I’ll flog you,”– perfect in general idea, if accompanied with a loud, coarse, barking kind of cough.

The threat to flog boys for misbehaviour was not an empty one, but according to Tucker, he often didn’t follow it through.

There are no portraits of Keate. One of his detractors referred to his appearance as a cross between Napoleon and a widow. Tucker writes:

The resemblance to Napoleon is the three-cornered hat which he wore. The widow-resemblence is in his Doctor of Divinity’s gown.

Tucker wrote there is no known image of Headmaster John Keate, but he remembers silhouette artists visiting Eton.

In 1818 Keate faced what has since become known as the Rebellion. Newspapers reported that Keate introduced a curfew to curb increasingly ‘dangerous amusements; such as hunting, shooting, driving, and sports of a like description.’

Some of the boys reacted by destroying school property, including Keate’s desk. This led to some boys being expelled, which triggered another round of rioting where walls were broken and windows smashed.

Expulsion from the school could seriously damage a young man’s prospects. According to one newspaper it meant they were unable to get a place in college at Oxford or Cambridge, and could not take a military commission.

Tucker contradicts this last point. He wrote how the Duke of York was so indignant at one young man’s expulsion that he granted him an army commission without purchase.

Glimpses into life at Eton

Flogging and fagging. Rebellion and rioting. These were some of the less savoury aspects of life at Eton College in the Regency. There was also sport, chapel services, and learning in Latin, Greek and classical history. Fetes and fairs were occasional events.

And then there was the end of term celebration and exodus. Tucker has left us a vivid description of the end of term. It was referred to as a ‘half’ (despite there being three terms in the year).

The hundredth Psalm was then sung by the whole College… On the last meeting in the half, the word went round: “Sing loud the last Sunday,” and the singing was loud… Anything more grotesque, indecorous, and irreverent can scarcely be conceived.
In a couple of days afterwards all is astir. Eton is full of post-chaises, gigs, tandems… all rushing off to different points to catch the cross-country coaches…

The boys equipped themselves with peas, pea-shooters and long tin horns.

Well, the start was made. Lower boys raise exulting shouts as the coaches start. Peas rattle on windows and wayfarers in every town and village on the road, and horns sound. Wayfarers only laugh; they recognise “the Eton boys” and no windows are injured

The boisterous habits of Eton boys are captured in this image by Cruikshank. It looks like the boys have collected signs from local shops. The tradesmen (right) appear to be negotiating for their return. (1824).

A note about the author

Tucker’s account was published anonymously in 1892. It’s presented as ‘by an old colleger’. However, the Dictionary of Anonymous and Pseudonymous English Literature attributes it to William Hill Tucker.

His account is subtitled Eighty Years Since. This matches his entry into Eton in 1811. He appears in the school list for Eton, which notes he became Rector of Duncan Waylett, Essex, in 1845. He held that position until the last few years of his life.

William Hill Tucker lived for almost a century, dying aged 98 or 99 on 10 November 1901.

Part of Eton College in the early 2000s (Flickr - Public Domain)

Andrew Knowles researches and writes about the late Georgian and Regency period. He’s also a freelance writer and editor for business. He lives with his wife Rachel, co-author of this blog, in the Dorset seaside town of Weymouth.

If you have enjoyed this blog and want to encourage us and help us to keep making our research freely available, please buy us a virtual cup of coffee by clicking the button below.

Sources used include: