Royal revolution: William and Kate changing the school rules
When four-year-old Prince George started school in September, it heralded a radical new approach to royal schooldays by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, writes William Langley.
Behind the ornate, Victorian porticos of London’s most fashionable prep school, four-year-old Prince George of Cambridge is learning what matters. Here, in classrooms once reserved for the poor of the parish, Britain’s future King will be expected to show “kindness, courtesy, confidence and humility”.
George’s arrival at Thomas’s Battersea says much about his parents’ priorities. William and Kate, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, closely studied their options before choosing the $30,000-a-year school, known for its focus on producing what its prospectus calls “conscientious and caring citizens of the world”.
For all its exclusivity, Thomas’s – sited in a fast-gentrifying borough sometimes known as South Chelsea – would once have been unthinkable as a school fit for an heir to the throne. Its warm-and-fuzzy ethos is far removed from the tough tutoring and discipline inflicted on previous generations of young royals. As one of the school’s principals, Ben Thomas, says, “The emphasis here is on making sure the children feel safe, secure, equal and happy. When we get to that stage, they’ll begin exploring.”
The stiff fees cover all the trappings – morning snacks of organic yoghurt, freshbaked pain aux raisins, and crunchy wholewheat grissini. Lunches include lamb ragout with fresh herbs, garlic and Puy lentils, followed by guava tartlets.
“We recognise that a balanced diet stimulates the brain, improves concentration and helps the children to study,” explains the school.
The equally mouth-watering perks available to pupils extend to use of a private ski chalet in the Austrian Alps and a range of activities including ballet, fencing, golf and pottery.
To the wealthy, mostly liberalminded parents – many hailing from showbusiness, the arts and media – who send their children here, Thomas’s provides a reassuring alternative to establishments that demand hard work and results from the outset.
Even the school’s origins as a charity set up by a 19th-century philanthropist play to the wholesome image. Susan Hamlyn, former Senior Editor of Britain’s The Good School Guide, calls it “a big, busy, slightly chaotic school for cosmopolitan parents who want their children to have the best English education money can buy”.
Yet the choice of Thomas’s came as a surprise to many royal observers, who expected George to be enrolled at the rival Wetherby School in Notting Hill, where his father and uncle, Prince Harry, were pupils. One likely reason is Wetherby remains stubbornly boys only, and Kate and William want their two-year-old daughter, Charlotte, to attend the same school as George. Perhaps also because siblings qualify for a discount on the fees!
There is a further reason, one that goes to the heart of the Cambridges’ radical approach to bringing up their children. Their much-publicised – and occasionally mocked – pledge to give their children a “normal” upbringing has proved more than a soundbite. Apart from their Spanish nanny, Maria Borrallo, and Kate’s indefatigable mother, Carole, the couple do almost all the childcare themselves.
Discipline and isolation
By royal standards, this hands-on approach is unheard of. Generations of little British Princes and Princesses have been raised under the stern gaze of governesses and tutors in draughty palace nurseries, often having only minimal contact with their parents or other children their age. William’s father, Charles, the Prince of Wales, has spoken in harrowing terms of the sense of neglect and isolation he felt in his early years. His parents were away for his first three birthdays and there is poignant newsreel footage of his mother, the then Princess Elizabeth, returning to London in 1951 after a month-long tour of Canada, to be greeted by assorted dignitaries and her three-year-old son who receives a polite pat on the head.
Yet, in a sense, things were simpler in the past. Royal offspring had a purpose first and a life second. Within their families, they were seen less as actual children to be cherished and nurtured than as dynastic jigsaw pieces, to be slotted into the complex board game of alliances and hierarchies that maintained a balance between the crowned heads of Europe.
“It wasn’t that these Kings and Queens didn’t care about their children,” says David Cohen, a
London psychologist and author of a book about royal upbringings. “They absolutely believed they were doing the right thing in preparing them for the life that lay ahead.”
Records from Tudor times show that Henry VIII – when only a little older than George – was expected to get up at 5am, attend Mass at
6am, then study maths, logic, law, languages and history before having breakfast (served with wine!). Afternoons would be devoted to instruction in swordfighting, archery and horsemanship, followed by more classes in music, chess, philosophy and Bible study. As well as his main tutor, the celebrated poet and scholar John Skelton, Henry was guided by some of the greatest minds of the age, including Sir Thomas More and the formidable Dutch theologian, Erasmus.
Henry’s daughter, Elizabeth I, remains the best-educated British Queen in history. Exceptionally clever, she soon outstripped the finest tutors the Court could find for her, leading
Royal offspring had a purpose first, life second.