History & Heritage

The school was founded by Edward Wilson in 1615 and was located in Camberwell, now part of Greater London but at that time a small village of cottages, homesteads, inns and larger buildings grouped around a village green. Wilson was born around 1550 in Cartmel, Lancashire, which had its own grammar school, from where he passed on to Cambridge University. No record remains of him taking a degree, although it is known that he went into the Church, being appointed Deacon at Ely in Norfolk in 1576. He subsequently became Vicar of the Parish of Camberwell, which was presented to him by Elizabeth I of England in person. This would indicate that he favoured the settlement of the Church of England which Elizabeth was resolved to make. His nephew Peter Danson became a governor of the new school at its founding. Danson was also vicar of Carshalton in Surrey, ironically only one mile from the present site of the school. A further member of the Wilson family, a namesake of Edward Wilson, is named in the Charter of the School as the Master.

Right: an extract from the matriculation record of Trinity College, Cambridge, for the year 1571. Edward (Ed) Wilson's name is listed bottom right. Reproduced by kind permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library.

At the time, the establishment of a grammar school in England required the assent of the crown. This was obtained after the first school buildings were constructed. The original Charter bearing this assent has since been lost, although in 1929 the governors of the school obtained a certified extract from the Patent Rolls. This requirement for the agreement of the Crown explains the legend Founded in 1615 by Royal Charter displayed near the main entrance. This charter was granted by King James I, who had succeeded his cousin Elizabeth by this time.

In 1845 the school was forced to close as a result of a financial scandal. Following an Order in Council of Queen Victoria in 1880, which superseded the previous Royal Charter, the school was rebuilt on a different site in Camberwell, opening in 1883. It again catered to the need for schooling of boys in Camberwell, which by this time had grown considerably from its rustic origins. Its working population largely consisted of men working in the professions, clerks, journalists, tradesmen and labourers. Naturally, a grammar school provided an asset to the neighbourhood, with the prospect for boys to go on to University education.

In 1961, using the assets from the Greencoat School, a mixed elementary church school which had closed (having shrunk to a non-viable size during the second World War), a new science block was opened opposite the main school site in Wilson Road and named the Greencoat Building.

The 1883 building continued to be used until 1975, when the school moved south to Wallington. This was motivated by growing dissatisfaction with the school's buildings (the Great Hall could only accommodate half the school) and the plans of the Inner London Education Authority to force all grammar schools to become comprehensive. Fortunately, the growing London Borough of Sutton, which continued to operate the 11+, wished to introduce another grammar school and provided an ideal opportunity for the school to relocate. The original 1975 building in Wallington was phase I of what was intended to be a larger school built in three phases, but the original plans for the second and third phases were never put into practice. Instead there have been various additions made when funding has allowed: the Mary Datchelor wing for Music, the Art and DT block, the Sixth Form Centre, Foundation Building and Junior School.

The school was one of the first to be designated a specialist college in Mathematics and Computing in 2002. This status was re-awarded in 2007 along with a second specialism in the Arts.

The school acquired its officially sanctioned Coat of Arms in 1985.

From 1883 the school was accustomed to use as coat of arms the version of the Wilson shield used by Edward Wilson (as seen above the main door of the old school building). Very many coats of arms associated with the name Wilson have a wolf salient as the main feature (salient means that the animal is shown leaping up with both hind paws on the ground). Different members of the Wilson family introduced various objects above the wolf, such as a row of three mullets (five-pointed stars). The version of the shield used by the Founder (though probably without any proper authority) was that of a Wilson from Didlington in Norfolk; Edward Wilson distinguished his coat of arms by replacing the three mullets with a silver fleur-de-lys and two bezants (gold coins, originally of Byzantium).

In 1985 the then Chairman of Governors, Lt. Col. W. R. Bowden, obtained a Grant of Arms from the College of Arms. The new officially authorised shield introduces a silver bar between the wolf and the objects above and a gold border around the edge of the shield; a crest is added above the helm in the form of a black wolf holding a silver fleur-de-lys in his paws with a black and gold mantle. The blazon reads as follows:

Arms: Sable a Wolf salient Or and a Barrulet enhanced Argent in Chief a Fleur de Lys also Argent between two Bezants all between a Bordure Gold. And for the Crest upon a Helm with a Wreath Or and Sable a demi Wolf salient Sable holding between its paws an Ogress charged with a Fleur de Lys Argent Mantled Sable doubled Or.

Motto: NON SIBI SED OMNIBUS ('Not for self, but for all': sadly Wilson's cannot claim a monopoly on this maxim as it is used by several other schools and institutions.)

Within a voided Hexagon Sable charged with three Fleurs de Lys Argent and three Bezants a Wolf salient Sable armed and langued Gules. A lapel badge of this design is worn by senior prefects.

Lt. Col. Bowden was a loyal and generous son of the school. As well as paying personally for the grant of arms, he once had his favourite poem printed up on cards to be distributed to all the boys, so convinced was he of the poem’s inspirational value to young men. Sadly, not enough cards were printed for subsequent generations to have a copy, but you can now read it here. (With thanks to Stuart Smith for providing his copy.)

‘If’ was voted the nation’s favourite poem in 1995.

Our Father, by whose servant
Our house was built of old,
Whose hand hath crowned her children
With blessings manifold,
For thine unfailing mercies
Far-strewn along our way,
With all who passed before us,
We praise thy name today.

Four hundred years unresting
Their silent course have sped,
New comrades ever bringing
In comrades’ steps to tread:
And some are long forgotten,
Long spent their hopes and fears;
Safe rest they in thy keeping,
Who changest not with years.

They reap not where they laboured,
We reap what they have sown;
Our harvest may be garnered
By ages yet unknown.
The days of old have dowered us
With gifts beyond all praise;
Our Father, make us faithful
To serve the coming days.

Before us and beside us
Still holden in thine hand,
A cloud unseen of witness,
Our elder comrades stand;
One family unbroken,
We join with one acclaim,
One heart, one voice uplifting,
To glorify thy name.

Words: G. W. Briggs
Music: 'Wilson's' by H. Murrill

On entry to the school, every pupil is allocated to one of six houses, corresponding to the six forms of entry. Boys remain in their houses for the duration of their school career. Houses are used as the basis of the pastoral system and for sporting and other competitions. House points may be gained by distinguished work or effort in all aspects of school life.

The present house system dates from 1981. Prior to that, the six houses were named after former eminent schoolmasters, clerics and old boys: Jephson, Kelly, McDowell, Nairne, Whiteley, Wilson. Four new houses were created from the old six shortly after the move to Wallington; a fifth, Southwark, was added in 2002 and the sixth, Datchelor, in 2014, as the school expanded to five and then six forms of entry.

Brecon

House colour: red

Named after the Brecon Beacons National Park, venue for the school's field trips.

The school's old Field Studies Centre was located in Talybont-on-Usk.

Badge: the red dragon of the Welsh flag, with the green and white field of Tudor replaced with the black and gold of St. David's cross

Motto: Y DDRAIG GOCH DDYRY CYCHWYN (The red dragon goes on the attack)

Camberwell

House colour: blue

Named after the original home of Wilson's School, founded by Edward Wilson, Vicar of St. Giles, Camberwell, in 1615. Look in a street atlas and you will still see Wilson Road, London SE5. The old school building is now home to the Camberwell College of the Arts, UAL.

Badge: the phoenix, for the school's rebirth

Motto: VIVAT REDIVIVA (Live again, live forever)

Datchelor

House colour: orange

Named after Mary Datchelor School, a girls' grammar school in Camberwell which closed in 1982. Some of the school's assets passed to Wilson's, enabling the Mary Datchelor wing to be built; also the 19th century painting Scholarship crowning Endeavour in the John Jenkins Hall is from the Datchelor school hall.

Badge: the ram, habicks, spotted griffin and ermine are taken from the Datchelor school arms, which are those of the Clothworkers' Company.

Motto: NON SINE PULVERE PALMA (No palm without dust — referring to the Roman circus, where the victor won a palm leaf)

Greencoat

House colour: green

Named after Greencoat School, a church school in Camberwell which closed after a history of 250 years in 1959 and whose assets were taken over by Wilson's.

Badge: the figures from the Greencoat courtyard, which originally adorned the respective boys' and girls' entrances of Greencoat School, and were moved in 1961 to the new Greencoat Building, Wilson's School's science facility, until the move to Wallington in 1975

Motto: VIROR VIRES VIRTUS (Green our strength and courage)

Hayes

House colour: yellow

Named after the home of the Old Wilsonians' Association in Bromley, Kent.

Every year the school has sports matches between the first team and the OWA.

Badge: a variant of the salient wolf and bezants of the school crest

Motto: OMNIBUS QUISQUE CUIQUE OMNES (One for all and all for one)

Southwark

House colour: purple

Named after the diocese of Southwark. Though not a church school, Wilson's has connections with the Church and Southwark diocesan representatives sit on the Board of Governors.

The school's 400th anniversary celebration was held in Southwark Cathedral in 2015.

Badge: the Devil eats Judas Iscariot. Taken from a mediaeval ceiling boss in Southwark Cathedral.

Motto: MODO MODO INCEPTUM (We've only just begun)