Sir Robert Hitcham's Primary School  

www.hitchams.suffolk.sch.uk  

Sir Robert Hitcham's Primary School is the oldest of the three Framlingham schools.  Sir Robert Hitcham (1571-1636) bought Framlingham Castle in 1635 and willed that there should be schools for forty boys in Framlingham, Debenham and Coggeshall to be supported by the income from his estate.  In 1654, after the will had been 'proven' by the Commissioners of Oliver Cromwell's court, the school began meeting in the Guildhall on the Market Square.  Mr Zacheus Leverland, a Londoner, was the school's first master.  A 'candle school' preceded the Hitcham school in the Guildhall, being no doubt connected with the Guild of Saint Mary mentioned in Green's history of Framlingham.

From 1698 to 1788 the school met in the room above the Market Cross.  This was an upstairs room in the middle of the Market Square where, as Green records, there was once a Market cross.  In 1788 the citizens of Framlingham petitioned the trustees of Sir Robert's will at Pembroke College for a better building.  The schoolroom is an improper one being low and much exposed to heat and cold.  The situation is inconvenient being in the heart of the town and children having no place to retire when necessity occasions … much annoyance is caused to inhabitants of the town.  Pembroke agreed to help and from 1788 -1879 the school for boys was in the building at the north end of the Hitcham's Almshouses.  During the nineteenth century there was a separate school for girls meeting in a room next to the workhouse within the castle walls.