Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

rockfreak

A week ago The Guardian ran a feature about the decline of Anglican churchgoing and how parish churches are falling into disrepair. I only introduce this subject because some of us will have grown up at CH with the glories of the Anglican liturgy, the stirring hymns, the King James Bible and the ...

rockfreak

rockfreak wrote: Fri Jan 02, 2026 8:48 pm The "Silk" mentioned here in the top row will doubtless be Dennis Silk who went on to be a cricketer for Somerset and also headmaster at Radley College. You may have seen him in that TV documentary where they followed various pupils from Radley and caught up with them years later.

rockfreak

Merlin! What a wonderful name. Perhaps he was considered something of a wizard by his parents. Do you think that a law should be introduced whereby parents should explain, on the birth certificate, why they have chosen this particular name for their child?

Anyway, MH (Jonah) Jones taught me for ...

rockfreak

Every time I try to post on the CH site more and more annoying ads seem to drift upwards, often from someone called PDF, inhibiting my attempts to post. Could the moderators who arrange these things convey to them that not one of their flaming ads has yet enticed me to buy the produce they are ...

rockfreak

Dubai it is a' changing (tune by R Zimmerman)

Come shoppers and tax exiles out in Dubai
Don't scan the horizon, don't look at the sky
The gunboat ain't coming, you're left high and dry
If your bling to you is worth saving
Iranian miss'les are filling the sky
And Blighty is where you are ...

rockfreak

Stoolball was played by younger members of the Prep houses until they could prove their proficiency in actually hitting a ball in flight in which case they were promoted to playing cricket. I've never heard of it being played anywhere else either. But then many things about the English public school ...

rockfreak

Of course it could be that the CH gospel choir is of the black US Southern states variety whose music has so influenced American soul music - Aretha Franklin's father was a preacher. In which case it may be a cut above the happy clappy Eurovision Song Contest style.

I had a friend who joined the ...

rockfreak

This business of women priests in the C of E was given an interesting slant when, years ago, the historian Bethany Hughes did a number on one of her BBC TV documentaries and found that women deacons were commonplace in the early Christian church in places like Syria. Makes today's arguments about ...

rockfreak

OK, so having checked out Dullally on Wiki I find that she is actually quite progressive and pro-feminist and pro LGBT. So I feel a bit bad about having jumped to conclusions about her. My experience of Born Again Christians and the evangelical mob is that they tend to be anti-gay and a bit ...

rockfreak

Couldn't make the link work Katharine. The "gospel" bit of it had me worried. Are these choristers redolent of the American Happy Clappy style of religion where their songs sound like entries for Eurovision, rather than the grand old hymns that we sang at CH? The Rev Oilwelby (late Archbish of ...

rockfreak

Whether it's squits, the way your girdle is worn, or silver badge wearers, is any of it really relevant to a modern day school? It should have been consigned to history long ago. It merely denotes how CH is still stuck in the past and not much different from the posh schools, especially as they are ...

rockfreak

The "Silk" mentioned here in the top row will doubtless be Dennis Silk who went on to be a cricketer for Somerset and also headmaster at Radley College. You may have seen him in that TV documentary where they followed various pupils from Radley and caught up with then years later.

rockfreak

The following were Senior Grecians during, or just after, my time at CH.

1955/56 Alan Everest MidB
1956/57 Peter Attenborough MaB
next three, order uncertain
Geoff Hines (LaB)
Jo Thomas (LaB)
David Simon (MidA)
1960/61 John Daniel (MidA)
1961/62 Andy Barker (PeA)
1962/63 Michael Pitcher (ThB ...

rockfreak

Do we think that getting a puffed-up reputation at one's grandiose boarding school is necessarily a good thing? It was said of (I think) the poet Rupert Brooke that he left school and college "magnificently unprepared for the long littleness of life".

rockfreak

After following Harlequins men's team I took to following the women and posting on their site. So I was delighted to get two Likes from the sublime Ellie KIldunne. It was to do with the pronunciation of Aiofe Wafer who has just recovered from injury and is back going great guns for Quins. I was duly ...

Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

Search found 1050 matches

Survival of the CofE

Re: Prep A House Photos

Re: Guardian obituary of Peter Austin Jones

Re: Guardian obituary of Peter Austin Jones

Re: Politics

Re: Prep A House Photos

Re: CH Gospel Choir at St Paul’s

Re: CH Gospel Choir at St Paul’s

Re: CH Gospel Choir at St Paul’s

Re: CH Gospel Choir at St Paul’s

Re: What's CH like nowadays?

Re: Prep A House Photos

Re: Senior Grecians

Re: Senior Grecians

Re: Women's rugby