Building record MDR14886 - William Gilbert Endowed (C of E) Primary School, Vicarage Lane, Duffield

A Boys Endowed School was erected at SK 342 437 in 1867, in lieu of the old school, which had been converted in to a parish room. (1) The Free Grammar School at Duffield was probably first founded in the 16th century. It received endowment from the estate of Joseph Webster in 1684, but by the next century the schoolmaster's cottage was in ruins. This was rebuilt, along with a new school to accommodate 40 pupils, on a site near the River Ecclesbourne in Town Street. The school remained there until the middle of the 19th century. In 1843, the trustees purchased, for the sum of £350, a plot of land in King Street on which to build a new stone school room for 60 pupils and a house for the headmaster. By 1857 about 80 pupils were being educated at the school, and from 1860 it became known as Duffield Boys' Endowed School. In 1865 the Midland Railway Company compulsorily purchased the school and land to allow a cutting to be excavated, through which the new rail line to Wirksworth would pass. With the proceeds of the sale, another new school was built on the present site in Vicarage Lane and was opened in 1869. Some years after the end of the Second World War, after lengthy negotiations between the diocese and governors, the Boys' Endowed School became a voluntary aided school. Amalgamation with the Gils' School and the Infant School in King Street too place in the mid 1960s, but for many years the William Gilbert Primary (Aided) School operated a split site, with the juniors at Vicarage Lane. Infant classrooms were added in the early 1990s during a major rebuilding programme. Further classrooms were also added in the late 1990s. (2)