Eight Years Later: The Final Chapter of King Willow

The final chapter of King Willow by George Mills is entitled "Eight Years Later," and it puts the finishing touches on the first two novels of Mills, including his very first, Meredith and Co.

The chapter begins: "It was late on a Wednesday afternoon, and the last day of the Oxford and Cambridge match at Lord's. The ground looked beautiful, the blue sky and green grass combining with the gay colours of the dresses in the crowded stands to make a wonderful splash of colour."

Oxford and Cambridge became the universities where the main schoolboy characters of Mills ended up.

After the match, the three main characters of King Willow—Pongo, Finch, and Falconer, better known as Hawk—end up in the car of Pongo, whom you may recall started as a timid and tearful young boy with a speech impediment at the beginning of Meredith and Co. They begin to discuss their former headmaster, "Peter" Stone, at fictional Leadham House School.

It is here we'll pick up Mill's narrative.


Shortly after the match, the three friends entered a large car that was waiting outside the pavilion. Pongo jumped into the driver's seat, while Finch and Hawk made themselves comfortable at the back. Pongo was on his way down to Sussex, to a small village where he now lived during vacation. He was going to drop the Hawk and Finch at their London hotels before going home…

There was a long traffic hold-up, and Pongo turned around.

'What about coming down and seeing Peter on Saturday? You know he's retired, and living quite near us, in the same village. You'd better come down to lunch, and we'll drop in to tea with Peter. By the way, Hawk, you've got to come see Uggles.'

'Uggles!' cried Finch. 'Is he still alive?'

'Yes,' answered Pongo, 'but he's very shaky on his pins, poor old chap! He'll go nearly mad when he sees the Hawk! There's quite a good train at 10.45 from Victoria. I'll meet you at the other end.'

As Pongo drove off from the traffic block, his mind went back some ten years, and he saw himself once again as a trembling new boy on his mother's arm, as he had waited for the train on the platform of Victoria Station. He addressed his two friends once more.

'I've not seen much of Peter yet, but I'll tell him we're coming. He'll probably give us tea in the garden. He's got a nice little place, and the last time I saw him he was very well.'

By this time the Hawk and Finch had reached their destinations, and Pongo dropped them off with a wave of his hand and a cheery 'Well, don't forget. The 10.45 from Victoria. I'll meet you.'


Longtime readers of this site will recall a message once received from Dr. Tom Houston of Windlesham House School, where George Mills had his first teaching job in 1925-1926. Let's review some of what Dr. Houston revealed about George.


G.R.A. Mills, BA Oxon, taught 4 terms at Windlesham House School [left] from Lent 1925 until Easter 1926, and maybe part or all of the summer, but his name was taken off the staff list by end of summer term 1926…

In 1925 Windlesham was at “Southern Cross”, Portslade, near Brighton; principal Mr Charles Scott Malden; headmaster Mr H D L Paterson; and the dog, Tubby.

In April George Mills married Miss Vera Beauclerc [sic]; they bought a house on Benfield Way, Portslade…

We have no record relating to his sudden (?) departure. He could, like a handful of other prep school masters, have been excited by the General Strike (that term)…

During summer 1935 he visited Mrs Charles [Malden], then in Springwells, Steyning, W. Sussex, and told her he had written a book “largely about Windlesham”, published by O.U.P. “He had been at 2 or 3 schools since, but is very faithful to Windlesham”, she said…

Uggles may have been related to Tubby, the Malden’s popular and heroic dog. The portrait of the headmaster Peter Stone has something of Christopher Malden, who had been in effect joint head for some years; he became principal in 1927. Mills evidently had a gift for befriending boys and learning their secrets; Meredith & Co. captures the idiom of pupils during the interwar period more accurately than any other novel.


There is certainly a wealth of information in those few paragraphs.

The excerpt from King Willow above notes that Pongo had a vacation home in a small village in Sussex. Mills, during the late 1920s and early 1930s was a rather itinerant teacher who had taught not only in Sussex, but in Windermere, London, and Glion, Switzerland, during the time. This home of Pongo's, used during vacations from school, could clearly have been based on Mills's own home in Portslade.

Despite Mills having left Sussex to continue to teach, he seems always to have kept ties there, which explains the repetitive nature of locations in Sussex continually cropping up in the later life of George Mills.

1935, incidentally, was the year during which Windlesham "moved to 60 acres in the Sussex downs north of Worthing," according to a more recent correspondence from Dr. Houston. That event may have occasioned some nostalgia on the part of Mills.

By the way, Charles Scott Malden, mentioned above, had died in 1896, the year of Mills's birth, and could not have been at Windlesham during George's tenure there, although the elder Malden still may have been a legend around campus.


However, it is the actual visit to Springwells, Steyning [right], that is of greater interest here. While what follows is not in any way a non-fiction account of that visit, the occasion must have meant a great deal to George Mills.



It was Saturday afternoon at about four o'clock, and three young men might have been seen walking slowly through the street of a beautiful little village in Sussex. They were arm-in-arm and talking excitedly.

'You know,' one of them was saying, 'Peter doesn't look much older. A bit grayer, that's all.'

The three young men went on talking until they reached a short drive entered by a wide gate that had been fixed against a post. They turned in through the gate and walked up the drive. Sitting outside the house, on a balcony, was Peter, with Mrs Stone. The tea things were laid, and Peter was on the look-out. When he saw his visitors he rose and hastened down the drive to meet them. He shook each hand cordially, his eyes sparkling with joy.

'Well, Falconer and Finch, this is a pleasure. Ogilvie [Pongo] told me you were coming down, and we were expecting you.'

The Hawk kept on looking at Peter. The grand old man had changed but slightly. He was as erect as ever, but perhaps somewhat more portly. He led the way up to the house, where Mrs Stone gave them all a very warm welcome.

Peter certainly had found a beautiful home. The house, an old farmstead, stood in a small but perfect garden. A little lawn stretched away from it, and a kitchen garden was at the back. Rose trees dotted about and well-kept flower-beds made the scene from the little balcony one of great beauty. Peter indicated some comfortable wicker chairs and Mrs Stone began to pour out the tea.

When the young men had settled themselves down, Peter talked about the match.

'I wish I had been there. That must have been a hot catch of yours, Falconer. The papers were full of it.'

'Oh, yes, sir,' laughed the Hawk. 'I told Finch that it was a bit of a fluke. He hit it straight at me, sir.'

During the serious business of tea there was little conversation. Peter kept glancing at the three boys, now grown to men, and he was very proud of them. Soon after tea Mrs Stone excused herself and left the men together. They produced their pipes and settled down to talking. They had eight years to bridge—eight years of ups and downs, of successes and failures at their public schools. Peter listened intently, allowing them to talk on.

After a while the conversation turned to the future and the careers they intended to adopt. The boys asked Peter's advice on all manner of subjects, and he did his best to answer them. Gradually, however, the as was only natural, the talk reverted to Leadham House, but this time Peter did not listen. As he sat back in his chair, blowing clouds of tobacco from his pipe, he was gazing into the future. He saw the three boys, now on the threshold of manhood, all making names for themselves and doing credit to their professions.

He knew their characters and feared nothing. He saw Finch destined for the Bar, a just and fearless judge, honoured by all men. Ogilvie, who was going into the army after his university career, Peter saw as a great soldier and administrator. But when he thought of Hawk, Peter smiled to himself. Falconer had been his favorite pupil, but Peter would not have admitted it to anybody. He knew that the hawk was to reach great heights, and he saw him as a priest in one of the poorest London parishes, cheerful and smiling, with a horde of ragged children clinging joyfully to the skirts of his cassock. He saw him in the midst of squalor and poverty going on his splendid way of radiating love and happiness. As he sat on the balcony that afternoon, entirely unconscious of the conversation going on around him, Peter's mind sped back through the years, and saw the Hawk, once more the grubby, laughing schoolboy devoted to sport and animals…


In this paragraph, filled with Peter's fictional reveries, we find some hidden real-life tributes.

First, Finch had earlier in the chapter been the batsman for Cambridge referred to by Falconer.

Finch is destined for the Bar out of Cambridge—much like the well-rounded mentor of George Mills at Warren Hill School in Eastbourne, Joshua Goodland [left]. While Goodland would never become a judge—Joshua would, in fact, pass away the next year while serving as vicar of the parish of Compton Dundon—it's probable that Goodland had shared with George the thought that if he'd stayed in his law career he might have at some point. After all, becoming a judge would have been the next logical step in his legal career. That step, however, was never taken: Goodland instead bought into Warren Hill School and eventually became owner and Headmaster. Perhaps it had been with regret that Goodland spoke of it with George.


And if this fictional visit to a village in Sussex reflects Mills's own visit there in 1935, it's interesting to note that 1935 was also the year in which Fr Basil Jellicoe, the noteworthy and charismatic reformer from the parish of St Pancras, had passed way from pneumonia at just 37 years of age—but most attributed his death to overwork on behalf of the London's poor children.

We've surmised there must have been a relationship between Jellicoe and Mills before, one that would have stemmed from George attending Oxford, where Jellicoe had run the Magdalen College Mission, which was manned by volunteer students from the university.

Once again, this indicates at the very least some admiration for Jellicoe [right] on the part of Mills, and even suggests that—given the intimacy that fictional Peter Stone exhibits in his knowledge Falconer above, as the latter graduates from Oxford—that the Mills and Jellicoe had been close friends.


Lastly, Peter envisions Pongo as an army officer who would make a "great soldier and administrator." Pongo as a timid young boy with a speech impediment (a lisp), as we know, was based on Mills himself.

So here we have a great clue: Pongo's character soon would be off to the army as an officer after of Oxford.
Mills, along with most others, must have seen war brewing in Europe. Soon after the publication of King Willow in 1938, George would be named an officer in the Royal Army Pay Corps out of the officer's reserve in 1940—interestingly, something Jellicoe had done following university, when he entered the navy as an officer during the First World War.


Spending WWII as a war substitute officer [left] certainly must have appealed to Mills. With the advent of hostilities in China and Europe signaling renewed global violence, a return to the military, this time as a officer, must have been on his mind.

So, here we have some evidence that Mills was already beginning to think that he might not spend the rest of his life writing books, especially as we can see that he was sending his most popular literary characters out into the world as adults.

George had been a failure in the Army Pay Corps during WWI, and in choosing Pongo for duty as an administrator in the army, he was—perhaps unknowingly—charting the same course for himself.


As we close things out at Who Is George Mills?, it seems natural that the examination of this chapter would fall close to the end of our work here. With that in mind, I'd like to finish it out to its end, as Peter sits among his billowing smoke, contemplating the future of the boys:


Then for no apparent reason he raised his eyes, and looked down the drive. What he saw made him sit up and smile.

'Ogilvie,' he asked suddenly, 'why didn't you bring Uggles to-day? I have not seen him for some time, and I was expecting him.'

Pongo laughed.

'Well, sir, he's rather weak on his legs these days, and he was so pleased at seeing the Hawk again that I thought it might be too much for him.'

Peter smiled expansively.

'He seems to have settled that point for himself. Here he comes!'

The three young men looked down the drive and rose to their feet. Uggles was labouriously coming towards them, puffing with his exertions, and Ogilvie laughingly called over to him.

'Come along, old chap, stir those stumps of yours!'

But the old bulldog found the pace altogether too hot for him. He was in extreme old age, but radiantly happy. Every few yards he lifted his head and looked up at his lord and master with devotion streaming from his eyes now growing dimmer. He ambled along slowly towards the spot where his friends were awaiting him, and snuffled as he went.



With that ending, King Willow closes with a paean both to the past and George's love of dogs, but with eyes focused clearly on the future.

George Mills was 42 years old when the book was published and surrounded by notes for his next two texts (which would both be published in 1939), but he was, himself, looking forward as well. Mills, who had known many more failures in his life than successes to that point, would begin to turn things around and make right many of the perceived wrongs he'd endured in his past.

This last scene, with a contemplative Peter wreathed in smoke and the worthy and loyal Uggles snuffling back to his friends, is the sort of sentimental tableau that Mills must have envisioned for himself at the end of his own life.

But before that could be, Mills had some unfinished business. First, his failed relationship with the military would need to be mended, leaving him with a point of pride there instead of a closeted shame.

We'll take a look at the ways in which Mills began to work steadily to vindicate what he perceived to be his failures next time.

George Mills: An Annotated Bibliography

Before we close things out here at Who Is George Mills?, it just wouldn't seem right not to have a bibliography of writing about Mills and his work from outside sources.

That said, it will have to be a slim one. If a great deal was ever written about Mills outside of brief advertisements for his books, not much of it is on-line today. I've presented everything here that I could find, no matter how spare.

And although this bibliography leads off with the text with the most disturbing title by far, it is in alphabetical order by author. Following each citation is either the entry in its entirety or an excerpt from the text. I have also taken the liberty of annotating each entry.



Adley, Derek John, and William Oliver Lofts Gullemont. The Men Behind Boys' Fiction. (London: Howard Baker, 1970)


Mills, George (r n) A schoolmaster in a Sussex preparatory school who has also written three highly enjoyable prep- school stories — 'Meredith & Co.', 'King Willow' and 'Minor and Major'.


[An incredibly skimpy but well-meaning autobiography and bibliography of the works of George Mills; one wonders about the meaning of "r n"; Mills was undoubtedly never a registered nurse!]



Auchmuty, Rosemary, Robert J. Kirkpatrick and Joy Wotton. The Encyclopaedia of Boy's School Stories: Volume 2. (Surrey: Ashgate, 2000; originally published in 1973) [above, right]


George Mills taught for many years in a preparatory school (after having been a pupil in one—Parkfield, in Haywards Heath), so it is not surprising that his three school stories should have a similar setting.

Meredith and Co. was one of the first prep school stories of its kind — lighthearted and whimsical, a forerunner to the Jennings books of Anthony Buckeridge in so far as it emphasises the comical side of school life, based on the misunderstandings that arise when the juvenile view of things meets the adult view. But it is also a more rounded picture of school life, in which the importance of games and work (the Common Entrance Exam) are not forgotten. The real hero, though, for many readers, was Uggles, a bulldog owned by one of the boys whose unexpected appearances caused havoc.

King Willow was a sequel to Meredith and Co., equally as high-spirited. Minor and Major was similarly set in a prep school, although a different one this time. If anything, it is even more whimsical, with its heroes nicknamed 'Puddleduck major and minor', and a series of pranks and bizarre happenings which disrupt the routine running of the school.


[What a well-considered summary and relatively complete summary of the prep school stories of George Mills. I would have to agree with the assessment that Uggles, the bulldog, was assumed to be a popular character, if by no one else but the publishing houses themselves—at least during the 1930s, when Uggles [far above, left] graced the gorgeous cover of the first edition of Meredith and Co., and was prominently displayed on the spine and in interior plates within 1938's King Willow.]



Kirkpatrick, Robert. "Prep Schools in Books: Celebrating 60 years of Jennings." 8PS Now Online. (www.ps-magazine.co.uk: 28/4/10, 08:13:54 GMT)


Excerpt: Prep schools, with their enclosed environments, rituals, rules and traditions, are ideal settings for fiction. Indeed, prep schools have featured in fiction since the late 19th century, although it wasn't until Anthony Buckeridge began portraying the adventures of J.C.T. Jennings on the BBC's Children's Hour in October 1948 that prep school stories began reaching a wide audience. To begin with, prep school fiction was aimed, not surprisingly perhaps, at young children. An early example was George Mills' Meredith and Co., first published in 1933 and reprinted in 1950 and 1957. These reprints were presumably cashing in on the popularity of Jennings, whose first appearance in book form (Jennings Goes to School) was 60 years ago this year.


[It takes no more difficulty than to look at the entry above to see that what Kirkpatrick has written here is exactly backwards: George Mills breathed life into the boys' preparatory school genre and his titles were popular until the onset of WWII, when, my hunch is, other matters began to take precedence. Following the war, in 1950, Anthony Buckeridge took advantage of a void by cashing in on the popularity of books like Mills's. It would have been tit-for-tat for Mills and his publishers subsequently to cash in on the success of Jennings with George's late 1950s/early 1960s reprints.]



Lucas, John. "Public school fiction faces test of time." Guardian Books Blog. (guardian.co.uk: 4 January 2011, 14.53 GMT)

Excerpt: The tradition of the school story began in earnest with the publication of Thomas Hughes's Tom Brown's Schooldays in 1857, which opened the floodgate for a stream of books, comics and tales flowing well into the 1970s. While the focus of these works varied, from the somewhat earnest moralising of George Mills's 1938 novel King Willow to the slapstick of Charles Hamilton's Billy Bunter and the anarchic hilarity of Geoffrey Willans's Molesworth series, they were nevertheless subject to a series of shared conventions, the recognition of which made them a familiar, nostalgic experience, even to those readers who didn't attend boarding school.


[It is interesting to note that within my lifetime—from 1973 to 2011 here—that there has been a shift in point of view regarding the work of George Mills. In the second entry above, George's books are seen as a "rounded picture of school life", while here in 2001, the Guardian sees the prose as merely "somewhat earnest moralizing". One then wonders how the point of view had changed between, say, 1933 and 1970.]



And that, as they say, is that.

We don't learn a great deal here. The lovers offering paeans to the Jennings books appear to have not read the many, if any, of the titles by Mills, while the most cogent and informed of these assessments cite the Mills books as the "forerunners" of those by Buckeridge.

What can get a feel for, however, is that the books of George Mills are part of a long tradition of boys' school stories still in existence today. Mills was a key—if not well remembered—figure in the transition between school stories that still held Victorian sensibilities and more modern prose, especially in his interpretation and use of jargon, and in the broader capacity of exemplifying that the whole child needed to be addressed by his education through games, sport, and, yes, hard work.

Mills was not prolific. He didn't write stories about Uggles, et al, for years. In fact, rather than starring a single boy, the fiction of Mills shifts the focus from lad to lad as time passes—as happens in real life—and pays homage to the passing of time, another tip of the cap to reality. Boys grow and change. They pass from form to form. They sit the Common Examination, and they leave, existing after that primarily in each other's memories.

It's a unique point of view: Establishing a "brand," as it would be marketed today, and then not milking it for every dollar or pound it could be worth. No Mills was not prolific. But he was, indeed, significant.

Chances are, if you have read any other scholarship or informational, about George Mills, his life, and his books, I wrote it. I do not mean to my chest in saying so: There simply was almost nothing on the internet when I began my research. George Mills on Wikipedia? Shelfari? The addled Library Thing? Yeah, I wrote those.

So if you have or are aware of any other direct references to George Mills or his work, please let me know and I will include it on this site as quickly as possible—and thank you!

Armed for the Fray

No matter what sort of 'breakfast' one might have with the boys—and Mr. Mead seems to have had a good one to start his first day—the real adventures begin, as they say, once the class-room door actually closes. How much of the following text is actually based on the first day George Mills ever taught, and how much is a pastiche constructed from bits of many of his subsequent first days, is open to conjecture.

See what you think as we proceed into Mills's Meredith and Co. (1933):


Mr. Mead spent the first hour of school in the common room, smoking. He was wondering how he should meet his first class. He was not looking forward to the ordeal. He remembered Peter's advice.

'I'll give them a good deal of work to do, and keep them busy. I won't do more talking than I can help,' he said to himself. Five minutes before the second lesson was due, he stood in the corridor, waiting.

The Head Master came along, and smiled.

'Well, Mead, armed for the fray?'

The boys were changing over, and several of them ran past into their class-rooms.

'Yes,' Mr. Mead answered.

'Ah, well, your boys are waiting for you now. That is the room, the one facing you. Let them have it! Good luck!'

Mr. Mead walked along the corridor to his room. The door was being held open by a boy who was wearing tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles.

'Thank you,' said Mr. Mead as he swept past Headlights [Dimmer]; 'now go and sit down.'

Dimmer shut the door, and went to his place. Mr. Mead lost no time. He walked to his desk, sat down, and produced his mark book.

'Just give me your names,' he said.

While he was taking names he looked at the boys. They were sitting like angels, with expressions of complete guilelessness upon their faces. They stared at him as much to say, 'Well, you may try it if you don't believe us, but butter wouldn't melt in our mouths!' Mr. Mead had the uncomfortable sensation that he was being summed up. And so he was! No one sees through a man quicker than a boy, and Mr. Mead put an abrupt end to the mental X-raying process.


Even after 28 years of teaching, the first day of school—like Opening Day of baseball—is still a powerful event, a rebirth for both the children and for the teacher. At least, that is, when I have been the teacher. I've heard that Laurence Olivier often vomited before performing on stage, but that's likely a legend that has its roots in a panic attack he had before going on stage at the age of 57. Still, he apparently was nervous before a live performance. Likewise, my next restful night before the initial day of school will be my first one!

As mentioned in yesterday's post, children often have an extremely accurate sense of which adults can be trusted and which can't. They can frequently spot a phony from a mile off. I can't say that Mills would have been aware of this on his first day at Windlesham. It's far more probable that those initial moments with his first class went by in a blur, and time would have seemed to be moving much more quickly for him than he describes it here due to anxiety.

This passage is a collage of first day experiences at Windlesham, Warren Hill, The Craig, and at Glion, acquired over time. One does not have the ability to anxiously do paperwork while surmising the inner workings of the minds of a group of students through careful observation. That sort of inference just isn't made by a new instructor, fresh out of university, facing a group of strange faces, angelic though they may be!

Let's return to this Leadham House class-room:


'Open your exercise books, and your Translations. Page 32. French into English. If you do not know a word, look it up. Go straight on until you are told to stop.'

Having said this, Mr. Mead sat back in his chair and surveyed the class. Peter had been quite correct, and there was no attempt at open ragging, but the master noticed the boys were not really working. Dimmer opened his desk, and produced a piece of blotting paper; Meredith dropped his pen, and stooped slowly down to pick it up. He tried it, found that it would not function, so changed the nib. Renton was frowning at the inkpot, from which he had fished a large piece of blotting-paper. The only two boys who were working were Murray and Potter I. Mr. Mead smiled to himself. The boys were trying it on! He was no fool, and started on a plan of campaign. Leaning forward, he took up a pencil and continued his watch. Every few seconds he would make a little tick on the paper in front of him. Murray and Potter, who both sat at the same desk, looked up from under their eyelids and observed what he was doing. They nudged each other and smiled. Mr. Mead made no comment, but he was busy with the pencil. he could not help thinking what poor economists boys are. The Sixth formers were giving themselves a great deal of trouble to get out of work. They went to endless pains to waste time.

They thought that it was well worth while. The man was too good to be true! He said not anything, and they were having a glorious slack, and could look forward to a term of leisure. Three minutes before the end of the lesson Mr. Mead suddenly spoke, and the boys stopped work.

'I have here,' Mr. Mead announced, 'a little piece of paper on which I registered a mark whenever a boy wasted time. There has been a great deal of time wasted. Blotting-paper has been dropped; pens which should have been overhauled before school, have had to be replaced. Only two boys in the room have been working properly. They are,' here Mr. Mead consulted his register, 'Murray and Potter I. On my paper there are twenty marks, representing an unnecessary waste of time. I am wasting time now, but that is your fault. The time must, unfortunately, be made up, and you will come here on Saturday evening for half and hour. That is to say, all except Murray and Potter I.'

Mr. Mead had been horribly nervous during this pronouncement. At the end of it he gathered up his books and left the room. For some seconds there was complete silence. The boys looked at each other, and disgust, surprise, and bewilderment were depicted on their faces. Headlights was the first to speak.

'Well!' he said, 'of all the dirty tricks, that takes the cake. It seemed so easy, too!' He stabbed at the desk viciously with his pen, and added, 'That man is the sticky limit! Shut up, you two idiots, it's not funny!' This remark was addressed to Murray and Potter I. They were sitting at their desk hugging each other with rapture, and laughing loudly.

That afternoon, as they were walking to the cricket field, Mr. Mead told Peter all about it.

'That's right!' said Peter, laughing. 'I thought they might try it on. Well, you have won your victory, and should have no further trouble.'


No further trouble getting adolescent boys to do class work? Windlesham and Warren Hill must have been very special places, indeed!

That aside, I think it's interesting how many terms from the military are applied here to teaching: "armed for the fray," "a plan of campaign," and "won your victory." Some may say that those metaphors are improper, and that the relationship between a teacher and his or her charges should be one of a community working together, rather than adversarial. I couldn't argue about those sentiments in any way.

In reality, though, there are many situations during the course of a lesson, a day, a week, or a term, in which a teacher and a student, or even a teacher and an entire class, each digs in the proverbial heels in a mighty struggle against the other. War? A wild west showdown? A duel in the sun? Characterize those moments any way you wish—they happen and those confrontations often need to be "won" by a teacher who intends to last the rest of the term.

Teachers who intend to last an entire career, however, tend to come out ahead in these situations without causing the students to "lose face" in the aftermath, and that's not something the Mr. Mead accomplished above. I wonder if Mills ever mastered that trick, or could it have been one of the reasons he moved around a bit as an educator?

Anyway, let's check back in one more time, later in Mr. Mead's first day of classes and extra-curriculars:

Uggles followed the Hawk along the corridor. He found it rather trying, poor dog, as the afternoon was a hot one. The Hawk opened his desk, and sat Uggles beside him on the seat.

It chanced that Mr. Mead was on his way to the master's cottage for a cold shower. He was still in flannels and tennis shoes, and he walked noiselessly down the corridor. The sound of a boy's voice made him stop at the open door of a class-room, and he saw the Hawk seated at his desk, the lid of which was raised and rested against his head. The boy, having his head inside the desk, was utterly unaware of the master's presence, and was talking to Uggles.

'Yes, old chap,' the Hawk was saying, 'I am quite sure you will like him. He likes dogs, too; he told me so at breakfast!'


The reality working for Mr. Mead—and probably Mills—in this situation is that he has won over a key boy in the school. While the Hawk is not a Sixth former, nor a scholarly boy, he's athletic, honest, and extremely likable. His status among the boys of the school is near the top, and having the Hawk as a powerful ally will pay off for Mr. Mead, despite the master's perceived "dirty trick."

There'll be even more about Mr. Mead and Mills next time…

Breakfast with the Hawk and the Boys

It's a lovely, hot, early summer day here in the Sunshine State. The lawn is unruly after some recent rain, and I'm putting off going out to do battle with it. Instead, I think we'll check in on George Mills's fictional alter ego, Mr. Mead, at Leadham House School. Let's thumb ahead to Chapter XVII of Meredith and Co., and recall that last time, Mead was off to bed, anxiously awaiting his first day of teaching French.

MR. MEAD arose early in the morning, and walked across to the school with the Jewel [Mr. Gold]. He was anxious to see as much of the school routine as possible, and stood by the side of Gold as he read the roll call. Mr. Mead stood looking at the row of strange faces, and wondered what sort of task he would make of teaching. All the boys were perfect strangers, and he was thinking how best to break the ice during breakfast. As they were going downstairs the Jewel told him that his table was the one next to his own.

'You will have several members of the Third and Fourth forms. they are quite well-behaved, but rather talkative.'

After grace had been said, Mr. Mead sat down. He was not quite certain of the correct procedure. Should he help himself from the sideboard, or would he be waited on? He noticed the Jewel helping himself to coffee, so he joined him.

'Sorry, Mead, I ought to have told you that we help ourselves. If you want a second cup send a boy for it.'

Mr. Mead took a cup of coffee, and a plate of porridge. When he sat down, he looked at the boys who were seated at his table. He noticed particularly the boy to his right. He was a small, dark boy, with a happy care-free expression. Conversation was limited, as it often is in the presence of a stranger. Mr. Mead had just finished his porridge when the boy on his right spoke.

'Er, sir, do you like dogs?'

'Yes, very much. Do you have a dog at home?'

The boy became quite talkative.

'Rather, sir; hundreds! At least, not exactly hundreds, sir. But there's a topping dog here, sir. He belongs to one of the boy's maters, sir. He's a bulldog, and is called Uggles. Shall I get you some eggs and bacon, sir?'

My hunch is that this is an idealized first conversation with a student, invested with a great deal of "I-wish-it-really-had-been-that-easy." Upon the publication of Meredith and Co., Mills had already experienced at least four "meet and greets" with boys, having taught at Windlesham House, Warren Hill, The Craig, and the seemingly completely forgotten English Preparatory School in Glion, Switzerland between 1925 and 1933.

With so much movement from place to place, it's no wonder that Mills focuses on Mr. Mead's desire to quickly learn the "correct procedure."

Also despite Dr. Howell (Peter) Stone's advice the night before—all of which revolved around the classroom—Mills is letting us know in no uncertain terms here that the first true hurdle to be cleared is meeting the boys and establishing himself quickly. It's open to conjecture how long it may have taken Mills, at first, to win over the boys at Windlesham House, but as he was apparently a very personable fellow who enjoyed making people laugh, my hunch is that it must not have taken too awfully long.

Interestingly, we find that a real ice breaker here is the subject of dogs. Mr. Mead is immediately presented with an opportunity to win over a key boy in his form by simply admitting to a fondness for canines. I'd better dollars to doughnuts that it all didn't come off so readily in reality, but that once Mills knew man's best friend was a metaphorical foot-in-the-door with his charges, he used dogs to his advantage in all of his new teaching locales.

This isn't to imply that Mills exaggerates his fondness for dogs here simply for social gain. We do know already of his propensity to share a family story from well before he was born about his father's family taking their dogs along to church, and having one actually take in the service from a pew on one occasion.

Yesterday, we also learned that Mills's love of cricket could have helped him land at least one teaching job as Mr. Mead is welcomed by Mr. Marshall as an assistant with the Leadham House eleven. And, here, his love of dogs helps him open lines of communication with the boys.

Let's see how that breakfast conversation comes out:

Mr. Mead gave his plate over to the boy, and asked his name.

'Falconer, sir,' said the boy, and he went off, and returned with some eggs and bacon. Mr. Mead liked the Hawk. He was so natural, and his frank, open manner appealed to him. The meal proceeded most satisfactorily; Mr. Mead inquired the names of the boys, and was entertained with several stories of the holidays. he found all the boys very friendly—not the sort that tries to 'suck up' to a new master, but animated with a genuine desire to be on good terms. He found the atmosphere delightful.

[A quick aside: From this last paragraph, can we surmise that this genuine sort of student behavior was not always the way it was at Windermere and Glion?]

The Hawk looked up.

'Please, sir,' he asked, rather diffidently, 'what is your name, sir?'

Mr. Mead enlightened him, and the Hawk continued.

'What are you taking, sir?'

'French,' added Mr. Mead, shortly.

'Oh, sir, I hate French, sir. I only got seven for the exam last term.'

''Well,' said Mr. Mead, laughing, 'we shall have to improve on that!'

'Please, sir, are you taking us all in French?'

'Yes, I believe so.'

To the person who does not know the mind of the preparatory schoolboy, all his questions must appear to be rude curiosity. But in this case they served to break the ice, and enabled the boys to talk about something. The small boy is usually limited in intelligent conversation, and if he can, by asking questions, get someone else to talk, he does so.

That last paragraph is a great insight, and insight into the hearts and minds of prep students seems to have been Mills's long suit, at least early in his career.

In this scene, we see in microcosm Mills's fledgling days as a master in a preparatory school. While not the finest written lines in the history of English literature, this excerpt does display a comfortable, conversational genuineness—similar to the characteristics that Mead admires in young Falconer—full of both story-telling warmth and keen observation.

Having spent a day or two getting my feet wet at a new school now and then along my own way, Mills's concerns are real concerns. His wonder about his new students and his desire to get off on the right foot all ring perfectly true. And, despite the fact that Mr. Meads does have the ice completely broken unusually quickly in this scene, it does accurately portray the amazing speed at which children will determine whether or not an adult is trustworthy, and hence, worthy of hearing or participating in meaningful conversation among them!

So, after two excerpts from Meredith and Co., we find Mr. Mead—and Mills—possessing the 'people skills' necessary to be successful in a teaching career: He's an engaging fellow, seemingly dutiful to more experienced adults and to the needs of the boys.

Next time, let's step inside Mr. Mead's class-room as he begins his first hour teaching the Sixth form….

Houston, We Have Lift Off!

Imagine my excitement when I opened up my mailbox first thing yesterday morning and found this message from Dr. Tom Houston, Secretary to the Windlesham House Association, stamped just three hours before on Tuesday, March 16, 2010, at 4:32 AM:


G.R.A. Mills, BA Oxon, taught 4 terms at Windlesham House School from Lent 1925 until Easter 1926, and maybe part or all of the summer, but his name was taken off the staff list by end of summer term 1926. As acknowledged in the dedication to Meredith & Co he taught at three other schools probably after Windlesham; viz; at Warren Hall, Eastbourne (a 19th century school closed in 1930s or 1940s); at The Craig, Windermere (founded 1899); and at the English Preparatory, GLION.

In 1925 Windlesham was at “Southern Cross”, Portslade, near Brighton; principal Mr Charles Scott Malden; headmaster Mr H D L Paterson; and the dog, Tubby.

In April George Mills married Miss Vera Beauclerc; they bought a house on Benfield Way, Portslade.

During summer term he may have contributed to a pastoral play featuring Boadicea, Julius Caesar and a Brontosaurus done by the A.A.A. (Amateur Acting Association).

In the Michaelmas term 1925 he wrote pieces (a prologue and songs) for a staff concert, and wrote that up in the magazine. He made people laugh, a lot.

He might have had a hand in the AAA production in summer 26 called “Spanish Courtesy” or “A Knife between the Shoulder Blades”. We have no record relating to his sudden (?) departure. He could, like a handful of other prep school masters, have been excited by the General Strike (that term).

During summer 1935 he visited Mrs Charles, then in Springwells, Steyning, W. Sussex, and told her he had written a book “largely about Windlesham”, published by O.U.P. “He had been at 2 or 3 schools since, but is very faithful to Windlesham”, she said.

His novel drew upon both Windlesham and Warren Hill. The unfortunate maths master, Lloyd, was almost certainly drawn from J.G. Drummond (WH 1923-35), who took his own life shortly after leaving in disgrace. Uggles may have been related to Tubby, the Malden’s popular and heroic dog. The portrait of the headmaster Peter Stone has something of Christopher Malden, who had been in effect joint head for some years; he became principal in 1927. Mills evidently had a gift for befriending boys and learning their secrets; Meredith & Co. captures the idiom of pupils during the interwar period more accurately than any other novel.

My guess is that Mills came to the school soon after leaving university to teach English or “English subjects”; that was a junior appointment, seldom held for long.

That is about it. Sorry we have no more.

Tom H.

After receiving seemingly an avalanche of information, I was simply overwhelmed by it all. I had the middle initials I'd been so desperate for! I had a university and a degree! I had a date of employment! I had a wife, Vera, for cryin' out loud, and a house, and an extracurricular life: plays, songs, concerts, and typing up articles for the magazine. Somehow, I'd even ended up with an extremely unexpected brontosaurus!

And I found a real, apparently well-liked man who'd "made people laugh, a lot" …

All morning long, this mysterious George Mills seemed to have some of his obscurity steadily ebb away for me.

Of the characters in his wonderful first book, Meredith and Co., we find thumbnail sketches of the living individuals that Mills crafted into the staunch headmaster Howell Stone, known to his charges as "Peter", Mrs. Stone [No first name given!], Uggles, and the now regrettably tragic figure of Mr. Lloyd, the brilliant but somewhat misanthropic master of maths.

Sorry not to have more? Thank you so much, Dr. Houston—What an absolute treasure trove this message was for me. I could hardly fall sleep last night, as strange as that may sound: George Mills had suddenly become very real!

I immediately contacted Oxford's [Oxon's] Archives, and my heart raced when, amazingly, I was deluged with even more information within an hour or two.

And some of it came as quite a surprise…

Word from Heather at Peakirk Books, Norfolk

I’ve ordered Minor and Major from Peakirk Books in Norfolk, U.K., and have been getting great customer service from Heather Lawrence. Here’s my order info:

ITEMS ORDERED-------------
Item.........MILLS, George:, Minor and Major
Item Number..14155
Quantity.....1

Email: info@PeakirkBooks.com
Peakirk Books
Cherry Tree Lodge
Guist Bottom Road, Stibbard
Nr Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 0AQ
United Kingdom
Phone: 01328 829944

It's in transit, but cooler than simply sending me the book itself, Heather graciously consented to research George Mills. Apparently Peakirk is still in the process of moving its location and a “reference book on Boys school story authors” was in the old place. After retrieving it, here’s what she found out, from an e-mail stamped Wednesday, March 10, 2010; 5:57 AM [bold face and italic are mine]:

Hello again

Ref George Mills - I retrieved my book and it told me the following (unfortunately more about the books than the man).

G. M. taught for many years at a prep. School after himself being a pupil at one - Parkfield, in Haywards Heath) - so unsurprisingly his 3 school stories have a similar setting. Meredith & co was 1 of the first prep school stories of its kind, lighthearted & whimsical, a forerunner to the Jennings books of Anthony Buckeridge, in so far as it emphasizes the comical side of school life. However the importance of games & work are not forgotten.

The real hero for many is Uggles, a bulldog owned by 1 of the boys whose unexpected appearances cause havoc. King willow was equally a high spirited. Minor & Major was set in a different prep school. - even more whimsical than the previous 2.

Sorry not to have more useful information. The school he went to is located in Sussex, if you want to try and locate it - it may have some information on old pupils.

Kind regards

Heather

Thanks, Heather, for going above and beyond! So, we know that Mills apparently wasn’t primarily a writer, but a veteran teacher at a prep school after having attended one in West Sussex [Parkfield, in Haywards Heath] as a boy. Above, left, you can see a photograph of Haywards Heath [circa 1950] describing that location as “St Wilfrid's Church and the Schools.”

Does anyone have any information on “the Schools”? I'd be very much obliged...