| AdminHistory | Plans to establish a free school were sufficiently advanced by 1814 for a committee to be appointed to invite subscriptions preparatory to acquiring a site. The East India Dock Company donated a plot of ground with a frontage of 55 ft. on the north side of Woolmore Street and this was enlarged by the addition of an adjoining 75 ft of frontage at a cost of £150. The buildings were begun in 1815 and the school was formally established in April 1816 "For the education of poor children of both sexes of every denomination of christians".
George Green, who was a prominent nonconformist donated £4,000 of the £6,000 which was invested as its endowment and acted as treasurer of the committee. Other major donors included the West India Dock Company, the East India Dock Company and the East India Company. The total cost of the buildings (which included separate boys and girls wings plus houses for the master and mistress) came to £3,037. At a count in 1819 there were 249 boys and 170 girls in the school. In 1875 the managers transferred the school to the School Board for London and its title was changed from the Poplar and Blackwall Free (British) School to the Woolmore Street School.
In 1881 a scheme was established for administering the funds settled on the former school. The funds were to be managed by five ex-officio trustees (the Rector of Poplar, the vicars of St. Saviour's and St. Stephens, the minister of Trinity Chapel and the vestry clerk of Poplar) and three elected trustees. The net income of the charity was divided into four equal parts and paid to the All Saints, Poplar Boys' National School, the National Schools of St. Saviour's, Poplar, the National schools of St. Stephen's, Poplar and to the Trustees of the Trinity Chapel, Poplar, for the purposes of maintaining a Sunday school. |
| CustodialHistory | The provenance of the volume is not known. It was accessioned into the Local History Library collections in the 1970s (LP. 2993, class 820.2). It may have come from a council source. |