SCHOOLBOYS FIGHT FIRE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17233, 12 April 1930, Page 4

SCHOOLBOYS FIGHT FIRE

PYJAMA-CLAD BRIGADE AWAKENED BY BUGLE LONDON, March 3. Damage estimated at £15,000 was doin' by a tire which destroyed the famous Grignon Hail and eight classrooms at Foisted -School, Essex, in the early hours of yesterday morning. The outbreak was discovered about 2 a. mi., some three hours after the conclusion of a performance in the Grignon Hall by the Foisted .Dramatic Club. Four hundred boys were summoned from their beds by bugle call. Clad only in pyjamas and dressing-gowns, they manned the pumps and attacked llie llamos until the arrival of the Braintree and Dunmow tire brigades. The llames spread alarmingly, and shot into the air to a great height. 'l’he tire-lighters, prominent among whom was the headmaster, the Rev. F. Stephenson, concentrated their| efforts on saving the main buildings and the new part of the school, in-1 eluding the fine memorial hall erected to the memory of Old Felstedians who fell in tho war. These are divided from the Grignon Ball by a cloister and passageway respectively, and the efforts were successful. .FAMOUS 11ALL GUTTED The Grignon Hall aiul the eight class-rooms were completely gutted, only the walls remaining standing. 9 .'L’he hall was erected in 1910, at a cost of £IO,OOO, to the memory of a former headmaster. It contained a handsome roof of pitch pine and many valuable pictures, which were devoured by the flames. The lire was got 'under control about; midday. Interviewed by a press representative, one of the assistant masters said: "The head prefect and four others took charge, and the boys worked splendidly; there was no panic. They were self-organised and self-com-ma tided. No <mo was injured, and the main buildings are intact.” The headmaster, in an interview, praised the school lire brigade for the wav they had conducted their work. He' said all the boys behaved splendidly in an alarming situation.