Rector’s eNews 35: 4 November 2026

This week, the 5^th in this short Christmas Term, is intentionally a week of quiet routine and relative calm to allow the boys to focus on writing and preparing for exams. Stuff continues to happen in the background, but things feel settled and as focused as can be at a school like this. It is good to see the boys take their exams seriously with a genuine desire to do their best. Whilst the stakes are higher for the senior boys, for the younger ones, this really is an opportunity to learn about how they learn, to build stamina in their revision, and to gain confidence and familiarity with the exam setting.

This week has other significance for us as we look ahead to Remembrance Sunday. Michaelhouse honours its Old Boys who died in the World Wars very intentionally. There is a short corridor between the main quad and the chapel that is a poignant reminder to the boys every time they walk through it on their way to chapel, and the apse and apse windows are a beautiful memorial in themselves. Of course, the chapel, rededicated after the Second World War remains the formal memorial to the 127 OM’s who died in that conflict.

Having had the privilege of visiting the Western Front in Belgium and France on a number of occasions, it is hard to imagine today the horrors of those wars. The Battle of Delville Wood is possibly South Africa’s most distinguished contribution to the war. The 1^st South African Infantry Brigade captured the site on the 15^th of July 1916 and held it until the 19^th of July, suffering huge losses under artillery fire. Delville Wood was a salient – a bulge in the line – that was of strategic significance and its heroic capture and defence was an important feature of The Battle of Bazentin Ridge under the overall command of General Douglas Haigh.

Records tell us that five Michaelhouse Old Boys died at Delville Wood and the schools’ strong ties to the battle are represented in the flag that now is displayed in the Rector’s Reception at school. This is one of the two original flags used at the unveiling of the magnificent memorial that now stands at the end of an avenue of oak trees just outside the French town of Longueval. It is a beautiful setting and when you walk through the woods – still pockmarked by artillery craters now well grassed over – it is impossible to imagine that under that bombardment the entire forest, bar one single tree, was destroyed, with the troops hiding in it utterly decimated. If you ever get the opportunity to visit this site, I urge you to do so. It is a place of rare beauty and sorrow, and the monument is a noble tribute to those who fought and died there.

Of course, the most poignant loss to Michaelhouse at Delville Wood was that of Lieutenant Anthony William Scudamore Brown, the 3^rd Rector of Michaelhouse who, after much searching of his conscience, met with Bishop Samuel Baines to ask for his blessing to leave Michaelhouse – the Diocesan College of the Province of Natal – to enlist with the Allied Forces. Baines reluctantly agreed and it is recorded in the history of our school as told in Stars of the Morning. Baines wrote: “And when the term was over, and he had spent two or three days in quiet to review the position, he sought me out in Durban to tell me he must go. There was no longer any doubt where his duty was.” He died on 18 of August 1916, and he is buried in the cemetery at Delville Wood. He was 35 years old.

On Sunday, and on every day, we remember them.

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