Houses

Students are all placed into one of the four houses and the school tie incorporates a coloured stripe denoting the wearer's house: yellow, red, blue or green respectively.

There are house competitions in all the major sports and curriculum areas; points are awarded for participation in these events. In the Lower School, achievement points are given for good work, notable effort and praiseworthy actions. At the end of the academic year all points awarded are totalled and the winning house captain is presented with the 'Times Shield'. All house trophies are on display in the Main Hall.

Above is the current running total for each house.

Radcliffe - Winner 2024-25

House History

To help sports competitions within the school, the students were divided into four Houses called Red, Yellow, Green and Blue. Later these were changed to Cambridge Line, Main Line, Hitchin Line and School, the separation being based upon the distribution of homes. Although the school was spilt into Houses before 1920 this lapsed and was re-introduced in the summer of 1925. And so the names of the four men who were associated with the Old Free House were chosen as titles, Mattocke, Skynner, Radcliffe and Pierson. 

John Mattock

The idea of contributing to the welfare of children by founding a school was his. In 1639 rents from two meadows (six acres and three acres) were given over to Trustees to pay for a schoolmaster. With help from Hitchin citizens, an old school building at the top of Tilehouse Street was bought and renovated. 

John Skynner

One of John Mattock's original Trustees who was given the authority to appoint the schoolmaster. Ralph Skynner, his brother, a Trustee gave proceeds from additional land acquired from the Vicar, Thomas Kidner (1667) to educate ten children described as poor.

Sir Ralph Radcliffe

Interested in the O.F.S in the early Eighteenth Century. Tried to dominate it but townsfolk did not want Trustees who could not work together and he was discredited. Gave money to provide clothes. Earlier Ralph Radcliffe formed a school at the Priory. It is said to have been transferred to Tilehouse Street in 1559.

Joseph Pierson

After the trouble about the admission of Dissenters and as a result of an application to the Lord Chancellor, Joseph Margetts Pierson was made one of the Local Trustees although he had no finanicial or personal involvement in the school; he gave eight hundred pounds to support the endowments. 

(Information taken from The Formative Years of Hitchin Boys' School by Robert Walmsley)