Hurstpierpoint College is a public school (English private boarding and day school), located just to the north of the village of Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex. The College was founded in 1849 by Canon Nathaniel Woodard and is a member of the Woodard Corporation. History and overview The school was established in 1849 as St John's Middle School, based in Shoreham. Its first headmaster, Edward Clarke Lowe, had worked with Woodard at Lancing College and stayed at Hurstpierpoint for 22 years until 1872. The school moved to Mansion House in Hurstpierpoint and then, thanks to the local benefactors the Campion family, on 21 June 1853 made its move to the present site. Intended to resemble the collegiate system at Oxford and Cambridge, Nathaniel Woodard designed the College to have adjoining Inner and Outer quads and the chapel and dining hall adjacent to each other. The school was inspected by the Independent Schools Inspectorate in 2019. Houses The senior school consists of 13 houses including the recently added Wolf house. All students in their last year (Upper Sixth), whilst retaining affiliation to their former houses, join the 13th house, the co-educational day and boarding 'hall of residence', St John's House. In the early 70s the senior school comprised just seven houses, named: Eagle, Martlet, Shield, Red Cross, Chevron, Fleur de Lys and Star. Each house had a house master and house tutor who were also teachers within the school. Traditions The school preserves ceremonies, which for the most part were taken from other schools such as Winchester College, in order to give the school a feeling of tradition back in its early Victorian days. "Hurst" has performed a Shakespeare play every year since 1854, beginning with Richard III after the first headmaster, Dr Lowe inspired the first players onto stage. Hurstpierpoint College boasts the oldest Shakespeare society in existence, older even than that of the Royal Shakespeare Company which was not formed until 1875. The Hurst Johnian, the school magazine, founded in May 1858 is a source for the School's history. Its policy has been to maintain the annals of the school, and it continues to publish current reports and articles on the past. Evidence from the national archives suggests that it is the oldest school magazine in the country. Notable Masters Sabine Baring-Gould: Novelist and composer of hymns, the most notable being "Onward, Christian Soldiers". He was a Master of the College