I am the last boy to have been beaten at Eton. I confirmed this in a conversation with Tony Little, the then headmaster of that venerable school, during his 2002-15 tenure. “Our archivist has checked the files,” he said, “and can find no record of any beating since summer 1980.
” “So if I were to say I am the Ruth Ellis of corporal punishment at Eton,” I asked hopefully, referring to the last woman to be hanged in Britain, “would I be correct?” “If you wish to make such a claim,” Little replied, “that is certainly within your grasp.” From Lord of the Flies to Hogwarts, the dark side of boarding schools occupies its own fascinating genre of horror and bleak comedy. Earl Spencer’s recent memoir spotlighted the long-term psychological impact of “boarding school syndrome”.
Insights into that culture have informed how we understand our three most influential recent leaders: old Etonians David Cameron and Boris Johnson; and Winchester-educated Rishi Sunak. Where did their entitlement and casual cruelty come from? Did it originate during their formative years, in traumas experienced far from their mums and dads, in secretive halls, at the hands of unaccountable masters? My emotional Waterloo happened in January 1984. I was 13, in my first year at Eton.
I was in a house – one of 25 buildings where Etonians live – where there was much illicit drinking. One Saturday afternoon, I went to Windsor with an older boy, bought a bottle of Bacardi from a superm.
