Mr A P Cary Field
We are currently sifting through the WHS archives and have found some truly inspirational stories. Over time we will be adding them to this website. We hope you find this information about Mr A P Field of interest.
Arthur Perrott Cary Field
Headmaster 1895-1919
Born in London on 29th March 1867 to Rev. Thomas Field and Sophie Eleanor Elwes.
After a couple of Assistant Masterships in Malvern and Newcastle-Under-Lyme, he moved to Birmingham and founded a news boys preparatory school, West House School for boys, in his rambling Georgian house, formerly a girl’s school in Edgbaston. He founded it in partnership with Mr A R Charters. He married Miss Ethelwyn Bullock of Congelton in 1987 and had a family of three sons and two daughters. He was sole Headmaster of West House School from September 1907 to the date of his death, 21st January 1919 and laid to rest in Edgbaston Parish Churchyard.
The world is a poorer by the death of A P Cary Field. Good schoolmasters are not so common that we can afford to lose a great one. For I think no one who knew him as such would wish to deny that Mr Field was a great schoolmaster. He laid the foundations on which others will build, and unless these foundations are well and truly laid the later building will necessarily be faulty. And the high standard of West House School was first and foremost due to Mr Field's personal efforts and influence. From the intellectual point of view, I believe that all of us who have obtained subsequently any measure of academic success would say that we owe it largely to the good luck that gave us such a favourable start as the opportunity or being taught by Mr Field.
Extract from a Sermon by The Rev. H E Clatworthy, Vicar of St James Church, Edgbaston 1919
