Scouring back issues of The Sidcup Times (part of the Kentish Times stable of newspapers), I stumbled across this advert from 1931. The school had only opened in 1924 but this ad suggests the school was not shy in promoting itself. Numbers were relatively low at this point but grew throughout the 1930s and 40s to the point where the Main Road site became inadequate. The ad describes St Mary’s College as ‘A High Class Day School for Boys’ which was ‘conducted’ by the Marist Fathers with students prepared for Oxford Exams and London Matriculation. At this point there was also a prep school.
Shortly after this advert was placed in the newspaper, Fr Patrick Lawless became headmaster after being appointed to St Lawrence’s in 1932. He had been a chaplain in the French Army during the First World War and was apparently quite a stern man.
James Ashe, who was a pupil at St Mary’s during the 1930s, recalls: “The only time I ever saw Fr Lawless smile was during a singing class when we sang the last line from The Song of the Vagabonds (from the 1925 Broadway Show The Vagabond King) as “The Law of The Lawless is That I Obey!””
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