History of Gillotts

In 1950, the school opened as a Gillotts Girls’ Technical School, under the Headship
of Miss Barford, with an intake of 25 girls. There was a boarding wing (Thorne House) for 30 girls,
and after 10 years the numbers had risen to between 75 and 80 girls. In 1960, the school closed as a “girl only” school and was amalgamated with Henley Secondary Modern School (which had been housed previously at the Technical College, Gravel Hill). It was renamed Gillotts Secondary School and became a comprehensive school in 1976.

The Headteachers of Gillotts are:
Miss Bede (Betty) Barford (1950 – 1957)
Miss J. M. Gregory (1957 – 1960)
Mr R. W. Pritchard (1960 – November 1969)
Mr Malcolm White (April 1970 – 1980)
Mr David H. W. Grubb (1980 – 1986)
Mr John Lockyer (1987 to December 2000)
Mrs Catherine Brooker (January 2001 to August 2007)
Ms Catharine Darnton (September 2007 to March 2026)
Mr Mark Bedford (from April 2026)

The school’s motto, non nobis solum, was given to it by Miss Barford – it was the motto of the school she attended, Boston High School:

The phrase comes from the works of  Marcus Tullius Cicero, a Roman statesman, orator, and philosopher (106-43 BC).  Remembered now as a politician and lawyer, he also wrote a number of works of philosophy, including a work often translated as ‘On Duty’ but really being a consideration of the ties that bind us together and how we should relate. In this book, he wrote these words:

‘non nobis solum nati sumus ortusque nostri partem patria vindicat, partem amici’ –
‘we are not born for ourselves alone; our heritage, our friends all have a share in us.’

Cicero goes on to say the meaning of cosmopolitanism is that we live in kinship and we each play an important role in “contributing to the general good by an interchange of acts of kindness, by giving and receiving.” 

The school’s land has been known as Gillotts since Tudor times, with its origins being as an Elizabethan farm, with a small house on site; by the 1600s this was held by a Henry Round, possibly a tenant farmer.