Why did King Charles hate Gordonstoun so much, when did he go to school there and was he bullied?
AS a young boy King Charles was sent to study at Gordonstoun - one of the UK’s leading independent schools.
The decision to send him to a British school was a significant departure from the royal norm - and one King Charles reportedly hated.
Charles is said to have been sent to study at Gordonstoun, in the 1960s, by his father, Prince Philip – who had also studied there.
Charles was the first Prince of Wales to be educated at a school, as opposed to private tutors.
He first went to Hill House School in London, then to Cheam School – the oldest private school in the country.
Charles reportedly struggled to make friends at Cheam and, by the end of his time there, Philip was keen for him to follow in his footsteps and attend the school where he had spent his formative years.
It was then that it was decided the prince would attend Gordonstoun – a remote school in north-east Scotland.
Charles wasn’t keen on the idea and was very close to his maternal grandmother, the Queen Mother, who even wrote to her daughter, urging her to keep him closer to home.
But Prince Philip persevered with his wishes to send his son to Scotland, where he would have “more privacy” from the press.
He was sent to Gordonstoun at the age of 13.
Reports suggest that Charles did not feel a good fit at Gordonstoun as he labelled his time at the school as “a prison sentence”, calling the school “Colditz in kilts”.
Charles was not as athletic as his father had been – and each morning started with a run - whatever the weather, followed by a cold shower.
It is said that the bunks were hard and the windows in the dormitories were kept open all year round.
According to fellow school friends, Charles was also relentlessly bullied during his time at the school.
Charles wrote in a letter home in 1963 describing the tough time he was having, it read: “The people in my dormitory are foul. Goodness, they are horrid.
“I don’t know how anybody could be so foul.”
In another, he wrote: “I hardly get any sleep in the House because I snore and I get hit on the head all the time. It’s absolute hell.”
Despite the letters and accounts suggesting that the King struggled being so far away from home, he did speak on the matter in a more positive light when giving a speech in the House of Lords.
The King said: “I am always astonished by the amount of rot talked about Gordonstoun and the careless use of ancient clichés used to describe it.”
King Charles left Gordonstoun in 1967 with five O-levels in English Language, English Literature, History, Latin and French and two A-levels in History and French.
Who else went to Gordonstoun?
The Queen and Prince Philip also sent Prince Andrew and Prince Edward to Gordonstoun, and the Duke of Edinburgh also studied there.
King Charles’ sister, Princess Anne, was not educated at Gordonstoun, which at that time was for boys only, but she later sent her two children, Zara and Peter to study at the school.
Other notable alumni include:
- Oona Chaplin – actress
- Balthazar Getty – actor and heir to the Getty oil fortune
- Duncan Jones – son of David Bowie
- Heather Stanning – rower and Olympic gold medallist
- Roy Williamson - musician
- William Boyd - author
- Jason Connery -son of Sir Sean Connery
- Lord Rothermere - owner of the Daily Mail
Where is Gordonstoun?
Gordonstoun School is an independent school for boarding and day pupils in Elgin, Moray, Scotland.
It is named after the 150-acre estate originally owned by Sir Robert Gordon in the 17th century.
The school grounds are set within a beautiful, wooded campus a mile from the Moray Firth and eight miles from the nearby town of Elgin.
Gordonstoun is renowned for its outdoor education programme and is now the first senior school to educate a British monarch - since Charles became King.