The Milner Schools

The Milner Schools are an unofficial and historically significant association of 23 South African high schools for boys modelled on Eton, Harrow, Winchester and Charterhouse, designed to prepare them for further education at Oxford or Cambridge or to be leading and influential figures in South African society. Most of the Milner Schools were established by Lord Milner, the Governor of the Cape Colony and British High Commissioner for Southern Africa, and his successor, the Earl of Selborne, during the reconstruction period following the end of the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902). Some of the schools that became known as Milner Schools were in existence long before Lord Milner instituted his policy of Anglicization but all schools in the country came under the influence of his policy after the end of the Second Anglo-Boer War and the most prestigious became Milner Schools. Some of the schools are public schools in name only, operating as virtual private schools. After the war, Milner and his sought to establish a new order in South Africa in which the social, political and economic landscape would be dominated by British subjects, South Africans of British descent or Anglo-Africans. This policy of Anglicization led to the establishment of the Milner Schools.
The schools are regarded as elite in every respect and originally only admitted boys predominantly from the South African English / Anglo-African upper classes, but later, and to a lesser degree, upper class Boers (from 1908 onwards identified almost exclusively as Afrikaners) and upper class Europeans, Australians and Americans. Over the years, however, academically gifted boys from lower classes have been admitted through various scholarship schemes. Black boys were originally excluded from admission as there were various colonial laws (initially the “Native Laws” which evolved into the apartheid system) in place preventing them from participating effectually in society at large. This has also changed gradually as more privileged black boys gained admission over the years as the apartheid laws were steadily relaxed in the 1980s and with the evolution of a new black middle class (known pejoratively in South Africa as Black Diamonds) following the onset of the democratic dispensation in 1990-1994.
All of the Milner Schools are housed in grand buildings designed by the renowned South African and British architects of the day, including Sir Herbert Baker, and sprawl across large wooded estates with a standard of education, services and facilities unparalleled on the continent and on par with the finest schools in the First World. The Milner Schools have a rich history and follow traditions typical of British public schools, like the use of boaters, canes and morning suits as uniform, initiation rituals, the use of prefects and Head Boys (senior boys entitled to exercise school discipline), the practice of having internal groups known as "Houses" run by boys known as "House Captains", "Showing Up" or "Ripping", doing domestic chores or writing 'lines' or "beating"/caning and birching for misdemeanors and the practice of senior boys using junior boys as fags or skivs (skivvies), essentially as servants.
There is a tendency among alumni of the Milner Schools to regard the alumni of more recently established private schools in South Africa as inferior, as parvenus / new money / nouveau-riche / or gauche. Alumni of the Milner Schools continue to play major roles in South African society. Because of the success of alumni of the Milner Schools in social, economic and political affairs in South Africa,specifically, and across the African continent, there is a widespread belief that the education offered at these schools is better than that offered at other schools and so competition is high amongst parents to secure places for their children at one of the schools. Accusations of elitism have also been levelled at the schools which often tend to prefer to admit children of upper class, prominent and/or rich Africans (white or black) above others. Most of the Milner Schools are located in mainly white residential suburbs or traditional Anglo-African centres of power.
The first Milner school was Pretoria Boys’ High School, established in 1901, and it is by and large iconic of the idea of the Milner school. It had its roots in the republican Staatsmodelschool. Ironically, the Staatsmodelschool served as a prison for British officers during the Second Anglo-Boer War, including Sir Winston Churchill, who made a daring escape from there on the 12th December 1899.
Well-known alumni of the Milner Schools include billionaire entrepreneurs Elon Musk, founder of PayPal, SpaceX and Tesla Motors, Mark Shuttleworth, founder of internet security company Thawte and Linux distribution Ubuntu,and Raymond Ackerman, founder of the supermarket chain, British Cabinet Minister Peter Hain, former president of Walt Disney International Europe and current chairman of BBC Worlwide Etienne de Villiers, 100m Paralympic sprint champion Oscar Pistorius, golfer Gary Player, rugby players John Smit and Percy Montgomery, best-selling novelists Wilbur Smith and Bryce Courtenay, artist William Kentridge, cricketers Graeme Smith and Shaun Pollock, film actor, director and producer Sharlto Copley, king of the Bafokeng Nation Kgoši Leruo Molotlegi, chairman of the Coca-Cola European Advisory Board, Havas Media and Corporate Televsion Networks (CTN) Baron Watson of Richmond and Julian Ogilvie Thompson, former executive director (current non-executive director) of the Anglo-American Corporation and chairman of De Beers Consolidated Mines.
The following is a list of the 23 Milner Schools and their locations in South Africa:
* Pretoria Boys’ High School, Pretoria
* King Edward VII School, Houghton
* Jeppe High School For Boys, Kensington
* , Grahamstown
* Grey College, Bloemfontein
* Grey High School, Port Elizabeth
* , Wynberg
* Diocesan College (Bishops), Rondebosch
* Hilton College, Hilton
* Kingswood College, Grahamstown
* , King William’s Town
* , Kimberley
* , Rondebosch
* St Patrick’s Christian Brothers’ College, Kimberley
* , Queenstown
* South African College Schools (S.A.C.S.), Newlands
* Paul Roos Gymnasium, Stellenbosch
* Selborne College, East London
* Maritzburg College, Pietermaritzburg
* Durban High School, Berea
* Michaelhouse, Balgowan
* Glenwood High School, Glenwood
* , Houghton

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