The School

Eastville Primary County School - (Junior Mixed), to give the school it's official name, was located between Coombe Road and Berkeley Street, Eastville, Bristol 5. The school was built in the later part of the 1890's, as an Infants and Girls School, based on the fact that the entrance in Berkeley Street has "Girls" and "Infants" carved in the stonework, and the1916 entry in Wright's directory refers only to an Infants Mistress and a Girls Mistress. There were two entrances to the school; one in Berkeley Street, with the main entrance being in Coombe Road - by which name the school was universally known. Coombe Road ran between the main Fishponds Road and Greenbank View.

In the 1901 Census Coombe Road is known as Victoria Road, being renamed c.1928, presumably, to indicate that it was a road leading to Coombe Brook. Coombe Brook rises above Hopewell Hill and Cockshot Hill and makes its way, via Clay Bottom, to Greenbank Cemetery. From the cemetery it flows through the grounds of what was 100, Fishponds Road before joining the River Frome. Interestingly, a 1936 map shows Coombe Brook going over Greenbank View !

* A note in the 1928 Kellys Directory under Victoria Road states that it is now called Coombe Road.

(Many thanks to Geoff Crane for researching the above).