With the exception of the seventy Collegers who were housed by the School, all Oppidans lived in boarding houses run by either Dames or their male counterparts Domines, right up to the late 18th Century. These varied in standard and size, from the acceptable to places that ‘fathers wouldn’t tolerate for their horses’. The charges for boarding were expensive and the food largely inedible, indeed one senior boy didn’t eat in his boarding house for his final two years.
An Old Etonian (OE) in the late 1890s wrote the following:
“In old times the houses in which Oppidans lived were presided over by Ladies called ‘Dames’.
Each boy had his ‘Tutor’ who was supposed to look after his education independently of what he was taught in the School by his division master. In the case of the younger boys, the Tutor superintended the pre-preparation of work to be done for the division master.
During the 19th Century as the Ladies in charge of the houses retired or died, their places were taken by Masters who themslves were still called ‘Dames’. There is still one lady in charge of a house, ‘the last of the Mohicans’. The Dame referred to was Jane Evans, daughter of William Evans, the Drawing Master who had run the house before her. She died in 1906, the last of the true Dames.
