Spotlight on Old Mancunians: Sir George Clark – Distinguished Historian

The archives recently received an enquiry from the great granddaughter of G N Clark. Rarely do we have to research the life of such a distinguished Old Mancunian.

George Norman Clark was born in Halifax in 1890 and until the age of 16 was educated as a boarder at Bootham (Quaker) School in York. Transferring to MGS in 1906, he was made a prefect and after a term in Classical V spent his remaining time in Classical VI under the aegis of J L Paton and other such luminaries as “Broadie” Broadhurst.

Classical Sixth 1907, Clark seated second from left on the front row

An Open Scholarship to Balliol took him to Oxford where with two memorable exceptions he was to spend the rest of his career. After a First in Greats (Classics) he switched to History where he also gained a top First and was elected Fellow of All Souls College at the singularly early age of 22. One of his research projects during 1912-14 was writing the Quatrocentenary History of MGS due to be published on the 400^th anniversary of its foundation in 1915. As a member of the OTC at Oxford, however, he was immediately called up on the outbreak of War. Sadly therefore his history of the school was never completed but many years later he sent us the notes he had prepared which remain a treasured possession of the archive. The School doctor, A A Mumford, nobly stepped in to take over the project and his volume was finally published in 1919. It has to be said that it was a great pity that Clark was unable to complete his book for whatever the merits of Mumford he was not an historian.

Clark’s war career was an adventurous one – as an officer in a front line regiment he saw a great deal of action, was wounded twice and finally taken prisoner at the famous Battle of Vimy Ridge  in 1916. In the POW camp he taught languages to his fellow prisoners and wrote plays for them to perform – one was so successful it was put on in London after the war. He was not tempted to follow Harold Brighouse (Hobsons Choice), Stanley Houghton (Hindle Wakes) et al however, and returned to academia in Oxford first at Oriel College, then back to All Souls as Professor of Modern History (1931-43) and thirdly to Cambridge (Trinity College) as Regius Professor of Modern History (1943-47). The pull of Oxford was strong and he left the fens to become Provost of Oriel (1947-57). His career paralleled that of Sir Ernest Barker (MGS 1886-93) who was also a Regius Professor of History at Cambridge in spite of spending much of his career at Oxford.

Clark’s contribution to modern historical scholarship was immense – he edited the Oxford History of England (the standard multi volume work) and contributed The Later Stuarts (1929) which was still in use for most of the 20^th century in spite of appearing as the first book of the series. Many other works have been of value to students over the years.

He was much honoured (Knighted in 1953 , made a Fellow -later President – of the British Academy and  of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences) and his portrait is in the National Portrait Gallery. He can justly be regarded as one of the greatest scholars to emerge from MGS.  

Jeremy Ward