Belfast Education in the Early Nineteenth Century

The "Royal Belfast Academical Institution," which reflects so much honour on its founders, was projected in 1807; and, within a few weeks from the first promulgation of the design, subscriptions to the amount of £16,000 were raised for carrying it into effect: this sum was further increased by subscriptions from other parts of Ireland, and from England; and, under the patronage of the Marquess of Hastings, and by the unwearied exertions of several gentlemen, nearly £5000 was subscribed in India: making the total amount £25,000. In 1810, the patrons and principal subscribers were by act of parliament incorporated a body politic, to consist of the Lord-Primate, the Marquess of Donegal, the Bishop of Down and Connor, the Bishop of Dromore, and more than 70 of the principal subscribers, including all who should subscribe and pay 20 guineas, with power to elect a president, vice-presidents, treasurer, secretary, managers, visitors, and auditors, of whom 21 should be competent to form a board, to transact all business relative to the institution, with license to take lands not exceeding £2500 per annum, and other privileges.

The buildings were completed at an expense, including furniture and apparatus, of £28,954. 3. 8., leaving no provision for the endowment of professorships; for which object the managers applied to government, and in the year 1814 received from parliament a grant of £1500, which was continued during the years 1815 and 1816; after which it ceased till 1824, when it was renewed on the recommendation of the Commissioners of Education, and in the year 1834 was increased to £3500; of which sum £2000 was for additional buildings, and £1500 for general expenditure. The institution comprehends a collegiate and a school department, the former under the direction of seven professors of natural philosophy, moral philosophy, logic and the belles lettres, mathematics, Latin and Greek, Hebrew, and anatomy, respectively; there are also two professors of divinity, one appointed by the general Synod of Ulster, and the other by the Seceding Presbyterian Synod of Ireland. The professors were, in 1818, constituted a board of faculty for superintending the courses of instruction and discipline observed in the institution, as were also the masters of the school department for that branch of it.

The collegiate department is conducted on a plan similar, in most respects, to that of the university of Glasgow; the session commences in November and ends in May, when public examinations take place; the mathematical class is generally very numerous, and is considered equal to any in the United Kingdom; the classical course is also extensive; the moral philosophy class has no prescribed course of reading, but lectures are given and examinations are held; the course of anatomy is pursued rather as a branch of general education than as a medical study, though admirably calculated as a first course for medical students, for whom it is in contemplation to establish a distinct class. The school department comprises the mercantile, English, classical, mathematical, Italian, French, and drawing schools, each superintended by a separate master. There are at present about 200 students in the collegiate, and 210 pupils in the school, department of the institution, to which is attached a good library, a museum, and a valuable philosophical apparatus. Nearly all the candidates for the Presbyterian ministry in Ireland are educated here; and the Synod of Ulster, and the Seceding Synod of Ireland, by whom the institution is cordially patronised, consider the general certificate of the faculty equivalent to the degree of M. A. in any of the Scottish universities, or to that of B. A. in Trinity College, Dublin, or either of the English universities: the total receipts of this establishment, for 1835, were £3646. 8. 5., and the expenditure was £3735. 19. 5.

The number of children educated in the various charity and other free schools, excepting the Sunday schools, is about 2850, of whom 1480 are boys and 1370 girls; one on the Lancasterian plan was formerly a Sunday school, and was converted into a day school in the year 1811, when a spacious school-house of brick, with a residence for the master, was built at an expense of £2000, raised by lottery and by local subscriptions; the school in Brown-street was established in the year 1812, under the patronage of the Marquess of Donegal, and a large and handsome brick building, with houses for the master and mistress adjoining, was erected by subscription, at an expense of £1500; the school in Donegal-street, which was the first in the North of Ireland, that placed itself in connection with the National Board, was founded in 1829, under the patronage of the Right Rev. Dr. Crolley, R. C. Bishop of Down and Connor, and two large school-houses were built adjoining the R. C. cathedral; and in the townland of Malone the late Marquess of Donegal, in 1765, built a very large school-house on the demesne of Willmount, and endowed it with the rent of an adjoining farm, now let for £40 per annum, which appears to have been originally a charter school, but is now open to all children of the neighbourhood, of whom those attending it are educated gratuitously, and supplied with books. The number of private schools is 74, in which are 3630 boys and 2820 girls.