In November, 1918 there had been no party at the School; an outbreak of Spanish Flu meant all boys had been sent home a few days before. But in 1945 the summer term had only just started and the sense of excitement was universal.

The first week of term (which started on May 1st) was slightly surreal. For the first time since the start of the Michaelmas Term of 1939 boys returned for the start of the term to find the blackouts were removed from the corridors around the Quad. On the Common a huge bonfire had been built ready for the celebrations that everyone knew were imminent.

Ex Cultu Robur, the School’s excellent account of Cranleigh during the War, noted: “All were strung up to a tense fever-pitch of an excitement too clutching for joy and relief. That would come later after “the tumult and the shouting died”—sorrow, pride, gratitude, awe and remembrance; but meanwhile England waited to go mad. The amount of prep that was done throughout the School can be imagined; every wireless was surrounded by a crowd of impatient prefects, waiting to pass on the news of the German surrender to the Houserooms as soon as it came through.”

The official announcement came at 8.15pm on May 7th stating that the terms had been agreed by the German High Command and would be signed the following day. As boys listened in their houserooms on the radio “such cheering broke out as may never be heard again”. Although prep continued “no more work was done … a surprising number of flags appeared out of study windows, East contributing a large black Swastika hung upside down”.

After prayers the Headmaster visited all the dormitories and announced that School would end early the next day and until the King’s broadcast to the nation at 9.00pm the boys would be free to do as they pleased.

Lessons ended at lunchtime and straight away boys headed to all parts, with the usual boundaries ignored. Some took the chance to visit pubs, many offering customers a free pint to mark the occasion, and a blind eye was turned. Some went home, others headed to Guildford, while what the Cranleighan described as “the unlucky few” remained at School. Local buses and the trains to Guildford “were filled to bursting point as we sweated in the sultry heat”.

A few more daring soles ventured up to London to join in the celebrations there. David Cooper (2 North 1951) was able to witness the procession of MPs, headed by Winston Churchill, as they made their way for a service of thanksgiving in Westminster Abbey (click here for a full account of his day).

Everyone managed to make it back to Cranleigh by the 9pm curfew. “We went back to the houserooms for call over and in time to listen to the King on the radio,” Bryan Wordsworth (1 North 1949) said. “In 1 North a boy in one of the toyes was asleep when the National Anthem was played; woken roughly to show proper respect he shot up and laid himself out by hitting his head on his locker and was then left until after the speech when he was brought round with some cold water.”

Then, “in pairs and crowds, stringing the road, no longer singly, we came down at 9.30pm to join in the village festivities. Imbued with the village spirit, our hearts opened with the sheer joy of it all as twilight descended. We attended the dance in the Village Hall, we joined in the torchlight procession as it made its way from the opposite end of the village to the Common where a huge bonfire had hastily been built.

“The flickering, waving lights were an impressive sight in the falling dusk as the long snake with the band playing made its way,” Ex Cultu Robur noted. “The glare of the bonfire lit up all the houses round about and shone on their flags with ruddy fierceness. The Swastika, silhouetted on its summit, fell with a crash into the flames as cheers rang out, and fireworks and crackers shot into the air. At length the school tore themselves away from their dances and their celebration pints and trudged up the road to bed.”

Others recall the party continued. “It was a fairly riotous night,” Wordsworth said. “with Monty Aldridge [the second master] doing his normal night patrol armed with a suitable flexible piece of wood.”