PLYMOUTH |
The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History |
|
|
St Joseph's Roman Catholic Primary School is situated at Chapel Street Ope, Devonport, Plymouth. The School's origin goes back to 1830, when it was started by Father Thomas Costello in a small room of a house in Granby Street, Devonport. When it outgrew that the school moved to larger premises in Chapel Street. Finally, in 1860, it moved into its own buildings adjacent to the newly erected Roman Catholic Church of St Michael and St Joseph in James Street, Mutton Cove. The premises were enlarged in 1863. During the Second World War much of that area was devastated by bombing and afterwards the population declined as the residents moved to newer, modern housing elsewhere. A new school was called for but in a different location. And so it came to be that on November 16th 1972 the Roman Catholic Bishop of Plymouth, the Right Reverend Monsignor Cyril Restieaux officially opened the new St Joseph's school on part of the former Raglan Barracks, Devonport. The new School cost £70,000, of which eighty percent was contributed by the Government. It had four class-rooms and was intended to take 160 children, although there were only 60 enrolled at the time. Also present at the opening was the parish priest, Father Charles Foley, who was himself an old boy of St Joseph's School.
|
