Prince George has started school; a royal enrolment that has upped the desirability of properties in the well-heeled environs of the south-west London prep school chosen to tutor the four-year-old.
Plans for the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to accompany their firstborn on his first day were changed due to her recently announced pregnancy and the severe morning sickness she has been experiencing. Instead the duke did the school run solo.
A crowd of well-wishers had gathered outside the school gate to watch. The young prince arrived shortly before 8.50am and was driven through a side entrance and a security gate closed behind them.
The third in line to the throne arrived for his first day at £18,000-a-year Thomas’s Battersea, where he will learn to “be kind”, acquire “confidence, leadership and humility” and not have a best friend to prevent other children having hurt feelings.
Holding his dad’s hand and looking a little apprehensive, George walked from the car and then had a formal handshake with Helen Haslem, head of lower school. the duke was holding his son’s school bag.
It was a low-level arrival as far as media were concerned. Unlike William’s first day, which was witnessed by a bank of photographers, the fiercely protective Cambridges stipulated only one TV camera and one photographer would be there to capture the moment of George’s first day.
The newest and most famous pupil, who will be known as George Cambridge, was escorted into the reception class.
Kitted out in his John Lewis uniform (also available at Peter Jones in Sloane Square) – winter and summer uniforms, red art smock, and PE kit including black ballet shoes total more than £365 – the young prince can look forward to a broad education. Along with maths, English and science, the curriculum includes classes in “understanding the world”, “expressive arts and design” and “communication and language”. Art, ballet, drama, ICT, French, music, and PE are all taught from day one.
If, like his great-uncle Edward, he inclines towards thespianism, the school performs eight different productions and a nativity play every year, and has its own sound and lighting crew. Any musical leanings will be encouraged enthusiastically through weekly concerts and summer and winter galas.
He may, of course, prefer to just charge around the rooftop playground, with climbing frames and stunning views across the river Thames and Battersea Park.
Ben Thomas, principal of Thomas’s London Day School, who was headteacher at Thomas’s Battersea for 18 years, said he hoped George would learn to be himself.
“The whole aim of these precious early years of education is to give children that confidence in who they are. So we are not going to try and mould him into any kind of particular person and we wouldn’t do that with any of our pupils.
“I hope he will have the confidence to be himself with all his quirks and his idiosyncrasies and characteristics.”
The choice of Thomas’s Battersea makes him the first direct royal heir to be educated south of the river, but then he is only the third-generation heir to attend public school.
His father, the Duke of Cambridge, attended Wetherby school in Notting Hill, west London, gaily waving to photographers on his first day, and leaving the establishment with the distinction of winning the Grunfield Cup for the child with the best swimming style.
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