Welcome!

"I taught at the Gilberd at North Hill from 1966 till 1985. These were very happy years and I feel lucky and privileged to have met so many wonderful people there – pupils and teachers. I always felt that the activities outside the classroom were very valuable, enabling the teachers to get to know the pupils better in a relaxed environment. 

These pictures of trips abroad and at home, as well as of the Christmas party for homeless children, have brought back many happy memories for me and will, I hope, do the same for former pupils." - Eddie Ross, April 2021.

If you went to the Gilberd School in Colchester between the mid 60s and the late 80s you would have known, liked and respected Eddie Ross. 

Eddie taught French and German in the long since demolished language huts next to the Upper School playground and he took a keen interest in the wellbeing of students at the school. He has only recently stopped teaching at the Sixth Form College (which is based at the North Hill site of the old Gilberd School) and he was still providing pastoral support to students at the college right up until the pandemic hit at the start of 2020. He continues to teach online on a 1-1 basis.

During his time at the school Eddie organised a number of school trips and he took a lot of photos. He has been kind enough to allow these photos to be scanned and the purpose of this website is to make these images available to past pupils and teachers. Please do share links to the site on social media so that past pupils out there can more easily discover these wonderful old photos.

You can download a copy of Eddie's book 'The Gilberd North Hill' here and if you want to drop Eddie a line you can do so by emailing us at eddiesphotos@icloud.com and we'll forward your message on to him. 

Finally, if you have any photos from your Gilberd School days please don't hesitate to get in touch and we'll share them with other visitors to this site. We are always happy to scan any images that don't exist digitally, so don't be put off if you only have prints or negatives. 

We hope this website brings back lots of good memories.