St Paul's Girls' School

**St Paul's Girls' School** is a private secondary school for girls in Hammersmith, London. It was started by the Worshipful Company of Mercers in 1904.

## High Mistresses

The headmistress of St Paul's Girls' School is called the High Mistress.

- Frances Ralph Grey (d.1935), High Mistress 1903–1927
- Ethel Strudwick (1880–1954), High Mistress 1927–1948, daughter of the Pre-Raphaelite painter John Melhuish Strudwick
- Margaret Osborn (1906–1985), High Mistress 1948–1963
- Alison Munro (1914–2008), High Mistress 1964–1974
- Heather Brigstocke, Baroness Brigstocke (1929–2004), High Mistress 1974–1989
- Helen Elizabeth Webber Williams (born 1938), High Mistress 1989–1992
- Janet Gough (born 1940), High Mistress 1993–1998
- Elizabeth Mary Diggory (1945–2007), High Mistress 1998–2006
- Clarissa Mary Farr (born 1958), High Mistress 2006–2017
- Sarah Fletcher, High Mistress 2017–present

### Arts

- Gillian Ayres – artist
- Mischa Barton – actress
- Nicola Beauman – publisher, founder of Persephone Books
- Helen Binyon  – artist
- Lesley Blanch – author
- Justin Blanco White – architect
- Celia Brayfield – author
- Sophie Hunter – theatre and opera director
- Brigid Brophy – dramatist
- Lucy Briers  – actress
- Margaret Calvert – graphic artist
- Miranda Carter – biographer
- Edie Campbell – model
- Cecilia Chancellor – model
- Joan Cross – singer
- Emma Darwin – author
- Monica Dickens – author
- Suzi Digby – conductor and musician
- Flora Fraser – author
- Justine Frischmann – retired musician and artist
- Gluck (Hannah Gluckstein) – artist
- Francesca Gonshaw – actress
- Imogen Holst – musician
- Sarah Hobson – travel writer
- Ursula Howells – actress
- Celia Johnson – actress
- Rachel Johnson – journalist and editor
- Jane M. Joseph – musician and composer
- Amy Key Clarke – poet and author
- Marghanita Laski – author
- Nicola LeFanu – composer
- Amanda Levete – architect
- Alice Lowe – actress/author
- Jessica Mann – author
- Yvonne Mitchell – actress/author
- Emily Mortimer – actress
- Lucy Moss - playwright/director
- Santha Rama Rau – author
- Joely Richardson – actress
- Natasha Richardson – actress
- Georgina Rylance – actress
- Katherine Shonfield – architect
- Dodie Smith – playwright
- Catherine Storr – author
- Imogen Stubbs – actress
- Emma Tennant – author
- Angela Thirkell – author
- Mary Treadgold – author
- Salley Vickers – author
- Samantha Weinberg – author
- Rachel Weisz – actress
- Antonia White – author

### Business

- Isabel dos Santos – wealthiest woman in Africa as of 2020
- Grace Beverley – founder of Tala and Shreddy

### Culinary arts

- Thomasina Miers – chef and founder of _Wahaca_ restaurant chain
- Henrietta Lovell – founder of the Rare Tea Company

### Education

- Eleanora Carus-Wilson – economic historian
- Sheila Forbes – former principal, St Hilda's College, Oxford
- Henrietta Harrison – professor of Modern Chinese Studies, University of Oxford
- Jessica Rawson – warden, Merton College, Oxford
- Barbara Reynolds – scholar
- Joan Robinson – economist

### Humanitarianism

- Myrtle Solomon – pacifist and former chair War Resisters' International
- Ruth Wyner – homeless charity director

### Law

- Sonia Proudman – High Court Judge

### Journalism and media

- Emily Buchanan – BBC World Affairs correspondent
- Clemency Burton-Hill – broadcaster and author
- Edie Campbell – model and socialite
- Victoria Coren Mitchell – presenter, poker player
- Daisy Donovan – TV presenter
- Stephanie Flanders – BBC Economics editor
- Amelia Gentleman – journalist
- Bridget Harrison – journalist
- Bronwen Maddox – senior journalist at 'The Times' newspaper
- Veronica Pedrosa – Al Jazeera English correspondent
- Sophie Raworth – news reader
- Susanna Reid – news presenter
- Anne Scott-James – journalist and editor
- Alexandra Shulman – editor-in-chief, Vogue 1992–2017
- Carol Thatcher – journalist
- Erica Wagner – author, critic, and literary editor of _The Times_
- Eirene White, Baroness White – journalist and Labour politician
- Petronella Wyatt – journalist

### Politics

- Jane Bonham Carter – Liberal Democrat peer
- Vicky Ford, Conservative MP and formerly MEP
- Harriet Harman – Labour MP, former Acting Leader of the Labour Party, former Leader of the Opposition and former Cabinet minister
- Susan Kramer – former Liberal Democrat MP
- Mavis Tate – Conservative MP and women's rights campaigner
- Anne-Marie Trevelyan, Conservative MP
- Jo Valentine, Baroness Valentine – member of the British House of Lords
- Eirene White, Baroness White – Labour Minister of State then life peer
- Shirley Williams – former Labour Education Secretary and co-founder of the Social Democratic Party

### Science

- Kate Bingham – venture capitalist
- Ruth Bowden – anatomist
- Caroline Deys – doctor
- Rosalind Franklin – scientist, research led to discovery of the structure of DNA
- Jean Ginsburg – physiologist, endocrinologist
- Christine Hamill – mathematician
- Kathleen Kenyon – archaeologist
- Irene Manton – botanist
- Sidnie Manton – entomologist
- Onora O'Neill – philosopher
- Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin – astronomer
- Catherine Peckham – doctor and scientist
- Joan Beauchamp Procter – zoologist, herpetologist

### Sport

- Kitty Godfree – tennis player
- Lara Prior-Palmer – equestrian
- Cecilia Robinson – cricket
- Zoe de Toledo – rowing

## Notable former staff

- Margaret Cole – socialist politician, former Classics teacher
- Gustav Holst – composer, pioneer of music education for girls
- Nicola LeFanu – director of music during the 1970s
- Clara Taylor – chemist and science teacher, 1913-1921

## Controversy

The school was in the news in November 2017 because of allegations of sexual abuse that happened from the 1970s to the 1990s. In November 2017, One teacher resigned vecause of the allegations.

## Other websites

- Official School Website
- ISI Inspection Reports
- Profile on the ISC website
- Profile at _The Good Schools Guide_
- Profile  at _Tatler_ Schools Guide

## Infobox (school)

- **name**: St Paul's Girls' School
- **image**: St Paul's Girls' School in London W6, spring 2013 (1).JPG
- **image size**: 250px
- **established**: 1904
- **type**: Private schools in the United Kingdom, Private day school
- **head label**: High Mistress
- **head**: Sarah Fletcher
- **chair label**: Chairman of Governors
- **chair**: Simon Wathen
- **founder**: Worshipful Company of Mercers
- **address**: Brook Green
- **city**: London
- **country**: England
- **postcode**: W6 7BS
- **local authority**: London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, Hammersmith and Fulham
- **urn**: 100366
- **enrolment**: 808
- **capacity**: 825
- **gender**: Girls
- **lower age**: 10
- **upper age**: 19
- **free label 1**: Former pupils
- **free 1**: Old Paulinas