The Rev’d Richard Bonner, Rector of Maresfield, was buried in the church chancel in 1692. The slab marking his resting-place was found during church repairs in 1837. He was a substantial benefactor for the parish. He left money for educational purposes and also for a Bible, to the value of 8/-, to be given annually to a deserving poor child (under age 14). This charity money was later added to the school funds. He bequeathed a cottage that became the site of a school bearing his name.
Rents from a property which he owned Norlington Farm, Ringmer, to the value of £2-10-0 yearly were to be used “to teach two poor children in the parish the English tongue and to instruct them in the principles of the Christian religion.”
At the beginning of the 19th century, the Revd R. Bingham, then curate in charge, started a school for the better class at the Rectory.
The earlier part of the present school was built in 1819 under the instructions of Lady Frances Shelley to replace a former one which had been the second one built on Richard Bonner’s site.
Lady Shelley personally supervised the building and accompanied by her eldest daughter Cecilia, walked to the school regularly. In 1873 the Revd Mr Butler organised another rebuilding programme which included the School House and coincided with free education.
The school buildings were virtually unchanged until after the Second World War when in 1945 Mrs D.A. Hardman became headmistress on the retirement of Mr A.E. Cosham who had been at school for half a century. The Sussex Express Herald in 1945 reported:
Children at Bonners School, Maresfield bade farewell to their headmaster Mr A.E. Cosham, retiring after over 50 years in the teaching profession.
The occasion was marked by the singing of songs and *Auld Lang Syne*, and he was presented with a cheque by the girls of the first division. Letters of appreciation and good wishes came from parents. Mr Cosham is to be succeeded by Mrs Hardman.
When a pupil at Ringmer Council School, Mr Cosham was stated to be one of the three best-read scholars in the country. At Ringmer School he gained a Queen’s Scholarship and became a student master and was promoted to the headship of Maresfield in January 1907. While he was at Maresfield the school gained many scholarships and a reputation for games, especially cricket. The boys have twice figured in the final of the East Sussex Schools Cricket League and the girls have headed their division in the Stoolball League and have played in the final at Lewes.
Mr Cosham is a member of the Parish Council, organist at the Parish Church, captain of the local cricket and football clubs and superintendent of the recreation ground. He has played football for Ringmer, Maresfield and Uckfield, but it is as a cricketer that he is best known. He has played for Lord Sheffield’s XI, Eastbourne, Hastings, Lewes Priory, Heathfield Park, Mayfield and the Sussex Club and Ground.
In 1905 Mr Cosham married Miss G. Richardson at Ringmer when they were both teachers at Ringmer School. His wife became an assistant teacher at Maresfield in 1909 and retired in 1939. The school has invariably received good reports from both H.M. and the Diocesan Inspectors. A movement is on foot for the village to make a public presentation to Mr and Mrs Cosham and Mr H.W. Tilbury has agreed to act as hon treasurer. Until they can find a suitable house at Maresfield, Mr and Mrs Cosham will reside at Uckfield.
Mr and Mrs Cosham lived at ‘Oakfield’, New Town, Uckfield for the rest of their lives. Their property adjoined ‘Mountfield Lodge’ which was a preparatory school in the early part of the 20th Century and was in 1988 made into one unit and subsequently divided into eight one bedroomed units and renamed ‘Mountfield House’.
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