{"id":829655,"date":"2025-07-01T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=829655"},"modified":"2025-07-01T17:03:50","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T15:03:50","slug":"the-man-behind-the-most-expensive-school-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/829655\/the-man-behind-the-most-expensive-school-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"The man behind the most expensive school in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

William Orde Newnham founded a school in KwaZulu-Natal that is now the most expensive and one of the best-performing private schools in South Africa, Hilton College.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Newnham was born in Farnham, Surrey, in 1825 to a well-educated family. His father, William Newnham, was a respected surgeon, and his mother was Caroline Atkinson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was a botanist educated at St John’s College, Cambridge, during the same period as the renowned mathematician Rev. John William Colenso.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In May 1855, Newnham and Colenso arrived at Port Natal with a group of immigrants. Newnham established himself in the educational landscape of the Colony of Natal and embraced the role of colonial schoolmaster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During this period, he met Gould Arthur Lucas, a British Army officer who had survived the infamous 1852 sinking of the HMS Birkenhead. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lucas had arrived in South Africa in 1851 and later served as a district adjutant in Pietermaritzburg. He and Newnham became close friends, an alliance that would prove pivotal years later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a return to England, Newnham came back to Natal in 1867 and attempted to set up a school in Ladysmith. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school was unsuccessful, partly due to the stifling summer heat, which Newnham found unbearable.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lucas heard of his struggles and stepped in. In 1871, he helped Newnham secure part of a farm called Hilton, near Pietermaritzburg, to establish a new school. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The land was originally part of Ongegund, a Voortrekker-granted farm later purchased by Johanna Grobbelaar and subdivided after her husband\u2019s death. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One adjoining portion had been named \u2018Hilton\u2019 by Joseph Henderson, chairman of Natal Bank. Lucas named his estate \u2018Upper Hilton\u2019, inspired by \u201cHill Town\u201d, a place in England significant to the Hendersons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1872, Newnham arrived at the newly acquired site, and, on 29 January 1872, Hilton College officially opened its doors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The initial group of 50 pupils was housed in dormitories near the stables, while the original farmhouse was expanded to serve as the central school building. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Newnham remained headmaster until his return to England in 1877.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Era of developement <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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In 1878, Henry Vaughan Ellis, a Rugby School alumnus, took over the lease of Hilton College. Ellis sought to transform Hilton into a school modelled after the prestigious English public school system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, the institution consisted of only two thatched bungalows, but Ellis oversaw the construction of a double-storey building, with the upper floor known as “The Lords” and the lower, “The Commons”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

From these modest beginnings, Hilton began to grow. Fields were levelled, new buildings rose, and trees were planted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ellis imported many traditions from Rugby School, establishing an informal link between the two institutions, visible today in Hilton\u2019s crest and motto. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1903, Ellis announced his retirement but wanted to ensure the school\u2019s legacy would endure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the suggestion of Ernest Acutt, a founding pupil and then-Mayor of Durban, the school and its land were sold to a company formed by Hilton alumni, Hilton College Ltd. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This new ownership marked the beginning of Hilton as a school guided by its old boys. Following Ellis\u2019 retirement, George Weeks briefly took over as headmaster but resigned within the same year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1906, William Falcon was appointed headmaster, ushering in a period of significant expansion. Under his leadership, the school grew from 50 to over 200 pupils. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

World-class South African private school <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Several iconic buildings were constructed, including the William Campbell building and the school chapel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The original red-brick structures gave way to the signature Cape Dutch architectural style that defines the school today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Falcon also introduced the current school uniform and established the house system, naming the first three houses after Hilton\u2019s leaders: Newnham, Ellis, and Weeks (later renamed Pearce). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These developments laid the foundation for the modern Hilton College. Over the last 153 years, Hilton College has evolved into a world-class institution known for its academic excellence, elite status, and rich traditions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It now stands as the most expensive and one of the highest-performing private schools in South Africa.  The school offers dual academic pathways: the IEB (Independent Examinations Board) and Cambridge A Levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In recent years, Hilton has achieved outstanding results. The 2022, 2023, and 2024 matric classes all maintained a 100% pass rate, and the class of 2023 earned a record number of distinctions per candidate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 2024 cohort continued this success, with its 116 matriculants earning an average of 2.6 distinctions each. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of these, 99 wrote IEB exams and achieved 2.5 A symbols per candidate, while the 11 Cambridge A Level candidates earned an average of 2.9 A symbols. Six pupils sat AS Levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This academic excellence comes at a cost. In 2025, Hilton College\u2019s annual boarding and tuition fees are R420,729, a 5.8% increase from 2024. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When BusinessTech began tracking school fees<\/a> in 2014, Hilton was the only school charging more than R200,000. Now, it has more than doubled that figure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the high fees, Hilton continues to attract families seeking the very best in education, thanks to its exceptional facilities, top-tier educators, and a prestigious alumni network. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school has produced a number of prominent South Africans, including Springbok rugby stars Bobby Skinstad and Gary Teichmann, Microsoft executive Paul Maritz, and former MP Tim Harris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hilton College<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From humble beginnings, this college is now the most expensive and one of the best-performing private schools in South Africa.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":829741,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[9381,19049,853,22986],"class_list":["post-829655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-hilton-college","tag-kwazulu-natal","tag-south-africa","tag-william-orde-newnham"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=829655"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829655\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":830186,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829655\/revisions\/830186"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/829741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=829655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=829655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=829655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}