The Prep School had negotiated some very turbulent waters in the preceding years with the sudden departures of two previous Headmasters. It was clear that despite the excellence of the staff, the Prep School needed a special type of person to steer us into tranquil seas and help us to grow and develop.

Within a few weeks of Andrew Moore’s appointment, it was clear that the Governors had ‘played a blinder’ and found the school a true gentleman. A man of intelligence and integrity. Andrew Moore very quickly became so well-liked that parents and staff were prepared to forgive him even the cardinal sin of having lived in Barnstaple, attended West Buckland in his youth and then defected to Blundell’s!
Andrew is a family man. First and foremost, his own family, and alongside that for nearly nineteen years was both his extended West Buckland family and also his church family. Such is the drive and energy of Andrew Moore that he managed to commit fully to all these roles to the benefit of all.


Andrew arrived at WB with his lovely wife Linda and his four children all under 11 years of age. He immediately set about working a phenomenal number of hours. Teaching, assisting with trips, looking after Prep boarders and supporting his staff. Andrew would never expect any staff member or pupil to do anything he was not prepared to do himself. He rarely missed being in the playground to greet parents at the beginning and end of a day. He was almost always on the touchline of both girls’ and boys’ fixtures and taught lessons, took many trips to Portsmouth, Wales and France and did duties alongside his staff.


I will never forget the gusto with which he would launch into every activity on the PGL trips. Hanging upside down on the zip wire; gasping, laughing and spluttering as he capsized into the River Wye; waving with slight embarrassment but eternal good humour as Lesley Hartley and I sent 44 Prep children past a bus on which Andrew was embarking on a day trip to visit a friend in France – one at a time they filed past with tissues held to their eyes saying tearfully, ‘Au revoir, Papa!’ to the bemusement of the other bus passengers and the driver!
Andrew could be seen at every school function. He threw himself into the school and the role with such commitment that we used to joke that he can’t have worked as hard as a Housemaster at Winchester because he would never have had time to father William, Jeremy, Alex and Isabel.


Andrew always had strong views on producing well-rounded children. It is my belief that we need to enable children to flourish. Exams are important but not the be all and end all. In this new world we have realised that children learn best when they are happy. Andrew enabled children to flourish, to be imbued with a love of learning but also with strong core values. Honesty, loyalty, creativity, resilience, commitment, a sense of community, social responsibility, empathy and kindness. These are the qualities with which Andrew operated on a daily basis. Both children and parents could appreciate that he was the embodiment of all these things and set his pupils and staff a fine example. Andrew has given the gift of a wonderful moral education to thousands of children over the years and is, quite rightly, held in very high regard. He has also given the gift of an exceptional, rewarding working life to his staff and we all owe him a great debt of gratitude.
It is never easy to do justice to a colleague in writing a report such as this. It is fitting for me to end this report by wishing Andrew a blessed future. Our thoughts are with him and his family; William, Esther and Caleb, Issy, Alex, Jeremy and his soul mate Linda as they face the challenges ahead.


Whenever Andrew was addressing a gathering of people or delivering a message he would often tell a story, so it is fitting for me to end with a story which reflects the calibre of man that is Andrew Moore, and the influence we hope he has had on the thousands of ‘Preppies’ at both Winchester and West Buckland. He was our ‘Catch of a Lifetime.’


When he was eleven years old, Andrew loved fishing. He would go every chance he got, casting off from the dock at his family’s cabin on an island in the middle of a New Hampshire lake. On the day before the bass season opened, he and his father were fishing early in the evening, catching sunfish and perch with worms. Andrew tied a small silver lure and practised casting. The lure struck the water and caused coloured ripples in the sunset, then silver ripples as the moon rose over the lake. When his pole doubled over, he knew something huge was on the other end. His father watched with admiration as the boy skilfully worked the fish alongside the dock.
Finally, he very gingerly lifted the exhausted fish from the water. It was the largest one he had ever seen, but it was a bass.

The boy and his father looked at the handsome fish, gills playing back and forth in the moonlight. The father lit a match and looked at his watch. It was 10 P.M. – two hours before the season opened. He looked at the fish, then at the boy.

“You’ll have to put it back, son,” he said.
“Dad!” cried the boy.
“There will be other fish,” said his father.
“Not as big as this one,” cried the boy.

He looked around the lake. No other fishermen or boats were anywhere around in the moonlight. He looked again at his father.
Even though no one had seen them, nor could anyone ever know what time he caught the fish, the boy could tell by the clarity of his father’s voice that the decision was not negotiable. He slowly worked the hook out of the lip of the huge bass and lowered it into the black water.

The creature swished its powerful body and disappeared. The boy suspected that he would never again see such a great fish. And he was right. He has never again caught such a magnificent fish as the one he landed that night long ago. But he does see that same fish – again and again – every time he comes up against a question of ethics.

For, as his father taught him, ethics are simple matters of right and wrong. It is only the practice of ethics that is difficult. Do we do right when no one is looking? Do we award prizes to pacify the most difficult or affluent parents? Do we refuse to cut corners to get the design in on time? Or refuse to trade stocks based on information that we know we aren’t supposed to have?

The answer is: Yes. Yes, we would if, like Andrew, we were taught to put the fish back when we were young. For we would have learned the truth. The decision to do the right thing lives fresh and fragrant in our memory and from that memory, we are forever strengthened.

Jan WITHERIDGE