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The Royal School
Entrance to the school in 2016.
College Hill, Armagh BT61 9DH, Northern Ireland United Kingdom
Information
Type	Voluntary Grammar
Religious affiliation	Church of Ireland
Established	1608; 417 years ago (1608)
Gender	Coeducational
Alumni	Old Armachians
Website	royalschool.com

The Royal School, Armagh is aco-educational voluntarygrammar school, founded in the 17th century, in the city ofArmagh inNorthern Ireland. It has a boarding department with an international intake. It is a member of theHeadmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference.^[1]

One of a number offree schools created in 1608 by KingJames I of England &Ireland, the school was to educate the sons of local Protestant merchants and farmers during theplantation of Ulster. It has four "sister" schools:Royal School Dungannon inDungannon,Enniskillen Royal Grammar School inEnniskillen, theRoyal School Cavan inCavan, and theRoyal and Prior School inRaphoe. In November 2013 the school was placed 78th inThe Sunday Times Top 200 UK Schools Guide for results at A level and GCSE combined. In May 2014, an inspection by the Education and Training Inspectorate found the leadership and management of the school to be 'outstanding'.^{[citation needed]}

Originally intended to be sited atMountnorris, the turbulent situation inUlster at the time led to a move to the relative safety of Armagh city. Despite this, an early headmaster of the school, John Starkey, and his family, were drowned by insurgents during the1641 Rebellion.^[2] The school arrived at its current 27-acre (110,000 m²) site on College Hill in the 1770s.^[3] A boys' school from its inception, the school was amalgamated with Armagh Girls' High School in 1986 to become co-educational.^[4]

Each pupil is assigned to a house – Darcy, Rokeby, Beresford or Armstrong – which are named after former Church of Ireland archbishops. Successive archbishops have chaired the board of governors for over four centuries. In 2008, the school celebrated its quatercentenary along with the four other 1608 Royal Schools. To mark the occasion, QueenElizabeth II andPrince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, visited the school. A history of the 1608 Royal Schools was produced in the same year by former headmaster, Thomas Duncan.^{[citation needed]}

The school was the inaugural winner of therugby unionUlster Schools Cup, beatingRoyal Belfast Academical Institution after three replays. They won it again the next year and continued to dominate the early years of the competition, winning it seven times in the first ten years. Fortunes waned after this, with only three finals contested between the victories in 1885 and 1977, none of which was won by the school. However, the school did not compete in the competition for around fifty years following the death of a pupil during a match in 1928.^{[citation needed]}

The school won the Schools Cup in 2004, beatingCampbell College in the final.^[5] John McCall, the captain of that team, died 10 days after the final while playing for the Ireland U19 rugby team in theIRB U19 World Championship inSouth Africa.^[6] He had been told of his selection for this team on the day of the Schools Cup final. A few months later, a second member of the squad, Todd Graham, was killed in a road accident while visiting his parents at their home inZambia.^[7] These tragedies brought perspective to what had been an otherwise successful year, with the school becoming the first school sinceMethodist College Belfast in 1936 – and only the second school ever – simultaneously to hold the schools cups for rugby andgirls' hockey. Thecricket 1st XI were beaten semi-finalists in their equivalent competition. The girls' hockey team won theKate Russell all-Ireland hockey trophy on the day that John McCall died.^{[citation needed]}

The girls' hockey team won theSchools Cup in 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2010, 2023 and were beaten finalists in 2005. They also obtained the title of the best youth hockey team in Europe in 2008. In 2004/2005, the school was described inThe Irish Times as the "girls hockey school of the decade".^{[citation needed]}

The Old Armachians is a social organisation consisting of former pupils of the Royal School. Although at one time the Royal School educated politicians and novelists, its most recent notable exports have been rugby players.^{[citation needed]}

• Tommy Bowe – Irish rugby international and British and Irish Lion
• Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh (1769–1822) – British Foreign Secretary 1812–1822^[8]
• Frederic Charles Dreyer – Captain ofHMS Iron Duke at theBattle of Jutland, British representative at theLeague of Nations Military Committee^{[citation needed]}
• Mervyn A. Ellison (1909–1963) – astronomer
• SirReg Empey – Leader of theUlster Unionist Party (2005–10)
• Willie Faloon – flanker forConnacht Rugby
• Frank Harris (1855–1931) – British editor, novelist, short story writer, journalist and publisher
• John Lennox – professor of mathematics at the University of Oxford
• George Green Loane (1865–1945) – classical scholar, schoolmaster, editor, and author
• SirJohn Hall Magowan – British ambassador to Venezuela 1948–1951
• Richard Maunsell (1868–1944) – chief mechanical engineer of theGreat Southern and Western Railway of Ireland and theSouthern Railway of England
• Stuart Neville (b. 1972) – author best known for his novelThe Twelve or, as it is known in the United States,The Ghosts of Belfast
• Edward Pakenham (1778–1815) – British Army general
• Thomas Preston (1860–1900) – scientist whose research was concerned with heat, magnetism, andspectroscopy
• Samuel Shephard – recipient of theGeorge Cross and a serving Officer in the Royal Marine Commandos
• John Taylor, Baron Kilclooney – deputy leader of the UUP from 1995 to 2001
• Richard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley (1760–1842)–Lord Lieutenant of Ireland andGovernor General of India, attended the Royal School in the 1770s

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54°21′07″N6°38′53″W / 54.352°N 6.648°W /54.352; -6.648

• 1608 establishments in Ireland
• Boarding schools in Ireland
• Boarding schools in Northern Ireland
• Educational institutions established in the 1600s
• Grade B+ listed buildings
• Grammar schools in County Armagh
• Private schools in Northern Ireland
• Member schools of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' Conference
• People educated at The Royal School, Armagh

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