Loretto College
 |
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| Established | 1827 |
|---|---|
| Type | Independent day and boarding school |
| Headmaster | Graham Hawley |
| Founder | Thomas Langhorne |
| Location |
Linkfield Road Musselburgh East Lothian EH21 7RE Scotland |
| Staff | 232 |
| Students | 615 |
| Gender | co-educational |
| Ages | 0–18 |
| Houses | School, Pinkie, Hope, Seton, Balcarres, Holm |
| Colours | Langhorne, Tristam, Greenlees, Mackintosh. |
| Publication | The Lorettonian |
| Former pupils | Old Lorettonians |
| Website | Loretto School |
Loretto School, founded in 1827, is an independent boarding and day school for boys and girls aged 0 to 18. The campus occupies 85 acres (34 ha) in Musselburgh, East Lothian. It has approximately 600 pupils. The school is currently under investigation as part of Lady Smith's inquiry into child sexual abuse.
The school was founded by the Reverend Thomas Langhorne in 1827. Langhorne came from Crosby Ravensworth in Westmorland. He named the school for Loretto House, his then home, which was itself named for a medieval chapel dedicated to Our Lady of Loreto which had formerly stood on the site of the school. The school was later taken over by his son, also Thomas Langhorne. The last link with the Langhorne family was Thomas' son John, who was a master at Loretto from 1890 to 1897, and later headmaster at John Watson's Institution. Loretto was later under the headmastership of Dr Hely Hutchinson Almond from 1862 to 1903.
The school originally accepted only boys, but in 1981 girls joined the sixth form and in 1995 the third form, so making the school fully co-educational by 1995.
In 2001 the film director Don Boyd published an article in The Observer detailing his systematic sexual abuse by a teacher in the school. The revelation led to further allegations about the teacher from other former pupils and subsequent calls for the teacher's prosecution. The teacher, then 79 years old, was charged, but the case was dropped on the grounds of his ill health. The teacher subsequently died. In 2017, it was announced that the school would be investigated as part of Lady Smith's inquiry into child sexual abuse.
Although the school is not the oldest independent school in Scotland (it is nearly 200 years younger than George Heriot's School), it claims to be the oldest Scottish boarding school.
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