Prince Philip shipped ancient font to Charles’s school in Scotland

Telegraph reportersMon, August 3, 2026 at 6:10 AM UTC

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The font stood in the school’s chapel for several years before being returned to its original home in Shropshire - William Cash/PA

Prince Philip had a historic font moved from a derelict church to Prince Charles’s school in Scotland so he could be “surrounded by ancient objects of English beauty”.

He arranged for a 12th-century font to be shipped to Gordonstoun School in Moray when the young Prince started there in 1962.

It stood in the school’s chapel for several years before being returned to its original home of St Michael’s Church in the hamlet of Upton Cressett, Shropshire, where it remains to this day.

Shaped like a large stone barrel, the so-called “Gordonstoun font” is an example of a Norman tub font, with ornate carvings around its outside and a lead-lined interior.

Philip spotted it while visiting St Michael’s in the 1960s with Ivor Bulmer-Thomas, a former MP, who had been working with him on a scheme to protect unused historic church buildings.

Prince Charles’s school photo from Gordonstoun, which he began attending in 1962 - Keystone Press /Alamy

St Michael’s had fallen out of use in 1958 and was in a “terrible state”, and was shown to Philip as an example of a dilapidated country church in need of rescue.

Mr Bulmer-Thomas went on to set up the Redundant Churches Fund, which later became the Churches Conservation Trust, of which the King is now patron.

Author and journalist William Cash’s parents moved to Upton Cressett estate in the 1970s.

When Philip visited the Grade I-listed church, it was locked and its contents, including the font, were expected to be put into storage, Mr Cash said.

“They went to see it, and Prince Philip apparently said [of the font], ‘I think that would be really good if it was moved to Gordonstoun, because I want my son to be surrounded by ancient objects of English beauty’.

“I think Philip thought, ‘What a waste to have it just sitting in a storage unit’. It’s quite large – how they got it up to Gordonstoun I really do not know.

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“This is a strange story that to this day most people don’t know about.”

The font stood in the modern school chapel during Prince Charles’s time there before being returned to Upton Cressett in the 1970s, when St Michael’s was invested as one of the Church Restoration Fund’s first churches.

Prince Charles arrives for his first term at Gordonstoun School with Prince Philip, left, and a school governor - Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Although St Michael’s no longer holds regular services, the font is still occasionally used, with Mr Cash saying he and other members of his family were baptised with it.

He said visitors to the church today are “flabbergasted” when they learn of the font’s royal connections.

“They find it almost impossible to believe that this font has moved so many hundreds of miles for the King’s aesthetic benefit,” he said.

He added: “It always feels like something out of an Arthurian legend, like this was a font that was fit for a king, a Norman font with roots going back pretty much to the age of William the Conqueror.”

Steve Tarling, a community officer at the Churches Conservation Trust, which now looks after St Michael’s, described the church as “a really lovely, picturesque, almost fairy tale chapel”.

He continued: “You could imagine someone out of the Brothers Grimm having a wedding in there – it’s an understated little chapel, but a nice little oasis of calm in what is quite beautiful countryside.”

Mr Tarling said he had the impression it had been an “honour” for the local community that Philip had chosen their font to accompany his son, but that they were “grateful” it had been returned.

“I think it would just miss something there without it. I think it completes the picture,” he said.

“It’s like the cherry on top of the cake.”

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