The Viscountess Lady Downe, (1780 - 1867) lived at Bowden Hall in Upton St Leonards as a guest of the Brooke Hunt family. She bought the local school, which she repaired and extended and she also purchased further parcels of land nearby, rents from which were used to benefit the poor people of the parish. She would come to watch the children at their lessons, stabling her pony and trap in the wooden shed in the schoolyard which still exists. 

The LEA moved the school to Bondend Road in the 1990s: the Trustees continue to be freeholders of the new school, taking a keen interest in its welfare.   

Lady Downe is buried in the churchyard of St Leonard’s Church. The charities she created were amalgamated in 1982 to form the present Trust, which is regulated by the Charity Commission.