[Thomas Cooper attended the Free School in Gainsborough as a ‘Bluecoat’ scholar from autumn 1813 until 1816]

One little step of preferment that I obtained during the last year I was a Bluecoat boy, was a source of both pride and pleasure.  I was chosen, with half a-dozen other boys, to join the choir in the church; and my place was now no longer on the low benches in the middle aisle, but in the church gallery, close to the organ.  I could thus see the large church organ played, as well as hear it; and how I wondered at the changing face of the organist, young Mr. Hand—a great musical enthusiast—as he touched the keys!  The other boys laughed at him—but I could not.