In 1905, the Trustees of Pate’s Grammar School Foundation established the County High School for Girls and Miss Helen Donaldson Heatley was its first Headmistress. Opening on 17th January 1905 and situated in Livorno Lodge, (in St. Margaret’s Road close to the corner of North Street), its name was soon changed to Pate’s Grammar School for Girls.  Starting with 82 girls and 5 staff, pupil numbers rose to a healthy 190 by the end of her headship in 1911. 

Miss Heatley chose the school motto ‘Honestas non Honores’ (honourable conduct not worldly honours) as it embodied her ideal for the school – the spirit of doing good work for its own sake and not just in the hope of reward.  She felt passionately that girls should have an all-round education and insisted upon the teaching of science and was particularly keen on the role of games. Hockey, tennis, netball and cricket were played, as she believed that games encouraged girls to develop ‘rapid observation, quickness of decision, love of fair play, courage, self-control and good temper’. We have much to thank her for!

By 1930 the school was seriously overcrowded and the need to expand to a new site became pressing. On 23rd July 1938 Sir Richard Livingstone, President of Corpus Christi College, laid the foundation stone for the new Girls’ School in Albert Road (now Pitville School). The building was financed by the County Council and leased to the Pate’s Foundation at a nominal rent. The School opened on 19th September 1939, before it was completely finished, in order to forestall any attempt to requisition the premises for the War Department. In 1946 Livorno Lodge became home to the newly established Pate’s Junior School.  

In 1986 Pate’s Grammar School for Girls, Albert Road, closed and Pate’s Grammar School opened as a mixed grammar school at the Princess Elizabeth Way site. The former Monkscroft School site was used for the Lower School forms until 1995 when the current school opened, accommodating all pupils at the Princess Elizabeth Way site.