[7] Edward Alleyn, as well as being a famous Elizabethan actor, was also a man of great property and wealth, derived mainly from places of entertainment including theatres, bear-gardens[8] and brothels.

[9]All of these ventures were legitimate at the time and rumours that Alleyn turned his attention towards charitable pursuits out of fear for his moral well-being have been traced to the journalist George Sala and discredited.

However, Edward Alleyn faced objections from Francis Bacon, the Lord Chancellor, in getting the patent of incorporation that was necessary to secure the foundation's status as a college.

[12] The business of the charity was conducted in the name of these thirty members by the Master, Warden and four Fellows (Chaplain, Schoolmaster, Usher and Organist).

[15] The next 200 years were beset by both external difficulties such as diminishing financial fortunes and failing buildings as well as internal strife between the various Members of the college over problems both major and minor.

[16] The lack of a disinterested body of governors and having no official connection to the universities of Oxford or Cambridge contributed significantly to the school not fulfilling Alleyn's vision in its first 200 years.

[17] Some notable Masters did preside over the college in this time including James Allen (the first master to drop the 'y' from his surname) who in 1741 made over to the college six houses in Kensington, the rents of which were to be used in the establishment of two little schools in Dulwich, one for boys from the village, the other for girls to read and sew, from which James Allen's Girls' School arose.

[17] The additional wealth of the college eventually resulted in the Charity Commission setting up an enquiry into the advisability of widening the application of the funds to those extra beneficiaries Alleyn had specified in later amending clauses to the foundation's original statutes.

Although the Master of the Rolls, Lord Langdale rejected the appeal in 1841 on the grounds that Alleyn had no right to alter the original statutes, he did express dissatisfaction with the college's provision of education.

[19] Immediately following this criticism, the Grammar School of the College of God's Gift was established in 1842 for the education of poor boys from Dulwich and Camberwell.

[20] The foundation scholars of the college, however, continued to receive an education far short of Alleyn's vision, however, despite further attempts at reform by the visitor.

[7] In 1882, following a scheme issued by the Charity Commissioners, an act of Parliament was passed after which the Upper and Lower schools were officially split into separate institutions.

This followed a period of political debate, resolved at appeal in 1876 at the Privy Council where Lord Selborne ruled in Alfred Carver's favour.