A HOUSEMASTER at a Ministry of Defence boarding school for the sons of

servicemen struck his head and died after falling from a stepladder

while putting up decorations for a pupils' Christmas disco, a fatal

accident inquiry in Stirling heard yesterday.

Mr Ben Philip, 46, who had worked at Queen Victoria School in

Dunblane, Perthshire, for 20 years, was found unconscious in the school

theatre on the night of December 9 by house matron Kathleen Johnstone

after apparently falling 10ft on to the floor.

Miss Johnstone called an ambulance and school nurse Jean Wharton

arrived. ''He was moaning and giving signs of cerebral irritation -- he

was very restless,'' Miss Wharton said.

Mr Ian Grant, consultant surgeon at Edinburgh's Western General

Hospital to which Mr Philip was transferred with a fractured skull, said

he never regained consciousness and, despite surgery to remove a blood

clot, was diagnosed brain-stem dead two days later.

Headmaster Julian Hankinson said Mr Philip normally would have left it

to the pupils to put up posters and Christmas decorations for the senior

boys' disco, under supervision. However, on December 9 he had departed

from usual practice and returned to the theatre to work alone after the

pupils, who had been helping him, went to do prep.

The inquiry was told that, earlier, two tall stepladders had been

balanced on tables to reach the theatre ceiling. Pupil Mark Henderson,

15, said they were ''wobbly'' and when he went up one of the ladders he

asked two other boys to hold the legs.

Sheriff Kevin Veal asked: ''Do I take it that if there had not been

boys at either leg, you certainly wouldn't have gone up the ladder? The

boy replied: ''No.''

Mr Hankinson said Mr Philip was accustomed to the ladders, which he

used for adjusting the lighting for school plays, and had never

complained about their suitability or stability.

He said Mr Philip, a bachelor, had been a dedicated schoolmaster.

Sheriff Veal recorded a formal verdict that Mr Philip died of head

injuries sustained in the course of his employment.

He said the inquiry was not the proper forum to decide whether or not

the ladder had been balanced on a table when it fell.