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Remembering the Sportsmen of the Somme

As we reach the Remembrance period, our series focusing on Sportsmen of the Somme concludes with Peter Bloor summarising the fates of those sporting stars that fought for King and Country during the battle in 1916. 

The players of Clapton Orient and the Footballers’ Battalion

Inscribed on the reverse of the memorial to the men of the 17th and 23rd Battalions of the Middlesex Regiment - the Footballers’ Battalions - which stands in the Somme village of Longueval are the words of the 17th’s commanding officer, Colonel H.T. Fenwick: “I knew nothing of professional footballers when I took over this battalion. But I have learnt to value them. I would go anywhere with such men. Their esprit de corps was amazing. This feeling was mainly due to football - the link of fellowship which bound them together.”

Three of those men were William Jonas, George Scott and Richard McFadden of Clapton Orient. Jonas was killed on July 27th 1916 but has no known grave and is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing. Scott died of wounds on August 16th and is buried in St. Souplet British Cemetery, and McFadden on October 23rd: he too has a known grave and is buried in Couin British Cemetery.

The players of Heart of Midlothian and McCrae’s Battalion

“McCrae’s. I like that battalion. It has a dash about it” - Major-General E.C. Ingouville-Williams, Commanding Officer of 34th Division. (Quote taken from the book “McCrae’s Battalion, the story of the 16th Royal Scots” by Jack Alexander)

Four members of the battalion that so impressed Ingouville-Williams were the Heart of Midlothian players Duncan Currie, Ernie Ellis, Harry Wattie and James Boyd. Currie, Ellis and Wattie were killed on the first day of the battle, July 1st, and Boyd on August 3rd during the attack on High Wood. Not one of them has a known grave and all are remembered on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing.
Another of “The Bravest Team” that is now commemorated with a statue at Tynecastle was Thomas Gracie, who died in service of leukemia on October 23rd 1915 and is buried in Glasgow (Craigton) Cemetery.

The players of Yorkshire CCC and the Leeds Pals

Writing to the Yorkshire secretary Frederick Toone from hospital, where he was recovering from a wrist wound, Roy Kilner said of Major Booth that ‘He was always the same old fellow, one of the few who never did get ‘swelled head’”, also telling Toone that ‘I had the pleasure of being in his company on the eve of the ‘scrap’ - also Dolphin. I cannot say what has become of Dolphin. He is lucky if he got out. Let’s hope he has.’” - Yorkshire Evening Post, 11th July 1916

Arthur Dolphin did survive the battle and the war, his steel helmet saving him from a shrapnel burst on July 1st, but Major Booth was killed and he is now buried in Serre Road Cemetery No.1 (link opens a photo of his headstone).

Evelyn Lintott of QPR, Bradford City, Leeds City and the Leeds Pals

Lieutenant E.H. Lintott was also killed on 1st July 1916 and his death was noted on the same line of the Battalion War Diary as that of 2nd Lieutenant M.W. Booth, two of the eleven officers killed that day as “Every wave was met by a very severe Machine Gun fire.” Evelyn is another who has no known grave and he too is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial.

The lightweight boxer Jerry Delaney of the 1st Sportsman’s Battalion

Corporal Jerry Delaney was one of the Sportsman’s Battalion’s specialist bombers [grenade throwers], men who cleared trenches, redoubts and other defensive positions and thrived in confined, man to man, face-to-face combat, as did boxers. The Sportsman’s bombers were called upon twice during the attack on Delville Wood on July 27th, first at 8.30 a.m. when they and two teams of Lewis gunners captured a redoubt from which heavy machine gun fire had come, and at 3.30 p.m. they helped the 1st Kings Royal Rifle Corps hold off a German counter-attack. Jerry may have been killed in either of these actions, but equally he could have been killed at any time during the day’s fighting that only ended for the battalion at 7 p.m. when it was relieved. Jerry’s body was never found and he is another who is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial.

Two County Durham sportsmen, Alf Maynard and Denis Hendren

Durham’s opening batsmen on August 4th 1914, the day war was declared, and on the 10th, when the county played its last match before the war put a stop to cricket, were the England rugby forward Alf Maynard and the former Middlesex cricketer Denis Hendren. Both would become casualties of the Battle of the Somme, Private D. Hendren as a member of the 18th Durham Light Infantry, the Durham Pals, in the blazing sun and heat of early July and Lieutenant A.F. Maynard in the sleet, snow, biting cold and deep mud of November.

Denis was seriously wounded but recovered and was able to resume his cricket career after the war, but Alf was killed, on November 13th 1916. He has no known grave and is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing.

Billy Jarman of the Leeds Northern Union (Rugby League) Club

When he returned from five months away touring Australia and New Zealand Billy, an army reservist, had just six hours to spend with his wife and three children before reporting to his regiment, the Scots Guards. A journalist from the Yorkshire Evening Post imposed upon that precious time at Billy’s house in Armley, Leeds, and reported that “He would have been more keen on going to the front if his absence from his family had not already been so long” but that he had added “Still, my duty lies there.” 

Private S.W. Jarman - Billy used his middle name - was killed on August 15th 1916 while doing that duty, the day-to-day job of holding the line, when his trench was shelled and blown in. His body was never found and he is remembered on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing, one of the nine Sportsman of the Somme remembered in this series to have no known grave. 

References

Images: Banner image, “The army isn’t all work” recruiting poster, Imperial War Museum ref. IWM (Art.IWM PST 7686) 
West Bromwich Albion v. Clapton Orient Gallaher 1928: Kilmarnock v. Heart of Midlothian Gallaher 1928: Arthur Dolphin Chums 1923: Evelyn Lintott, Famous pre-Great War footballers J.F. Sporting Collectibles: Jerry Delaney Copes 1915: Alf Maynard - taken from Scotland v. England team photo on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission site, copyright unknown