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When was the first international rugby match, and who played in it?
Scotland and England have long been rivals on the rugby pitch and now compete annually for the Calcutta Cup. But did you know that the two teams first faced one another in the world's first rugby international match? Dominic Sandbrook considers the occasion on 27 March 1871
To most of the people of Edinburgh, 27 March 1871 was nothing special. As they streamed to work across the city’s bridges, trudging to their workshops and factories in the fine spring air, it seemed just another Monday, heralding the start of another week of toil. Yet for local residents interested in the new sports that were taking root in Britain’s industrial cities, it would be a day to remember. In that morning’s edition of The Scotsman, an advertisement proclaimed that Raeburn Place, the home ground of the Academical Cricket Club, would be hosting an unprecedented sporting encounter, with entrance costing a shilling a head. At three o’clock, 40 young men from England and Scotland were due to contest the world’s first international rugby match. When did the first international rugby fixtures begin? There had long been talk of arranging international fixtures. The previous year, an English side had played a team of Scottish exiles at the Oval in London, although they had been playing under the Association (‘soccer’) rules, which were not very popular in Scotland. The football world was still dominated by bickering between the champions of different codes, and in January 1871 representatives from 21 English clubs had met in a Regent Street restaurant to try to standardise rugby regulations and eliminate the more violent excesses. Read more | Rugby warriors: the rugby-playing heroes of the First and Second World War Their neighbours, however, were determined not to be left behind, and a group of Scottish clubs promptly sent an invitation to London. “With a view of really testing what Scotland can do against an English team,” they wrote, “we, as representing the football interests of Scotland, hereby challenge any team selected from the whole of England, to play us a match, 20-a-side, Rugby rules, either in Edinburgh or Glasgow.” As though determined to confirm suspicions of English insularity, the newly formed Rugby Football Union did nothing about it. But one of London’s oldest clubs, Blackheath, picked up the gauntlet – and the match was on. Who played in the first rugby international? To modern eyes, the world’s first rugby international, played by Scotland and England, looks a slightly strange occasion. When the match kicked off, some 4,000 people were packed into Raeburn Place – tiny by today’s standards, of course, but an extraordinary number by the standards of the day. And the teams’ pre-match preparations were a far cry from the meticulous routines of their modern equivalents. The English players had travelled up the previous night, sleeping on bare boards in a third-class carriage, having paid for their tickets themselves. As for the match itself, rugby in the 1870s would look almost unrecognisable to a modern fan. Scoring a try counted for nothing; it merely allowed the scorers to take a kick at goal. Penalties, meanwhile, were unknown, since no gentleman would ever cheat. And given the persistent bickering over the laws, it is a safe bet that few of the 4,000 spectators would have been entirely clear about the rules. Still, the next day’s Glasgow Herald told its readers that a fine time had been had by all. “The competitors,” it explained, “were dressed in appropriate costume, the English wearing a white jersey, ornamented by a red rose, and the Scotch a brown jersey, with a thistle… The difference between the two teams was very marked, the English being of a much heavier and stronger build compared to their opponents.” However, to the home fans’ delight, the English failed to score during the first 50 minutes, and after the teams had changed ends the Scots began to dominate. As might have been predicted, confusion about the rules flared up again, with the English players bitterly complaining about a Scottish try. Some accounts suggest that the Scots had barged their way over the line, others that a player had fumbled the ball, which was a foul in England but not in Scotland. Either way, the fact is that the game ended with Scotland triumphant, having scored one goal and two tries to England’s solitary try. Afterwards, the ball was exhibited in a shop window in Stockbridge, a symbol of Caledonian pride at a time when the newspapers were debating the prospects for Scottish home rule. Who won the first international rugby match? Yet, in a preview of controversies to come, one of the match umpires, a local headmaster, had not even seen the winning score. Dr HH Almond’s view had been obstructed by the crush on the line, but he had decided to give the verdict to Scotland anyway. “When an umpire is in doubt, I think he is justified in deciding against the side which makes the most noise,” he said later. “They are probably in the wrong.” This article was first published in the March 2013 issue of BBC History Magazine
Revisit the hidden history of one of French rugby's most shameful episodes, in an archive article from Professor Tony Collins
Marshal Philippe Pétain, head of state of the collaborationist French government in Vichy, issued a decree on the morning of 19 December 1941 that was unique in the history of world sport. With a stroke of his pen, he announced that the sport of rugby league, or le rugby à treize as it is known in France, was banned. Its playing was to cease, its offices closed and its assets confiscated by the government. Overnight, a sport with thousands of players and hundreds of clubs was wiped out. Why did Vichy France ban rugby league? The cause of this extraordinary decree lay in the sporting and social upheavals that gripped France in the 1930s, but its origins can be traced back to the origins of French rugby in the late 19th century. Rugby had deep roots in France. Taken up by Anglophile middle-class young men in the 1880s, it rapidly became popular among the French elite. The first French club, Racing Club de France, was formed in Paris in 1882. Baron de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympics, was a strong supporter of the game and its amateur ethos. He refereed the first French rugby championship final in 1892. By the early 1900s, the game had begun to spread around the small towns and villages of southern France, attracting working-class players and spectators. After the First World War, rugby’s popularity meant that it became the focus for intense local rivalries. The French championship became dominated by small town clubs, such as Quillan in the foothills of the Pyrenees. Bankrolled by local “notables”, these clubs ignored the game’s amateur rules in the rush to sign the best players. As the competition between clubs grew fiercer, so did the way the game was played. In southern France, the sport became known as “rugby de muerte”, because of the violence that was commonplace in championship matches. Read more | Rugby warriors: the rugby-playing heroes of the First and Second World War The French Rugby Federation (FFR) appeared powerless to stop either payments to players off the field or the violence on it. Across the channel, British rugby unions felt that the French had become such a problem that in 1931, following a brutal match with Wales in Swansea, France was expelled from the Five Nations international championship. To make matters worse, in early 1934 French international forward Jean Galia announced that he was going to lead a breakaway from the FFR and start the rival sport of rugby league in France. Rugby league had begun in England in 1895 when the majority of the northern clubs broke away from the Rugby Football Union because of its refusal to allow working men compensation for taking time off work to play the game. The rules were also changed to make the game faster, such as by reducing the number of players to 13, and the sport became an emblematic part of northern working class culture. France in 1934 was in the midst of a social upheaval that would result in the 1936 election of a “Popular Front” government supported by communists, socialists and liberals. Traditional France seemed to be under threat and “neo-rugby” became identified with the progressive spirit of the times. Popular Front minister Leo Lagrange attended the first international rugby league match between England and France, and teams with names like Treize Populaire Parisien were formed. Rugby league grew rapidly from nothing to 225 clubs in little more than four years. But the collapse of France in June 1940 following the Nazi invasion changed everything. The Vichy Government under Marshal Pétain pursued a policy of “Travail, Famille, Patrie” (work, family and fatherland) that reasserted right-wing France’s traditional values. One of those values was a belief in amateur sport. Consequently, the new regime declared its intention to ban all professional sport. French rugby league was no more than semi-professional even at the highest level but this fact, coupled with the game’s progressive reputation, was enough to damn it in the eyes of Vichy. In theory, the ban extended to soccer, but the round-ball game continued while league was outlawed. The minister for family and youth, Jean Ybarnégaray, was unequivocal. “The fate of rugby league is clear. Its life is over and it will quite simply be deleted from French sport,” he declared in August 1940. In October, following a report into the state of rugby by the president of the FFR, who called on the “Treizistes” to repent and rejoin the union, Vichy declared its intention to ban the league game. Its “deletion” was directed by commander Joseph Pascot, Vichy’s director of sport and a French international rugby union player in the 1920s. Pétain’s decree of December 1941 was simply the announcement of an accomplished fact. But the ultimate responsibility for the ban lay in more famous hands. Jean Borotra, the “Bounding Basque” who won five grand slam tennis titles in the 1920s, including two Wimbledon championships, became Pétain’s Commissioner for General Education and Sports in July 1940. He oversaw its sports policies until he fled Vichy in 1942. Interviewed in the 1990s, Borotra admitted his guilt about the ban. “Pascot couldn’t have done that without my authority,” he told English writer Mike Rylance. Although it revived after the war, French rugby league never recovered from the blows it received under Vichy. Its assets were never restored and until the 1980s it was forbidden to use the word “rugby” in its name. A 2002 French government report into sport under Vichy described the campaign against league as “merciless” in which rugby union officials “endeavoured to eliminate the rival code”. This article was first published in the September 2007 issue of BBC History Magazine
The history of rugby: when was the sport invented?
Did William Webb Ellis really invent the game of rugby at Rugby School? And when did the game split into rugby union and rugby league? As the 2019 Rugby World Cup kicks off, we revisit an article by Julian Humphrys that explores the origins and early history of the sport...
Did William Webb Ellis really invent the game at Rugby School? The evidence for this story – that a schoolboy invented rugby by picking up and running with the ball during a football match – is sketchy to say the least. At the start of the 19th century a number of public schools (including Rugby) were playing a version of football, all with slightly different rules, though it was normally permissible to catch the ball to kick it. In the 1820s, boys at Rugby began running with ball in hand, and this gradually became an integral part of their game. In 1863 the Football Association was formed to standardise the laws of the game. Running with the ball was outlawed but Rugby carried on with its own version of ‘rugby football’. Scotland v England: The world's first international rugby match How did the game spread? Mainly through the influence of former Rugby pupils who introduced it where they lived and worked. Soon ‘rugby clubs’ were being established throughout Britain and the colonies but, as with early football, there were considerable variations in the rules. How was rugby standardised? In 1871 a meeting was held at London’s Pall Mall Restaurant. The Wasps representative turned up at the wrong restaurant but 21 other rugby clubs were represented; the Rugby Football Union (RFU) was founded and three former Rugby pupils, all lawyers, deputed to write the laws of the game. However, it wasn’t all plain sailing. Disputes over the laws continued at an international level for some time. Rugby warriors: the players who won the Victoria Cross Why did the game split into Rugby Union and Rugby League? Money. When, in 1895, the RFU voted against the payment of players for ‘broken time’ (ie for lost earnings) while playing, 22 northern clubs broke away to form the Northern Union. Later renamed the Northern Rugby Football League, it would allow its players to be paid and introduced changes to the laws of the game. The Union authorities determinedly defended the concept of amateurism, imposing draconian penalties – including life bans – on any player who had anything to do with the professional game. It wasn’t until 1995, a century after the original split, that the International Rugby Board bowed to the inevitable and accepted that Union players could be paid. This article was first published in the October 2015 issue of BBC History Magazine
Rugby warriors: the rugby-playing heroes of the First and Second World War
No other sport can boast such an illustrious record in the service of its country during times of war. Gavin Mortimer profiles players from the past who were heroes not just on the pitch but on the battlefields of war too…
On the night of 10 December 1941, ten British soldiers crept towards the aerodrome at Tamet, a coastal town midway between the Libyan cities of Tripoli and Benghazi. The aerodrome was held by the Axis powers of Germany and Italy. The Britons were deep inside enemy territory yet supremely confident in the challenge confronting them. They belonged to the newly formed L Detachment of the Special Air Service Brigade and were led by a huge Irish officer called Blair Mayne. Once on the aerodrome the men moved quickly from aircraft to aircraft, silently placing bombs on the wings of the machines. With that done, Mayne walked up to the pilots’ mess and, in a subsequent letter home, he described what happened next: “I kicked open the door and stood there with my Colt 45, the others at my side with a Tommy gun and another automatic. The Germans stared at us. We were a peculiar and frightening sight, bearded and unkempt hair. For what seemed an age we just stood there looking at each other in complete silence. I said: ‘Good evening’. At that a young German arose and moved slowly backwards. I shot him… the room was by now in pandemonium.” Read more: The history of rugby Scotland v England: The world's first international rugby match (exclusive to The Library) The SAS soldiers left behind them several dead Italian and German airmen, as well as 24 enemy aircraft destroyed or badly damaged. This hit-and-run raid was the first of a type that would be repeated dozens of times in the coming months, many of them led by the fearsome ‘Paddy’ Mayne. At the war’s end, Mayne was one of the most famous warriors in the British army, feted as much for his bravery (he won the DSO – Distinguished Service Order – on four occasions) but also for the fact that he was a rugby player of some repute. From 1937 to 1939, the 6ft 4in (1.93m) tall Mayne had played for Ireland, winning plaudits for his athleticism and aggression, and earning himself a place on the British Isles rugby union tour to South Africa in the summer of 1938. Mayne’s success with that team (made up of players from the British Isles and later dubbed the Lions) echoed that of another Irishman 42 years earlier. Leading the charge Tom Crean had dazzled for the British Isles team when it rampaged through South Africa on the tour of 1896, winning 19 of its 21 matches. One local newspaper described the irrepressible young doctor as “standing head and shoulders above everyone”, and Crean for his part loved South Africa so much he decided to remain and open a medical practice in the Transvaal. Another Irish member of the tour party, Robert Johnston, also opted out of the trip home and went into business not far from Crean’s surgery. The pair continued playing together, turning out for a team in Johannesburg, and when Britain and South Africa went to war in 1899 the teammates enlisted together in the Imperial Light Horse in September that year. A month later Johnston won the Victoria Cross during the battle of Elandslaagte when, as the citation for the decoration stated, he “very gallantly rushed forward under this heavy fire and rallied the men,” leading them in a charge that broke the enemy resistance. Read more: 11 November 1918: The day the world turned upside down (exclusive to The Library) 10 things you didn’t know about London’s sporting history A little over two years later Crean won a Victoria Cross of his own during an engagement at Tygerkloof. Serving as the Light Horse’s medical officer, the Irishman tended the wounds of several men under heavy fire, continuing to do so even after being shot in the stomach. The courage of Crean and Johnston was celebrated back at the Wanderers club in Dublin, the side for whom the pair had played before emigrating to South Africa. Remarkably, the Wanderers were able to toast the gallantry of another former player during the course of the First World War when Fred Harvey made it a hat-trick of Victoria Crosses in 1917 ten years after making his debut for Ireland. Harvey’s feat of arms was repeated in 1918 by another rugby international, an English naval officer called Arthur Harrison who had been a member of the England side that won the Five Nations championship in 1914. Four years later Harrison was one of the men who volunteered for the daring raid on the German-occupied port of Zeebrugge, which was being used by the enemy as a submarine pen. The raid’s objective was to sail three outdated cruisers into the port and scuttle them, so trapping the submarines. It was audacious and largely successful (though the Germans soon cleared the ships) but came at a devastating cost: 200 men dead and 384 wounded. Among the dead was Harrison, gunned down as he led an assault against a German machine gun emplacement. A fellow naval officer, Alfred Carpenter, later described his comrade’s demise in what to modern eyes is frivolous prose: “Harrison’s charge down that narrow gangway of death was a worthy finale to the large number of charges which, as a forward of the first rank, he had led down many a rugby football ground.” Read more: A history of British sport (exclusive to The Library) 1921: the year when football banned women <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2018/06/Women-football-3-adfff56.jpg" width="800" height="800" alt="Members of Preston Ladies' Football Club (formerly Dick, Kerr’s Ladies) pose while carrying out leg exercises during practice, March 1937. (Photo by Fox Photos/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)" title="Members of Preston Ladies' Football Club (formerly Dick, Kerr’s Ladies) pose while carrying out leg exercises during practice, March 1937. (Photo by Fox Photos/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)" /> Courage off the pitch Though Harrison and the three Irishmen are the only international players to have won the Victoria Cross, scores of their peers were decorated for gallantry in the two world wars. There have been 72 DSOs awarded, 86 Military Crosses and 16 DFCs (Distinguished Flying Crosses), two of them awarded to Group Captain Ralph ‘Sammy’ Sampson, who played for Scotland before and after the Second World War, and in between displayed immense skill and courage as a Spitfire pilot. No other sport can boast such an illustrious record in the service of its country during times of war. Football and cricket have both produced a handful of wartime heroes but nothing to compare to the scores of rugby players who fought with such distinction. Though Sir Tasker Watkins never represented Wales on the international stage, he was a talented club player who later became president of the Welsh Rugby Football Union. He was also awarded a Victoria Cross in 1944 during the battle for Normandy. Not long before his death in 2007, Watkins explained in an interview with The Daily Telegraph how rugby had helped in his own act of outstanding bravery. “The team ethic was huge, which is one reason I believe there to be such a correlation between rugby players and good soldiering,” said Watkins, adding: “Leadership and patriotism are two virtues that translate wonderfully well from the rugby pitch to battle… [so] that top rugby players had an independence of thought and deed that marked them out as leaders.” Gavin Mortimer is the author of Fields of Glory (Andre Deutsch, 2001). His latest book, The SAS in World War Two: An Illustrated History, will be published by Osprey in November. This article was first published in the October 2011 issue of BBC History Magazine
10 things you didn’t know about London’s sporting history
From Tudor tennis courts to Georgian swimming pools, London's love affair with sporting venues dates back hundreds of years. But some aspects of the capital's rich sporting history might surprise you. Here Simon Inglis, the author of Played in London, reveals 10 lesser-known facts
Had it not been for the intervention of Queen Victoria’s husband, Albert, the Oval cricket ground in Kennington might well have disappeared only six years after it opened Albert intervened to stop housing being built on the site in 1851 because he had recently become a fan of the game. The name Oval, incidentally, predates cricket being played there. It was coined to reflect the layout of roads around an oval-shaped market garden. The name Oval would nevertheless become synonymous with cricket, so that there are currently around 40 other ‘Ovals’ around the world, including in New Zealand, South Africa and the Caribbean. London has the oldest bicycle shop in the world (Pearsons of Sutton, established as a blacksmiths in 1860), and the second oldest cycle track in the world, Herne Hill, opened in 1891. (The oldest track is in Erfurt, Germany, built in 1885) Herne Hill was one of eight purpose-built velodromes constructed in the capital during the first cycling boom of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The focal point for London cyclists was Holborn, where 22 showrooms were listed in 1901. The Pickwick Bicycle Club, formed in London in 1870, is the oldest cycling club in the world. London and England’s oldest golf club is Royal Blackheath Founded by Scottish exiles in the capital, the club celebrated its 400th anniversary in 2008, although the earliest confirmed records of the club’s existence date back only to 1766. As Blackheath was then, as now, a public expanse, golfers were obliged to wear red jackets in order to warn passers-by that a game was in progress. This custom is still followed by golfers on Wimbledon Common. There are now 108 golf courses in London, covering an astonishing 3 per cent of the total land mass of the capital – the equivalent in area almost of the entire Borough of Greenwich. London’s oldest surviving sports-related structure can be visited only by cabinet ministers and government officials Dating from c1534, it is the northern wall of a tennis court built at Whitehall Palace by Henry VIII, which now forms part of the Cabinet Office, backing onto Downing Street. It is said that Anne Boleyn was watching a game of tennis on this court when she was arrested on Henry’s orders in 1536, and that, having placed a bet on the outcome of the match, she begged to be allowed to see who won. Whitehall Palace was, at the time, the largest sporting complex in Europe, with four tennis courts, a cockpit, a tiltyard for jousting and a bowling alley. Pall Mall takes its name from the French game known as paille-maille (literally ball and mallet), a favourite of James I and VI The road was originally a pall mall alley, estimated at between 480 and 850 yards long. After the road we know today was laid out on the alley in 1661, Charles II had a replacement laid out in St James’s Park, covered in crushed cockle-shells. Only one set of pall mall mallets and a ball are known to have survived – they are now in the safe keeping of the British Museum. One writer has described pall mall (or “pell mell”, as Pepys called it) as “virile croquet”. The highest concentration of public and private swimming baths ever recorded in Britain was in Islington Between 1743 and 1939, no fewer than 14 baths operated. The longest lasting was the open-air Peerless Pool (1743–1868), commemorated today by both Peerless Street and Bath Street. A hundred yards from the site stands Ironmonger Row Baths, recently refurbished at a cost of £16.5m. Inside is the original towel chute and one slipper bath (a private bath in a cubicle). Ironmonger Row is the last baths in London to have a public laundry. There are two games thought to be played in London and nowhere else One is a form of Old English skittles, once popular in pubs across the South East, but now confined to a single alley at the Freemasons’ Arms in Downshire Hill, Hampstead. You can try it for yourself on Tuesday evenings from 8–11pm. The other is rugby netball. This was dreamt up by soldiers in 1907, and has been played on Clapham Common ever since. Games take place also on Tuesday evenings, but only during the summer. London’s oldest sports building still in use for its original purpose is the Real Tennis* court at Hampton Court Palace One of its walls dates back to 1625. Today the court is listed Grade I – the highest level of protection accorded by government. Only one other sports-related building is Grade I, and that is the Tiltyard Tower, also at Hampton Court. Now a restaurant and cafe, the brick tower was designed as a viewing platform for dignitaries attending jousting tournaments. It was at a joust that London’s first recorded sporting disaster occurred: a wooden tower on Cheapside collapsed in 1331, causing “grievous hurt” to those gathered on the ground below. *For the uninitiated, real tennis is a name adopted to distinguish the ancient game of tennis from its Victorian offshoot, lawn tennis. Between 1927 and 39, London boasted no fewer than 27 greyhound tracks At their peak in the 1930s and late 1940s, race nights at the likes of White City, Wembley, Wimbledon and West Ham drew crowds rivalling those of the major football clubs, offering facilities of a standard then unseen at most other sports venues. Not least, they encouraged women to attend! Today only three tracks survive, at Wimbledon (opened in 1928), Romford (1931) and Crayford (1986). Perhaps the most famous relic of the sport is the 1950s neon sign on the back of the Tote Board at Walthamstow. Although the track closed in 2008, both the sign and board have been listed Grade II, and will now form part of a housing development on the site. Sports historians have long believed that the first floodlit sports event in Britain, and therefore the world, was a football match at Bramall Lane in Sheffield in October 1878. However, my research suggests otherwise… …it has revealed that an earlier floodlit match took place in west London, and that instead of football, it was actually a polo match, between the Ranelagh Club and their neighbours at Hurlingham. Played on the evening of 18 July 1878, the match took place on the Ranelagh Club’s grounds, where Ranelagh Gardens now lie, immediately east of Putney Bridge station. Clearly an event only for the rich and well connected, entry was charged at 10 shillings a head (50p) – 10 times the cost of watching that year’s cup final. The Prince of Wales attended, and the experiment was reported to have been “highly successful and is likely to be repeated soon”. Simon Inglis is the author of Played in London: Charting the Heritage of a City at Play. This article was first published on History Extra in December 2014
History explorer: Britain’s coal industry
Dr Ben Curtis and Charlotte Hodgman visit the Big Pit National Coal Museum in Blaenafon, where miners risked their lives working in an industry that defined south Wales for decades
Sitting on the north-eastern edge of the south Wales coalfield – an area of about 1,000 square miles, stretching from Pontypool in Torfaen, to St Brides Bay in Pembrokeshire – the huge, red winding tower of Big Pit is an impressive and unmissable sight for visitors as they pull into the museum car park. Once the heart of mining operations at the site, its powerful engine still winds people up and down the 90-metre mineshaft, although these days the only passengers are visitors who have chosen to embark on a 50-minute guided tour of the former mine. The shrieks and groans of the winder – introduced in 1952 as a replacement for the steam-powered original – echo constantly across the site. Those wishing to take the underground tour are provided with a hard hat, safety lamp, waist belt with battery, and a rebreather that can filter toxic air for an hour – just in case! As the elevator cage comes to a shuddering halt in the gloom below, tour groups are led through the cramped, dark and often damp tunnels, where hundreds of men once worked in gruelling conditions, cutting coal by hand and transporting it to the surface. The underground stables for the pit ponies who pulled heavy trams of coal, and rarely saw daylight, are also poignant. Emerging into the fresh air, visitors are free to roam the site, which has retained many of its original structures, among them blacksmiths’ buildings from the 1870s; a lamp room, where miners collected and returned their equipment; and a fan house, which provided essential oxygen into the mine, and removed or diluted unwanted gases, dust and fumes. Elsewhere, a walk up to the former canteen (now a cafe), and then on to the viewpoint above, provides a stunning panorama of the site and the remnants of its industrial past. Small beginnings Standing on the site of an earlier mine (Kearsley Pit), which was sunk in 1860, Big Pit is an amalgamation of several other mines, and came into being in 1880 when the existing 30-metre shaft was deepened to 90 metres. “Coal mining had been present in Blaenavon since the late 18th century, but by the time Big Pit opened, the British coal mining industry was experiencing an unprecedented boom,” says Ben Curtis, lecturer in modern Welsh history at Cardiff University. “The pit is named for the width of its shaft, which measures 5.5 metres at its widest point, and was big enough to wind two trams of coal side by side – the first of its kind in the area.” And Big Pit continued to grow. By 1896, 528 men were employed at the site, producing gas, house and steam coal. By 1908, manpower at the pit had risen to 1,145. “The south Wales coalfield is basin-shaped, with coal seams dipping from the rim to the centre,” says Curtis. “Big Pit sits at the edge of this basin, where the coal is easier to reach, so its shaft is relatively shallow compared to more central sites like Deep Navigation Colliery near Merthyr Tydfil, which boasted a shaft of nearly 700 metres.” By the early 20th century, in terms of size of workforce, coal had become the single biggest industry in Britain. That workforce expanded from 109,000 in 1830 to 1,095,000 in 1913. “At this time, mining productivity in south Wales was something like 300 tonnes of coal per person, per year,” says Curtis. “That’s equivalent to one miner cutting around a tonne of coal every day, by hand. What’s more, colliers were paid according to how much they mined. The more you cut, the more money you were paid.” Killed in ones and twos Coal mining was one of the most dangerous industries in Britain throughout the period. “Most people tend to think of its dangers in terms of the terrible pit explosions,” says Curtis, who has been involved in a recent disability history project focusing on three British coalfields between 1780 and 1948. “However, these tragedies are not really representative of the whole spectrum of dangers. In fact, the total number of people killed in dramatic mining explosions is a tiny fraction of those killed in ones and twos by things like falling roofs.” A permanent disability was far more likely than loss of life. Some 16.5 per cent of British coal miners were injured every year between 1910 and 1914. And by 1914, a miner was killed every six hours, and severely injured every two hours, in the British coal industry. “One of the most common disabilities experienced by miners – and one that current and former mineworkers are still suffering, and dying, from – is pneumoconiosis, a lung disease caused by prolonged exposure to coal dust, which accumulates in the lungs”, says Curtis. “Eye-strain from poor light, inflammation of the joints from crawling and kneeling in cramped conditions were also common. But losing a limb wouldn’t necessarily put an end to a mining career – in the 19th and early 20th centuries, you could still potentially work underground, or transfer to a job on the colliery surface, such as sorting and sizing the coal.” Pit explosions, when they did occur, could be horrific and deadly. Britain’s worst mining disaster took place at Universal Colliery, Senghenydd in October 1913, when an explosion ripped through its underground workings. The disaster is believed to have been caused by a build-up of methane – known as firedamp – which had been ignited by an electric spark from a piece of mining equipment. Flammable gases were a common problem in coal mines; visitors to Big Pit are not permitted to take any electrical equipment into the mine for this very reason.) Some 439 miners and one rescuer were killed in the disaster, with rescue attempts continuing for three weeks after. Big Pit, too, had its share of accidents, including an underground fire in December 1908, which killed three people. And it wasn’t only men who faced daily dangers. In the early days of the industry, women, and children as young as eight could be found toiling in darkness for up to 14 hours a day. But in 1842, following a Royal Commission report on working conditions for women and children in the mines, an act of parliament prohibited all underground work for women, and boys under 10. Women still worked at the colliery surfaces – albeit in small numbers – until the early 20th century. Further mining legislation was passed in 1850, addressing safety with the introduction of coal mine inspectors, and raising the underground age limit for boys to 12. “As well as new legislation, the 19th century also saw new mining technology gradually introduced to collieries,” says Curtis. “Improvements to machinery resulted in deeper shafts, as the technology enabled mines to be ventilated more efficiently and coal to be wound up the shaft quicker.” But some of these developments, while improving productivity, introduced new dangers for miners. Electrical machinery in enclosed spaces could cause injury and dangerous sparks, while powerful coal-cutting machines introduced in the 1920s and 1930s increased the amount of coal dust being thrown up into the air. This in turn saw a surge in diseases like pneumoconiosis. Power of the unions Miners’ determination to improve their working conditions and wages led to a scattering of localised unions springing up across Britain’s mining communities. In 1888, the Miners’ Federation of Great Britain (MFGB) was established in Newport and 10 years later the South Wales Miners’ Federation (SWMF) was formed, following the defeat of a strike by south Wales miners over pay scales, which had led to a six-month lockout of workers. By 1914, there were over 234,000 miners in south Wales and the SWMF had become the largest affiliated union within the MFGB, the biggest union in Britain at that time. In 1899 it had joined the MFGB, followed by the Northumberland Miners’ Federation and the Durham Miners’ Federation in 1907 and 1908 respectively. But despite a united front, from 1914 the industry went into decline. “The First World War greatly disrupted the south Wales collieries, which had relied on exporting their coal,” says Curtis. “Add to this the fact that many miners volunteered to fight, as well as the growth of coal industries in other parts of the world such as Germany, Poland and the US – not to mention an increase in the use of oil – and it’s not hard to see why the coal industry was soon in crisis. “The 1920s and 1930s was a difficult period for the coal industry, characterised by a fall in output and prominent industry-wide strikes. In 1947, nationalisation of the coal industry seemed to many miners to offer the prospect of a brighter future. But by the 1960s, pits began to be measured by their productivity and smaller sites closed in favour of larger, more productive ‘superpits’. Workers started leaving the mines, concerned for the future of the industry.” Decline and fall Although the coal industry still employed around 700,000 mineworkers in Britain during the 1940s and 1950s – and even as late as the early to mid-1980s boasted a workforce of around 200,000 – the decline seemed irreversible. In 1981, mining strikes looked likely after Margaret Thatcher’s conservative government proposed further pit closures. Thatcher backed down, but in 1984, the issue reared its head once more after it was announced that 20 pits were to close, with a loss of some 20,000 jobs. At its height, the strike involved 142,000 miners but, after a year-long stoppage, in March 1985 the National Union of Mineworkers was forced to bring the strike to an end. Pits closed rapidly over the following years and in 1994 the industry was privatised. “Almost everything we think of as defining south Wales today has been shaped by the legacy of coal and the mining communities of south Wales – from the prominent position of Cardiff, Barry, Swansea and Newport as former coal exporting ports, to the historically strong support for the Labour party, to the popularity of rugby, and the traditional association with male voice choirs,” says Curtis. “It’s no exaggeration to say modern south Wales was built on coal – geologically and historically.” British coalmining: five more places to explore National Mining Museum Scotland, Newtongrange, Midlothian Where mining history is on show This four-acre site – located at the former Lady Victoria Colliery – captures the developments in mining over generations. Highlights include the most powerful steam winding engine in Scotland and an extensive collection of mining-related artefacts and equipment. nationalminingmuseum.com Woodhorn Museum, Ashington, Northumberland Where you can view miners’ art Woodhorn is sited in original colliery buildings, along with a new building, inspired by the huge coal-cutting machines once used underground. Displays paint a picture of life in this former mining community, which is also home to the Ashington Group Collection – a series of paintings by artists known as the ‘Pitmen Painters’. experiencewoodhorn.com Welsh National Mining Memorial, Senghenydd, Caerphilly Where victims are remembered This monument and memorial garden commemorates the explosion at Universal Colliery in Senghenydd in 1913 in which 439 miners died, as well as other Welsh mining disasters. About 17 miles away, in Six Bells, Blaenau Gwent, stands the Guardian, a massive statue that memorialises victims of the Six Bells disaster of 1960, the worst in post-1945 Welsh history. visitcaerphilly.com Beamish Museum, Beamish, County Durham Where mining life is recreated This open-air ‘living history’ museum aims to give insight into life in the north-east of England in the 1820s, 1900s and 1940s. The 300-acre site boasts a former drift mine, mining village and a re-creation of an early 20th-century town. beamish.org.uk National Coal Mining Museum for England, West Yorkshire Where visitors can go underground Based at the site of the former Caphouse Colliery at Overton, the museum offers guided underground tours where visitors can experience the conditions miners worked in and see the tools and machines they once used. ncm.org.uk Historical advisor: Ben Curtis. Ben’s latest book is The South Wales Miners, 1964-1985 (University of Wales Press, 2013); Words: Charlotte Hodgman. This article was first published in the December 2015 issue of BBC History Magazine
When I met Mandela: 1995 Rugby World Cup final
In June 1995, Ed Morrison was chosen to referee the third Rugby World Cup final. Yet, little did he know, as he stepped out onto Ellis Park stadium in Johannesburg just before the game, that he was about to witness one of the most iconic moments in rugby history – Nelson Mandela’s appearance on the pitch to offer the South African team his support.
Ed shares his memories of that famous day with us Q: Can you run us through what happened that day? A: Well I had become interested in what was happening in the case of Mandela – I read books on his life, and became fascinated by him. But what I had never done was link rugby and Mandela. What became apparent quite quickly was how clever and wise he was in the way he brought white and black together in a rainbow nation. When Mandela came down the incline and onto the field wearing his cap and rugby shirt that day, I realised “this is something a bit different”. It was almost fantasy really. What struck me was how small [Mandela] was. But you could not help but feel completely overwhelmed by his stature. His presence was quite extraordinary. You look back on it and you just think “that was fate”. Q: How did you feel? Were you nervous about how the crowd would react? A: Any major sporting occasion is tense. You would not be human if you did not have some ‘fear factor’. But I remember thinking “I cannot worry too much about Mandela being here, or I will fail.” I had to be a little bit selfish. The crowd went bonkers. I was gobsmacked – he just smiled knowingly. I remember he had piercing brown eyes. He just looked at me and smiled. Q: When did you realise you had witnessed a huge moment in history? A: I’m not sure, but I feel incredibly privileged to have been there. I realised at the time I was in the presence of someone very different – he was unlike anyone I had ever met in my lifetime. He thanked everyone – it struck me how frail he was, even at that time. And you would expect a guest at a sporting event to be formally dressed, but there he was in his rugby shirt and cap, just like everyone else. Q: What do you think will be Mandela’s legacy? A: There are still massive issues in South Africa, as there are in other countries, but he had a huge influence. When I left the stadium I saw white faces and black faces celebrating their victory. If you had said to me when I was first refereeing in South Africa that I would one day see that, I would have thought you were on another planet. He was an extraordinary guy – a one-off. I just hope South Africa can carry on moving forward. Mandela has given the country a huge opportunity. Ed Morrison was a referee at international level for 12 years, and adjudicated five matches in South Africa between 1991 and 1999.
On 6 May 1954, Roger Bannister broke the world mile record and the four-minute barrier at the Iffley Road Track in Oxford, completing the distance in 3 mins 59.4 seconds – a huge achievement for British sport. Here, Professor Tony Collins discusses ten locations linked to the development of sport in Britain over the past 200 years – from Much Wenlock to Stamford Bridge
This article was first published in the February 2012 issue of BBC History Magazine The British, it’s often said, have a particular genius for inventing sports and games. Considering how many of these sports and games turn out to have evolved elsewhere in the world too, this may or may not be true. However, we can be certain about one thing: the British invented modern sports in all their money-drenched and over-hyped glory. To put that another way, you can trace a direct line from Britons setting down recognised rules for horse racing, boxing and cricket through to football’s World Cup, the Indian Premier League and the modern Olympic Games. “Although most countries have variations of folk tradition sports, which can range from hitting a ball with a bat through to mob forms of football through to maypole dancing – traditions that are very rooted in rural, agricultural lifestyles – Britain was the first place to develop what we would see today as codified, organised and commercialised sports,” says Tony Collins of De Montfort University in Leicester. It’s a story that begins in earnest in the 18th century. “The reason why Britain developed these sports was it was the first nation to become an industrial, capitalist economy where people had disposable income,” comments Collins. “There was the wealth to generate both an interest in sports and also markets for sports.” From the off then, money was central to sport’s growth. It’s no coincidence that this was also an era when, especially in a south-east growing prosperous as the centre of empire, the theatre grew in popularity and newspapers began to flourish. Beginning with the aristocracy, Britons were discovering the joys of leisure time. This meant games played for high stakes and gambling. Cricket matches with prize money of 1,000 guineas weren’t unheard of. Predating today’s ‘in-game’ wagers, on-site bookies would even offer odds on individual batsman’s scores. If this doesn’t tally with the familiar idea of stolid chaps playing up, playing up and playing the game, that’s because the idea of the noble amateur dates from the 19th century. This was a reinvention of sport linked to the growth of muscular Christianity and expressed in Thomas Hughes’s Tom Brown’s Schooldays (1857), a novel set in Rugby School that pushed “the moral and the educative lessons that sport could teach”. However, the idea of the amateur was always problematical. Cricketer WG Grace is reputed sometimes to have refused to walk when given out, perhaps in part because he was conscious that his generous ‘expenses’ made him better paid as an amateur than professional cricketers and that his role was to draw a crowd. As for why Grace hypocritically preferred expenses to a match fee, it’s because amateurs were gentlemen but professionals were lower class. The 19th century was also an era when mass spectator sport began to take off. The 1895 split between rugby union and rugby league, for example, wasn’t, as it’s often portrayed, just about clubs such as Widnes and Warrington wanting to pay their players. It also came about because northern clubs wanted rule changes to make rugby more attractive to Saturday spectators who were increasingly deserting for association football – the Football League, at first made up of teams based in the north of England and the Midlands, was founded in 1888. Fast forward to today and what Tony Collins calls the “arc of the amateur era” has most definitely ended. You could even argue that popular spectator sports, unashamedly professional and rich with the munificent sums paid by television, have returned to their 18th‑century roots. As for a figure such as Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich, it doesn’t seem wholly unreasonable to see him as a spiritual successor to louche aristocrats looking for amusement. And yet sport is never just about rich individuals. In Britain, as sport has become a national obsession, it’s also become tied up with national well-being and identity. Hungary’s 6-3 rout of England at Wembley in 1953 had as much of an impact on the national sporting psyche as the 1956 Suez Crisis did on British politics. “It was a tremendous shock to the system because it seemed to place a question mark over British superiority,” says Collins. “It’s not an accident that a lot of those kinds of doubts came to the fore in the 1950s when there’s lots of soul-searching and discussion about the role of Britain as its empire starts to disintegrate.” The dance between sport and the state of the nation continues. Leaving aside for a moment the problem of conflating English and British sport, what price a future historian contrasting England’s victory at the 2003 Rugby World Cup, when Clive Woodward’s strategy-fixated coaching methods seemed rooted in the management thinking of a then buoyant City of London, with the team’s dismal, undisciplined performance at the post-crash 2011 World Cup. Ten sites related to the development of British sport The Kirkwall Ba’ Orkney Islands Where rival ‘factions’ go head-to-head Football may be ‘the beautiful game’ but its deepest roots are plum ugly, mass contests where entire communities wrestled with an animal’s bladder trying to score a ‘goal’. The Kirkwall mass football game, which takes place twice a year, on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day, pits ‘Uppies’ against ‘Doonies’ – those born south of the local St Magnus Cathedral against those born to its north. It’s a primal spectacle and also a glimpse back to an agrarian society where people made their own entertainment on holidays – south of the border mass football often took place on Shrove Tuesday, Whitsuntide or May Day. The ba’ itself is a handmade, cork-filled leather ball, weighing about three pounds with a circumference of around 28 inches. While these football games typically had few if any rules, their reputation for violence may be overstated. Unlike modern sports, where injuries are often a by-product of the athletes’ great speed, traditional football is a slow-moving, attritional maul. You’re in far more danger of getting crushed than anything else. Typically there are local conventions to ensure that those who don’t want to be at the centre of the action can get away. The two annual ba’s begin on Kirkwall’s Broad Street, near St Magnus Cathedral, with the Men’s Ba’ starting at 1pm. Spectators are welcome, but be warned, the Men’s Ba’ can last up to eight hours! Subscription Rooms, Newmarket, Suffolk Where 19th-century gentlemen had a flutter on horse races Newmarket’s Subscription Rooms were where 19th-century betting men met after a day’s racing and is now home to the National Horseracing Museum, which traces the history of the ‘Sport of Kings’. Back then the splendid building was the venue for gambling men such as George Payne, Sir Joseph Hawley and the Marquess of Hastings to wager their bets, while outside large crowds would gather to find out from emerging members which horses were being backed. In the case of British racing, the most important king is arguably Charles II, who didn’t just reopen the theatres after the Restoration but was also keenly interested in the horses. Charles regularly moved his court to Newmarket, a town he adored, to enjoy the racing. As well as inaugurating the Town Plate, still run today, he founded the Palace House Stables and even raced as a jockey himself on occasion. Newmarket has been a home for British flat racing ever since and thus occupies a uniquely important role in the commercialisation of British sport. The first professional horse trainers were based in the town as early as the late 17th century, an era when other sports were hardly organised at all. Tellingly, the Jockey Club was founded as early as 1750, while the St Leger, the oldest-established of the English ‘classics’, was first run in 1776. The Rooms closed in 1981 after a decline in their use, but the building opened as a museum in 1983. Hambledon, Hampshire Where the ‘gentleman’s game’ came of age While the exact birthplace of cricket is unclear, few dispute that its cradle lies in Hampshire. In the late 18th century, Hambledon was home to the best team in the land, a village side so good that it famously walloped a strong All-England XI by a full innings in June 1777. Captain of the side in its glory years was local publican Richard Nyren. His son John would later immortalise his father and other members of the Hambledon team in The Cricketers of My Time (1833). It’s said that crowds of 4,000 and 5,000 would regularly turn out to watch the side, whose members were often poached by aristocratic teams based in London. The club was also important in developing the game, even pioneering the idea of a third stump in the wicket. Hambledon played at Broadhalfpenny Down, making this particular green space arguably the site of the first major cricket ground in England. Have a pint in the Bat and Ball Inn and you’ll be supping in a place that was once, in the words of David Gower, “the centre of the cricketing universe”. The Tom Cribb pub, Piccadilly Circus, London Where a prize fighter turned landlord is celebrated The idea of the athlete whose fame somehow transcends his own sport doesn’t begin with David Beckham. Or even Muhammad Ali. In December 1810, bare-knuckle pugilist Tom Cribb took on American former slave Tom Molineaux at Shenington Hollow in Oxfordshire. After a brutal and bloody fight that lasted more than 30 rounds, Cribb was declared the winner and became world champion. In 1811, Cribb broke Molineaux’s jaw at a rematch that drew at least 15,000 spectators, including many representatives of the great and good. Following Cribb’s win, his celebrity was such that he was mobbed wherever he went. A former coal porter had become a star, known personally to Byron and the Prince Regent. He was even a page at George IV’s coronation. Cribb later became the landlord of the Union Arms, a few doors from the boxing memorabilia-decorated pub that now bears his name on Panton Street. He is buried in St Mary Magdalene churchyard, Woolwich. “Even today any boxing fan with an awareness of the history of the sport would know Cribb’s name,” says Tony Collins. “For someone’s reputation in a sport to last more than 200 years is testimony to the impact he had on the national psyche.” Much Wenlock, Shropshire Where a Victorian local sports day took place Organised by surgeon and magistrate Dr William Penny Brookes, the Wenlock Olympian Society Annual Games first took place in October 1850. This was a very Victorian local sports day in that it came complete with a strong social agenda: “The promotion of the moral, physical and intellectual improvement of the inhabitants of the town and neighbourhood of Wenlock and especially of the working classes.” The games, which emphasised cultural pursuits such as poetry as well as hearty physical activity, were a big influence on Baron Pierre de Coubertin, credited with being the father of the modern Olympics, which were revived in Athens in 1896. In 1890, de Coubertin visited Wenlock and met with Brookes at the still-trading Raven Hotel, where you can still see memorabilia relating to the two men. He later gave a glowing account of his visit and referred to Brookes as “my oldest friend”. Unlikely as it may initially seem, there’s thus a direct link between muscular Christianity on the English-Welsh border and the ballyhoo surrounding London 2012. The Wenlock games themselves continue to this day. Should you visit between 8 and 15 July 2012, there’s the chance to view locals competing in pursuits ranging from volleyball to fencing and athletics to clay pigeon shooting. Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum, Wimbledon, London Where top British tennis players are remembered While the Victorians favoured vigorous exercise for boys and young men, their prudery meant there were few opportunities for women to participate in sport in the 19th century. In this context, what Tony Collins calls “more suburban, middle-class sports” such as tennis and golf were important because they offered women the chance to get involved. In 1884, the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club held its first ladies’ singles championship, won by a local vicar’s daughter, Maud Watson. However, the first true female sports star of the modern era was Lottie Dod, who won the first of her five titles in 1887, when she was just 15 years old. A versatile sportswoman, Dod also represented England at hockey, excelled in golf and winter sports, and won a silver medal in archery at the 1908 Olympics. Wimbledon’s museum, where you can see championship trophies and a collection of tennis memorabilia that dates back to the 16th century, pays due respect to Dod’s achievements. The All England Club also offers guided tours and holds an annual public ticket ballot for those who want to attend the championships. National Cycle Collection, Llandrindod Wells, Powys Where you can view 250 vintage bicycles If you want to see where the history of cycling happened, look down your local street. In the late 19th century, bicycles came financially within the reach of ordinary working people. A cycling craze began, which encompassed those whose forebears might never have left their home parish. “We forget nowadays, but it must have been an amazing invention because it was a cheap form of transport for the working classes,” says Tony Collins. “It also allowed women to travel alone for the first time, which obviously caused a great kerfuffle among the more morally minded Victorian middle classes.” One of those caught up in the craze was Tom Norton, a canny entrepreneur who set up a bike shop in Llandrindod Wells, then booming because of tourism. Later, the generally transport-mad Norton (who was friends with Herbert Austin, founder of the Austin Motor Company, and met Henry Ford in America) ran a car dealership at the art nouveau Automobile Palace, a building he commissioned, that now houses the National Cycle Collection. Norton’s first love remained cycling, though, and his internationally important collection of vintage bikes can now be viewed at his former premises in Llandrindod Wells. Croke Park, Dublin, Ireland Where 14 Gaelic football spectators were murdered Croke park, the home of the Gaelic Athletic Association, first hosted Irish sports such as Gaelic football and hurling in 1884. However, it’s a venue associated with the dark side of colonialism. On 21 November 1920, during the Irish War of Independence, members of the Royal Irish Constabulary opened fire on the crowd gathered to watch a Gaelic football match at the stadium, in retaliation for an IRA operation. Fourteen people died in the incident after 114 rounds of rifle ammunition were discharged. It’s all a reminder, if any were needed, of the close link between sport and nationalism. On a far less extreme level, Scottish and Welsh sports teams have often been the focus of dissent. The successful Scottish national rugby team of the late 1980s/early 1990s, for example, came in some sense to embody Scottish resentment against the Thatcher government’s imposition of poll tax north of the border, a year before it was introduced in England and Wales. Stamford Bridge, London Where a black sports pioneer first found fame The home of Chelsea FC hasn’t always been a football venue. From 1877–1904, it was used almost exclusively for athletics and it was here, in 1886, that Arthur Wharton equalled the then world record of 10 seconds for the 100-yard sprint. However, it’s not for his track-and-field prowess that Wharton (1865–1930) is primarily remembered. He was also a goalkeeper, who played for Preston North End (a key member of the 1886–87 side that reached the FA Cup semi-final), Rotherham Town and Sheffield United, and is believed to have been the world’s first black professional footballer. Although he was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in 2003, Wharton was a forgotten figure for many years and died penniless. “He has come to be a symbol of the important role that black players have played in the game, and he’s important to remember because he emphasises the role that black and other non-white players have always played in football, but also in British sport in general,” says Tony Collins. In 1997, the charity Football Unites, Racism Divides arranged for his final resting spot, at Edlington Cemetery in South Yorkshire, to be marked with a headstone. George Hotel, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire Where the roots of the Rugby Football League lie In 1895, choosing the venue because it was near equidistant between the west coast at Lancashire and the east coast at Yorkshire, the representatives of 21 northern rugby clubs met at the George Hotel in Huddersfield. Fearing they were about to be expelled from the game’s governing organisation, the Rugby Football Union (RFU), the clubs formed the Northern Rugby Football Union, later renamed the Rugby Football League. The split of league and union was a dispute that had its roots in class. The northern clubs wanted to be able to pay players six shillings in expenses to cover time off work from the factory. However, the RFU insisted the game should remain wholly amateur, and professionalism wasn’t officially allowed in union until 1995 – although stories of boots stuffed with notes down the years rather suggest that WG Grace’s double standards could be found in rugby too. It’s also important to remember that northern clubs were worried about losing spectators to association football and wanted rule changes to make the game more attractive to spectators. The George is now the site of the Rugby League Heritage Centre, a collection of rare memorabilia related to the game. Tony Collins is professor of history at the International Centre for Sports History and Culture at De Montfort University, Leicester You can watch archive footage of Roger Bannister breaking the 4 minute mile at http://youtu.be/wTXoTnp_5sI