The two world wars played havoc with everything and everybody. The first one changed society forever, sweeping away a large section of a generation of eager young men who thought it would be all over in a few months. It lasted four grim years, and millions of people worldwide lost their lives, homes and livelihoods. Many of the volunteers were rugby players who saw it as their duty to continue the traditions of empire and even regarded the challenge as a massive game for which they had been preparing for years. The most shocking statistic I came across was a report of the 1914 Merchant Taylors Old Boys side from Liverpool. Thirteen of their first XV had been killed, and two had been permanently disabled. It was meant to be the war that would end all wars but only 21 years later it all started again.

By then, our club had become firmly established. Even if it didn’t have a permanent home it had plenty of rugby, and the results showed promise. Public opinion with regard to WW2 in 1938/39 was very different. Appeasement had been the preference. We were unprepared and pre-occupied with recovering from the privations of the previous conflict as well as the great depression of the early thirties. Conscription to join up and fight replaced the enthusiasm for battle. And their parents knew only too well that the consequences would be another tragedy when reality replaced negotiation.

One of my first memories was being wakened by the air raid siren and carried under the starlit sky to the makeshift shelter at the bottom of the garden. I listened in my bunk bed to the explosions as the bombs began to fall on the Newcastle ship yards about 10 miles away. I had a couple of uncles who were closely involved in the war, one of whom was my hero. Uncle Bill lived in Australia and had decided to come back to join the RAF. He was deployed in the newly formed Fleet Air Arm, defending our ships on their arctic convoys to Murmansk to supply our Russian allies. He spent his leaves with us. We played endless games of football on the lawn, he told me about some of his adventures and rattled the windows of our small bungalow with his snoring every night. Like many of the survivors, he avoided talking about the horrific sights he witnessed, the incredible bravery of his colleagues and the gut-wrenching fear they faced every day.

So how did this war affect our rugby club and the young men who were caught up in the conflict? They have virtually all gone now, but the memories live on. Little wonder that our fears for the future are fuelled by the endless headlines not far from our shores.
It was hardly surprising that rugby soon closed down for the duration but Chester RUFC was back in business in 1946, with many of the players having served their country with distinction.

The immediate post war years must have been a testing time to re-establish the rugby team. Most things were still rationed, a new Labour Government were in power with ‘nationalisation’ and the creation of the ‘Welfare State’ to try and help the country back on its feet. Many of the returning servicemen couldn’t find work and soon began to wish they were back in the forces with their mates rather than having to get to know their families again after six years of privation.

The 1946/47 team photograph nevertheless confirms that Chester Rugby Club were back in business. No Colonel Bromley to lead the way, in fact with one exception the 17 people looking good naturedly at the camera were all in playing strip. Top left was Maurice Ellis who had never played the game but wrote a weekly report about the club and its activities for the Chester Observer under the pseudonym of ‘Touch Judge’. His contributions were somewhat extravagant in detail and even in result, but his prose never failed to paint an attractive picture of young men having a good time. Just the publicity needed to attract new members.

Maurice’s comments about the players in the photograph, record the contributions some of these former servicemen gave so that generations after them can remember the legacy they left and from which we continue to benefit. We must never forget. According to Maurice, EK Roberts had been in the eighth army and served in the Royal Tank Regiment in the Western Desert and was now a solicitor in the City. EK (Dusty) Millar had learned his rugby at Hawarden Grammar School and had been a captain in the King’s Regiment. He had been wounded in the Normandy landings. Captain AG Roberts played for the Welsh Regiment and Western Command. He spent most of his war in Burma. J Meredith was a major in the Royal Artillery. He was wounded twice and won the Military Cross. Finally, Jack Barber, a New Zealander and future club captain, renowned for training in his bare feet, came over in 1938 to join the RAF, where he became a ‘Battle of Britain’ fighter pilot. An unverified tale has it that he flew a spitfire under the Suspension Bridge on the River Dee.

Most of these men were now respectfully in the professions, especially the law. They still espoused the notion of being ‘Officers and Gentlemen’. Notable in the photograph were Dick Salmon and Jack Blake both employed as young solicitors with Walker, Smith and Way. Their rugby club involvement became a city legend as their office in Nicholas Street became known as ‘Rugby House’ with large numbers of articled clerks taken on if they could produce a suitable rugby CV.

John Craven