Remembering 'The Soldier Team'

On Remembrance Weekend, club historian Tim Carder takes a look back at the state of play at the Goldstone Ground in the run-up to Christmas 1914.

Tim Carder

2024-11-11T09:00+00:00

Albion's players in uniform.

A hundred and ten years ago, in December 1914, Britain had been at war for four months. Already 22,000 men had died on the Western Front – among them Freddie Bates, groundsman at the Goldstone Ground.

Yet football continued. Attendances had plummeted, but Albion were doing rather well in the Southern League.

Two players had been called up. Clem Matthews was a territorial with the Royal Sussex Regiment, posted to Newhaven for training and guarding the port, a vital link in the British war machine.

The other was Tom Higham. Always known as ‘Gunner’, he was a former soldier who, as a reservist, had been called to the ranks of the Royal Field Artillery. His absence hit the club hard as his work-rate and tackling were keenly missed.

Higham had been in France with the British Expeditionary Force since August. His brigade had seen action at Mons, on the Marne and Aisne rivers, and around Ypres.

Gunner’s letters from the Front were printed in local newspapers to inform supporters of his progress. In December 1914, Albion manager John Robson received one of his dispatches, which revealed a soldier’s longing for home.

“I am getting plenty of correspondence, letters from everyone, and I like to drop a line to all who write to me when I get the chance,” wrote Gunner. “If you don’t mind wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year for me I should be glad, but I wish I was there to do it myself.”

He went on to express gratitude for a gift that would be unthinkable today. “You must also thank the directors for being so kind as to send ‘smokes’. This is what I am doing: I give every man a packet each so they can enjoy a smoke as well as me, and we get on just like brothers.”

Although Gunner’s brigade was serving in Flanders at Christmas 1914, it doesn’t appear to have been involved in the famous Truce.

Back home, professional football was under pressure from those who thought that fit, athletic young men should be on the battlefield rather than the football field – and that those who paid to watch them were contributing towards a German victory.

Gunner Higham presented a different viewpoint: that the game was boosting the morale of the troops on the frontline. “I see in the papers that they are trying to stop football. I think they are doing a very foolish thing,” he wrote.

Tom Higham.

“It does not matter who I come across, they are talking about it. If football is stopped, what about horse-racing, foot-running, boxing etc? They have forgotten all this.”

Albion, to their credit, recognised their responsibilities. The players were receiving military drilling from inside-forward Charlie Webb, a former private in the Essex Regiment. Recruitment drives were staged at matches to boost the call to arms, while the club welcomed wounded troops to games as part of their recuperation.

But the pressure for the players themselves to fight would not diminish. The matter came to a head in December when the War Office and The FA agreed to raise a ‘Footballers’ Battalion’.

Around 400 professionals met at Fulham Town Hall on 15 December 1914. Recruits were to receive pay in addition to their club wages – already reduced because of low gates – plus a separation allowance for families. For the remainder of the 1914/15 season, they would be released to play for their clubs at weekends.

Albion’s Archie Needham was one of the first to step forward. He was followed by team-mates Ralph Routledge, Frank Spencer and Jack Woodhouse.

The four recruits returned to Hove and, no doubt, encouraged others to join up. By Christmas Eve, Ginger Batey, George Beech, Billy Booth, Charlie Dexter, Bullet Jones, Billy Reed, Alfie Tyler and George Wilcock had also enlisted.

Goalkeeper Bob 'Pom Pom' Whiting retired in December 1914, but joined his former team-mates in the Footballers' Battalion on New Year's Eve. He then made a playing comeback the following February and remained the club's no.1 until professional football shut down that May.

Such was the response of the Albion men that they were dubbed ‘The Soldier Team’. Sadly, Batey, Dexter and Whiting would make the ultimate sacrifice, along with many ardent supporters of the football club.