County Durham brothers & rugby players who made the ultimate sacrifice

In reports of the first recorded fixture in the 150 year history of Durham City Rugby Football Club, John Adamson is the only named player because he did just that – in his determination to beat the university, he broke his leg.

His two rugby-playing sons also played at the club’s Hollow Drift ground beside the Wear but they really did give their all – they were both killed fighting for their country in the First World War.

On Remembrance Sunday, their stories were remembered at the club which, after the Second World War, raised £1,500 to build a Memorial grandstand dedicated to 32 former players who had given their lives in the great conflicts.

Members of the junior teams of Durham City Rugby Football Club holding a tribute to each of the 32 players who lost their lives in the world wars

The rugby club was formed in 1872, only a year after the Rugby Football Union was created to standardise the rules of the “rugby-type game”. It is the second oldest club in the county, after Darlington which was formed in 1863, although as Durham School had played the game since 1850, the city was an early adopter of William Webb Ellis’ method of playing football.

Its first recorded game was on February 20, 1873, when John Adamson broke his leg.

John was the son of a Barnard Castle farmer, although he had been born in Wisconsin in the US. His parents had tired of tilling the Teesdale soils and had tried their hands at a small town called Little Grant for a couple of years before returning.

John, a corn merchant, married Annie Young in the year of the club’s formation. They lived at Neville’s Cross, and they had two sons who followed in John’s rugby boots…

Robert Adamson (above)
(1873-1915)

Robert played rugby for Durham School, the city and the county. He was 41, married with three children and working in a bank when the First World War broke out.

He joined the 7th Durham Light Infantry and on April 17, 1915, arrived on the Western Front. A Second Lieutenant, he lasted just six weeks, dying on May 26, at the Battle of Bellewaarde, near Ypres. It was an engagement in which the Germans used the mass release of gas for the first time.

His body was never recovered and his name is recorded on the Menin Gate.

Charles Adamson (above)
(1875-1918)

Charlie also played for school, city and county, but went further and represented the North of England. From there, he was invited to play for the Barbarians and then he was selected for the 1899 British Lions tour of Australia.

He was the stand-out player of the tour. He played in all 20 matches, scoring 136 points with eight tries, 35 conversions, three drop goals and eight penalties; in the four tests, he was the top scorer with 17 points, which included two tries, as the Lions came back from losing the first test to win the series 3-1.

Charlie Adamson takes a kick during the second test at Brisbane on July 22, 1899, for the British Lions

He stayed in Australia after the tour to play cricket in Queensland – he had played for Durham in their first Minor Counties match in 1895.

He then joined the Queensland Volunteers and fought in the 2nd Boer War in South Africa but was back in Durham by 1905 when he played against the New Zealand team on their famous first tour of Britain.

When the New Zealanders first arrived on these shores, they were known by the nickname of “the Originals”, but such was their free-running, free-scoring style that a reporter described them as playing as if they were “all backs”. Because their shirts were very black, a sub-editor apparently altered the reporter’s copy so they became “all blacks”, and a new nickname was born.

Some sources suggest that this error happened on the first leg of their tour in the south-west; other sources say it happened after the opening match of the northern leg when they thrashed Hartlepool Clubs 63-0.

The All Blacks’ second match in the North East was against Durham County at Hollow Drift. On a cold, wet day, Durham began with 13 players as two of their team were stranded at Ferryhill station. Still, set up by Charlie, Phil Clarkson of Sunderland scored a try (worth three points in those days) which was the first time the All Blacks had conceded in Britain.

The final score was 16-3 to the visitors, but Durham were said to have put up a very good show.

The Northern Echo said: "One may almost look upon the achievement as a victory for the north countrymen. We have heard a lot during the past few weeks about the New Zealand methods. Rumours have reached us from the south of deadly tactics, so invincible and incomprehensible as almost to savour of the occult.

"The result has been to turn the English rugby footballer, once such an optimist, into a fatalist, who thinks it was arranged before he was born that he should lose dozens of points before the rushes of the New Zealanders. But Saturday’s game should do much to dispense this delusion.

"It is possible that the check the colonials received on Saturday may be the turning point in the career of the New Zealand XV."

It wasn’t. In 40 matches, the newly named All Blacks scored 976 points and conceded just 59 as their devilish tactics created a new style of play.

That year, Charlie, a stockbroker, married Katherine Lodge, from Aycliffe, whose brother was an England international footballer. They had two sons, who both excelled at rugby with Durham City.

When the First World War broke out, Charlie was 39 with two boys under 10. He joined the Northumberland Fusiliers, rose to become a captain, and survived until less than two months from the end of the war. On September 17, 1918, he was killed in Macedonia in an attack on an enemy trench, and he is buried in Karasouli Military Cemetery in Greece.

The Adamson brothers are among the 32 former players who were commemorated in the Memorial stand. Although that stand has since been replaced, their names live on…

Richard Wilkinson, the chairman of Durham City Rugby Football Club, with Pam England, the great niece of the Adamson brothers, and club president Caroline McHale

“The memorial plaque was moved to the new clubhouse in 1992 where it sits by the front door,” said club president Caroline McHale at a remembrance event on Sunday attended by the junior teams. “How many times have we all hurried past it, without barely a glance as it stands there in quiet testament to our former boys in blue and gold?

“It’s easy to forget that it is not just a list of names from days gone by: behind those iron letters lies a young man, a living human being who studied at school, worked hard for a living, had fun with their friends. Loved and was loved by their family. Each and everyone of them has a story to tell, but in this our 150th anniversary this season we wanted to share the story of one of our founding families and what the memorial means for them.”

Members of the junior teams of Durham City Rugby Football Club holding a tribute to each of the 32 players who lost their lives in the world wars