The Remarkable Mr Nicholson

The façade of the Harpur Trust Elementary School today (above) and (below) as it looked in MDN’s time. The old Bedford Modern School buildings are to the right, furthest away from the camera

The 1892 Bedfordshire Times Directory (below) shows a list of staff and says there were “about 900” boys.  With 16 teachers this gives about 56 per class! Note MDN lodging in Wellington Street. H W Oclee and E G Capon were his team mates in the Bedford Town side.

The school was already well established in the town. In his report for the 1890/1 school year HM Inspector of Schools wrote: “Under Mr Bates’s able management this school continues to maintain the high reputation it has deservedly acquired. All the subjects are well taught while geography, arithmetic, Euclid and Algebra are conspicuously good”.  A similar report dated December 1891 referred to the “high reputation of this school for thoroughness, accuracy and intelligence of work” and said that the “discipline and tone of the boys are decidedly good”[12].  However, in 1892 the Inspector referred to “many changes in the staff which had rendered the work more than usually arduous”,  and a year later said that “some of the written work is not so uniformly good as it would be if the staff were more adequate for the needs of so large and important a school”.  

MDN’s work cannot have been easy, even though, as we shall see, it was enlivened by his burgeoning football career which may well have enhanced his popularity with the boys. In November 1892 Bates recorded that MDN and a colleague were away taking a Civil Service examination, and although nothing came of this, it does indicate that he didn’t intend to remain in teaching for ever. 

And so it was that on 6 April 1894 the headmaster recorded “Mr Nicholson has been offered and has accepted a post under Messrs Thomas Cook & Co in their banking department. He has given the customary month’s notice.” His actual departure is recorded on 5 May.

Before that, however, his life was to take a more dramatic turn.

Footballing beginnings (1889-91)

The first mention of MDN as a footballer comes in a report of the Shropshire Junior Cup Final,  as an 18 year old playing for Oswestry Crescent FC against Oswestry Town “A” in Shrewsbury, when he played inside right and scored twice in a 5-1 win. By the start of 1889/90 he was playing for Oswestry Town’s first team at half back ,  but by November he was at full back, where he was to spend the rest of his career.  Over Christmas 1889 he was picked for a North Wales XI to play Staffordshire at Stoke on Boxing Day, along with three other Oswestry players[13]. At the end of that season he appeared for Oswestry in the Shropshire Senior Challenge Cup  Final, where they lost to Ironbridge. His full back partner was Seth Powell, later to be his team mate at West Bromwich[14]. 

By the start of the 1890/1 season he had moved to Bedford to take up his teaching job, and he soon found his way into the Bedford Town side. It’s likely that his teaching colleagues Oclee and Capon introduced him to the club, and his first appearance was in the opening match of the season on 20 September in a 4-0 win at Wellingborough[15].  His reputation may have already spread wider, for on Friday 3 October he played for “Notts County Rovers” against a “Notts Church Association” team at Trent Bridge, during the local Goose Fair holiday. “Notts tried a new back in Nicholson, from Bedford, and I am told he played a good game, especially in the second half against the wind”, wrote the national correspondent for the Athletic News[16.] 

That season proved to be highly successful for the Town club, who won 17 of their 20 matches (see The first two Bedford Towns) .  For the first time they started to attract crowds in a town previously devoted to rugby union. They played mostly friendlies, but also reached the semi-finals of the Luton and Kettering Charity Cups. MDN appeared in all 13 of the matches for which I have been able to find a complete lineup, appearing at right or left back except for one occasion when he played up front against Powage Press of Aspley Guise and hit a hat-trick[17]. He clearly played a key role in what, many years later, was still remembered as “about the best team the club has ever had”[18]. At the season’s end his captain, Oclee, said that “he had played a magnificent game all through the season, and had undoubtedly been the backbone of the team”[19]. 

MDN (second left at the back) with the 1890/1 Bedford Town eleven including his teaching colleagues Edwin Capon (third from left in second row) and Herbert Oclee (with ball, on ground) . MDN is the only player wearing a badge, which looks a little like that of the famous amateur Corinthians club, though I have found no evidence that he played for them.

However, MDN’s talent was now attracting interest from bigger clubs.  There were rumours that he had been approached by Kettering and Luton Town (both professional clubs playing in leagues, unlike Bedford), and on 31 March 1891 he had played for what looks like a specially selected “Kettering and District” XI at Kettering against West Bromwich Albion, of the Football League (then in only its third season). He was one of five non- Kettering players in the team which beat WBA 2-1 before a 4,000 crowd[20]. That match seems likely to have provoked an approach from WBA, because at the Bedford club’s annual dinner in early May it was accepted that he would be playing elsewhere next season. In a short speech he admitted that “ he had been asked to play [for WBA],  and that was one of the first [leading] teams.  He had friends at Birmingham. The back he should play with was an old chum [his old Oswestry partner, Seth Powell] , and of course he would get better football by playing there…”[21]. 

To the First Division and the FA Cup (1891-4)

So MDN left the Bedford club, a wholly amateur set up which played only friendlies and local cup-ties, for the new world of League football at the highest level. His old colleague Powell had signed for WBA towards the end of the 1889/90 season[22], and was a professional from the outset. MDN continued teaching at Bates’s School in Bedford throughout his time at WBA-40 years later one of his old pupils recalled the sight of MDN “packing off for the Albion match after school on Fridays”[23]  -and although not usually available in mid-week, he clearly became a semi-professional at some point, although exactly when isn’t clear. Bedford was still his home, since his name crops up regularly in cricket reports in the summers of 1891, 1892 and 1893 playing sometimes for the Bedford Town club and sometimes for a Bedford Teachers XI.   He seems to have been a batsman rather than a bowler, as will be seen later. 

MDN’s old Bedford captain, Herbert Oclee,  was to join Luton Town-members of the Southern League- later in that 1891 summer for a reputed 2s 6d a week plus 6d for away matches, and he too continued to teach at the school[24]. Without two of its key players, the Bedford club disintegrated within twelve months.

Throughout MDN’s time there, the Albion club, founded in 1879, played at Stoney Lane, and did not move to the Hawthorns, a couple of miles south west, until 1900. As League football developed from 1888 and attracted bigger attendances, the facilities became inadequate and by the end of the century the Stoney Lane ground was described as “the poorest Division One ground for amenities”. MDN would have played before crowds of between the low thousands and about 14,000 at home, paying a basic 6d (2.5p) for admission on a ground with a pronounced slope towards one end [25]. 

They would have watched matches with much more long-distance hoofing of the ball, especially by defenders, than we see today, and less inter-passing play by forwards; there was still a tendency to kick and rush for the opposition goal, where even such a familiar feature as a goal net was only just becoming normal.  The all-conquering Preston team of 1888/9 had only recently popularised the 2-3-5 “pyramid” formation that was to last into the 1960s.  The referee’s whistle was still in its infancy, and MDN’s first season at WBA was also the first when the referee became a full infield participator, making the decisions himself and relegating the old “umpires” with their flags or handkerchiefs to the touchlines as linesmen.

WBA had won the FA Cup in 1888 (beating Preston 2-1) and were beaten finalists in 1886 and 1887. They were founder members of the League,  but had not exactly set it alight; in their three seasons so far they had finished sixth, then fifth, and then bottom, with only three wins in 22 games, in 1890/1.  In his three seasons at the club, MDN at least took part in an improvement of sorts; third from bottom in his first season and then eighth (out of 16) in the next two. 

He and Seth Powell were in the WBA team right from the start of 1891/2[26] . Once again the League season was a struggle but Albion reached the FA Cup final with a 6-2 semi- final replay win v Nottingham Forest at Derby’s ground before 15,000[27] . By now Powell was no longer in the side and in total he only made 30 first team appearances before moving on to non-League clubs and eventually returning to Oswestry.

After needing three attempts to beat Nottingham Forest in the semi-final, WBA beat Aston Villa 3-0 in the final at Kennington Oval on 19 March 1892 , before a record attendance of nearly 30,000.  It was the last final to be played there, and so many people crammed in that many were unable to see the play. WBA were the underdogs (Villa finished eight places above them in the League) but won due to “superior play and generalship”. MDN was said to be 5 feet 11 and weighed 12 stone[28] . “I don’t think I ever saw a better defence than McCulloch, Nicholson and Reader” [two full backs and keeper] said “Old Athlete” in the Athletic News for 21 March. It was huge step from the Kettering and Luton Charity cup-ties which had been the peak of his career at Bedford only 12 months earlier.

Cup winners-MDN and his WBA colleagues and the Cup they won in 1892.  Left to right: W Bassett, MDN, J Reynolds, R McLeod, J Reader, S Nicholls, T Pearson, A Groves, T McCulloch, C Perry, J Geddes.

Not everyone was so keen on Nicholson’s rumbustuous style of play. Reporting on the 0-2 home defeat by Bolton in his first season, “Brum” writing in the Athletic News for 2 November 1891, told how Albion’s Charlie Perry “was badly hurt by his club mate, Nicholson, whose elephantine rush is not pleasant to behold”. 

In the preview of the 1892 Cup Final in the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News for 19 March, he was wrongly said to be a master at “Bedford Grammar School”,   an error which appears several times (Bedford Grammar School, renamed Bedford School in 1917, is one of the independent schools under the Harpur Trust), but he was said to “play a very good game at right back”. In all in 1891/2, MDN played in 19 of WBA’s 26 League matches and all six of their FA Cup ties. 

In 1892/3 he played in only 13 of the 30 League matches and missed Albion’s only cup tie, a 1-4 defeat by Everton in the first round. Ten of the appearances were up to and including the Preston match on 10 December, on the Monday following which George Bates noted in his school log: “Mr Nicholson away from school. He was hurt rather badly I fear, on Saturday”.  He was still away a week later.  Although he returned to school in time for the spring term in January, he did not regain his WBA place until 18 March, and one of his last three appearances that season was against Nottingham Forest on 3 April 1893, when Albion were said to have “included several reserve men”[29].  While out of the first team, he played in several Birmingham Charity Cup ties and in a friendly against Aston Villa on 4 March[30]  . 

In 1893/4 he became a more regular choice again with 24 League appearances out of a possible 30 and one in WBA’s only FA Cup tie, a first round defeat by Blackburn. However it was noted that he was, unusually, picked for WBA in a Birmingham Cup tie against Walsall on a Monday, when the team …”included even Nicholson whose scholastic duties almost invariably prevent his appearance…any day but a Saturday[31]  (WBA won 1-0). Echoing the comments quoted above about his “elephantine” style, the report refers to the “impetuous neck-or-nothing rushes” of Nicholson and said that “the methods of the two [WBA] backs-Nicholson more particularly-do not commend themselves to everyone..” but adds that there is no doubt they were effective players.

Something of the atmosphere of these early blood-and-thunder matches can be gathered from MDN’s involvement in….

The Newton Heath affair

On 28 February 1894 George Bates made an intriguing note in his logbook:  “Mr Nicholson absent at Manchester attending under a subpoena order at the Assizes as a witness in a libel case”. 

This chance remark led me, via the British Newspaper Archive, to reports in the Manchester papers about the strange case of Newton Heath FC v The Birmingham Gazette.  Newton Heath was, until 1902, the club better known as Manchester United, and they were fellow members of Division 1 with WBA. The case arose out of the match between the two at Newton Heath’s Bank Street ground on 14 October 1893 which the home team won 4-1. There is an entertaining piece about the affair on https://www.sportsjournalists.co.uk/other-bodies/football-writers/dirty-tackle-or-fair-comment-you-be-the-judge/ . Basically the Gazette report, written by William Jephcott and published on 16 October, alleged that:

“It was not a football match, it was simple brutality, and if these are to be the tactics Newton Heath are compelled to adopt to win their matches, the sooner the Football Association deal severely with them the better it will be for the game generally.” 

He added a list of allegations against specific Newton Heath players that they had kicked named WBA players and concluded dramatically:

“I notice that next week Newton Heath have to play Burnley, and if they both play in their ordinary style it will perhaps create an extra run of business for the undertakers.”

This was all too much for the directors of Newton Heath, who sued the paper for libel, and the case was heard before Mr Justice Day and a jury at Manchester Assizes on 28 February and 1 March 1894.  That of course was the case in which MDN was to be a witness as he had played in the match.

The case was heard against a background of controversy about foul play; earlier that season Newton Heath had had three players suspended for incidents in their match at Derby, and the referee in that match had been banned for 12 months for not sending them off[32] .

Newton Heath argued that their reputation would be damaged by reports such as Jephcott’s,  so their gates would suffer and they would incur financial loss, giving them grounds for their libel action. Witnesses for Newton Heath included the match referee, James Strawson of Lincoln, who said he hadn’t seen any deliberate kicking or else he would have sent the players concerned off:  a Manchester based journalist who thought the match was one of the best he’d ever seen: a local headmaster who thought it was a “fair, inoffensive and manly match”, and a clergyman, the Rev Benjamin Reed, Rector of the nearby district of Miles Platting, who said the match was “disappointing and unusually tame”, and quoted a lady friend who had agreed with him. This caused “laughter” in the courtroom and brought Reed[33] a rebuke from the Judge for introducing hearsay.

The WBA players’ evidence, however, was that the game was very rough, and that John Peden of Newton Heath was “noted for hacking” and had sworn to get revenge for alleged injuries in an earlier match between the clubs; John Horton of WBA claimed that Peden had “grinned in his face and kicked him in the lower part of his body” while the referee’s back was turned;  Joe Reader, the WBA goalkeeper, said he was kicked in the back when the ball was already in the net for one of Newton Heath’s goals; and then MDN (wrongly described as “Thomas Nicholson” but correctly as a schoolmaster) said that Newton Heath seemed to have made up its mind to win by fair means or foul. He saw Reader kicked after the ball was in the net. Fitzsimmons [another Newton Heath player] tried to kick him when there was no cause for it, and when the ball was far away. Peden also jumped on him [MDN] and he saw Geddes [also of WBA] kicked while heading the ball. There was much further similar evidence from the WBA witnesses and from Jephcott, who had written the report[34].  

After the Judge had directed the jury to ask themselves whether the report was accurate or not, they decided that Newton Heath had been libelled (implying they believed the report was inaccurate), but awarded damages of just one farthing-in other words they found that the Club had not suffered any real loss by the report. The Judge clearly agreed, for he refused to award the Club costs, saying that the case should never have been brought and was of no importance[35] . The Manchester Evening News, however, recognised the enormous public interest now developing in the game and noted that the case “divided the attention….of hordes of people who delight to spend their Saturday afternoons on the football fields, and it was unkind of Mr Justice Day to include this trial among those which are of no importance whatever” [36]. 

This is thought to have been the only occasion when a club tried to sue a newspaper for alleged unfair reporting.  Many years later at the same club, Alex Ferguson just refused to give interviews to journalists whose reports he disliked…..

Moving on (1894-5)

By February 1894 there were rumours that MDN might join Kettering[37], but by May, at the time he left Bates’s School, it was announced that he had agreed to play for Luton as an amateur in 1894/5 in their Southern League fixtures but not in all their matches “since he is practically retiring from the field”[38]  -the latter remark presumably reflecting his new job with Thomas Cook. 

So he ended his WBA career with 56 League and eight FA Cup appearances, all but one at right back.   “Nicholson.. has secured a situation in London and will apply for reinstatement as an amateur” said the Birmingham Daily Post (my emphasis) on 16 April 1894, confirming that he had turned professional at some stage.

After playing for Crouch End in September 1894, he doesn’t seem to have made his debut for Luton until the match against Millwall on 6 October 1894[39] . This followed a dispute between WBA and the FA about his status-they required him to play this one match as a professional before being reinstated as an amateur[40].  By the end of that season, in which he played four league matches and three cup ties,  his Cook’s duties had clearly taken him to in Egypt because “he returned safe and sound from Egypt just in time to see the end of the season” and it was hoped that he might be available “at least occasionally” for the 1895/6 season[41] .

He did in fact appear for Luton just three more times in 1895/6-the first three matches of the season- and the team photo on the Strawplaiters site shows that by now he’d acquired a moustache which isn’t evident in the Bedford Town and WBA photos[43]. But with those three matches his playing career in England ended, and the next twenty years or so were to be spent largely overseas.

MDN, complete with moustache, second from left on back row, with Luton Town at the end of his career in England, 1895/6.  This was at the Dallow Lane ground, the first of Luton's two homes before they moved to Kenilworth Road in 1905 (Reproduced by kind permission of Brian Webb, from thestrawplaiters.com )

MDN and Football abroad

The fact that MDN was described on his marriage certificate in 1898 as a “bank clerk”, and in 1910, when admitted to membership of the Freemasons’ Fitzalan Lodge at Oswestry, as a “bank manager”[44], suggests that his role with Thomas Cook was on their financial side, rather than guiding tourists round the sights. After his initial visit to Egypt, by 1897 he had been transferred to Thomas Cook’s Vienna office, where a new and fascinating aspect of his football career began[45]. 

He was in the right place at the right time. “Vienna”, writes Jonathan Wilson in his absorbing tactical history of the game, Inverting the Pyramid [46], “was the centre of the British presence in central Europe, and football, having initially been played among the staff of the embassy, banks and various trading and engineering companies, soon took hold”. There was already a First Vienna club, largely consisting of English expats, but MDN soon became the club’s acknowledged best player and the biggest attraction for spectators. Later he became one of the main people behind what became the Austrian FA, and became its first President in 1900.  In 1899, no doubt using his Thomas Cook connections, he helped to organise a tour by an Oxford University team which attracted big crowds, even though the tourists showed the gulf in class by winning 15-0[47].  

By 1900 his activities had been picked up by the English media and he was reported to be  trying to spread the game in Austria by founding a new league and teaching players to play “in the English manner” [48].

MDN (second left in the back row, hairline now receding slightly) with the First Vienna team around 1900

MDN left Vienna for Paris (via another spell in Egypt and one in Hamburg) soon after this and probably retired from playing at about the same time.  But his name lived on in Austria and in 1914 a club was formed called SC [Sporting Club] Nicholson, later renamed FC Wien, which was one of the leading clubs until the 1950s[49] .  By 1935 he was regarded as “the man who put Vienna football on the map” [50].

In an article which seems to have appeared in much the same form in several papers in 1901[51], MDN surveyed the European football scene generally. Germany (which had 600 clubs), Belgium, Holland, Switzerland and Austria-Hungary all possessed “many good clubs”, and there were also some in Paris though not elsewhere in France-it was not permitted or encouraged in French schools. He criticised the English FA for allowing sub-standard English touring teams to play continental clubs, which gave them no real experience. He said that there were moves to form a super-league to bring together the best German clubs from the provincial leagues. New clubs were also being formed in Italy. Englishmen working abroad were involved in all these moves.

He seems to have been transferred to Paris early in the new century since, according to his funeral report [52], he played cricket there for France, scoring 100 for them in 1902 against Belgium.  He also appeared as a member of the Standard Athletic Club cricket team to play Mr E V Spiller’s XI “on the occasion of the opening of the new ground of the Athletic Club” in Paris in  in 1908[53] . Without casting too much doubt on his cricketing abilities, it’s likely that the Standard Club, consisting mainly of British expats, “represented” France from time to time, and others may well have done the same for Belgium[54].

Personal life

MDN was married on 22 June 1898-presumably while on leave from Vienna which was stated as his residence on his marriage certificate- at St Mary’s, Bedford, to Mary Anne Aldgate, who was two years older than him.  Her father was Ward Aldgate, an engine driver on the Midland Railway whose address was given as Millbrook Road, Bedford in the 1891 census. Her occupation is given there as a milliner. Both she and her father were born in Oadby, Leicestershire. 

The couple had at least two children: one son, Malcolm Douglas, was born on 11 February 1902[55], and another, James Donald, was mentioned in his funeral report in 1941. Both are likely to have to have been born abroad and the family does not appear in the 1901 or 1911 censuses.

Malcolm was an “insurance official” by the time of his marriage in September 1929 to Hilda Beatrice Wyett at All Saints, Putney, and that is also how he appears in the 1939 Register, by then living at Chorleywood, Herts. James had joined the RAF by the time of his father’s death in 1941. 

Later life 

The Freemasonry register of Fitzalan Lodge, Oswestry in 1910 shows MDN as “living in France”, and his occupation as “ Bank Manager”; he was initiated on 10 March 1910, and  paid subscriptions up to 1921 when the register stops.  He remained a prominent Mason for the rest of his life and held several offices in the organisation. 

Aged 43 when the Great War began, he would have been too old to be called up, but may have volunteered in some capacity. No trace of any military papers appears in the National Archives. According to his funeral report he returned to Shropshire in 1916, suggesting that his employment with Thomas Cook may have ended during the war. In the 1921 census he and Mary are shown as living back at Llynclys, his birthplace, and like his father became involved in the local quarrying industry. His occupation in the census is shown as "Assistant Manager, Porthywaen Lime Co Ltd". On his son Malcolm’s marriage certificate he was described as a “quarry owner”.   His funeral report indicates that he was a director of the Steetley Lime and Basic Company, which owned quarries in the area, from at least the mid -1930s until his death in 1941.  His wife died in October 1932 in the Oswestry area. The previous year, he had been invited by WBA to attend the FA Cup final against Birmingham along with other surviving members of the 1892 team[56]. 

Death

MDN died on 3 July 1941[57], at Lower Sweeney Farm near Oswestry,  but his probate entry gives his former address as Whitehaven, Llynclys (the one given in the 1921 Census)  .  Describing him as a “noted former athlete”,  the local paper said that he “took an active part in the affairs of the Steetley Lime and Basic Company, and was a director at the time of his death. He took considerable interest in ambulance work, and always impressed upon the employees at the quarries the advantage of proficiency in first aid work”[58].  His two sons attended the funeral-James was by then a Pilot Officer and was later promoted to Flight Lieutenant[59], and although the report mentioned that he was married it did not name his wife.

Of his footballing life there was only a brief mention, referring to his early days with Oswestry, and of course his FA Cup winner’s medal with WBA and the First Vienna club. None of those listed as attending his funeral seem to have been associated with the game. Perhaps in the middle of a World War people had more pressing concerns. But his achievements at home and abroad do not deserve to be forgotten. 

Notes

[1] In everything written about MDN in his lifetime he is referred to simply as “M D Nicholson”. His given first names were Magnus Douglas, although in some online sources in recent years he has been referred to as “Mark Nicholson”. I can find no evidence that he was ever so described in his lifetime.

[2] Joyce’s Football League Players’ Records wrongly gives his date of birth as June 1871. Joyce also wrongly gives the birthplace as Oakengates. 

[3] Kelly’s Directory for Shropshire, 1891

[4] Information courtesy of Ancestry message board poster Carol A Hunter, October 2019.

[5] The only mention of this I have found is in the report of MDN’s death in the Oswestry and Border Counties Advertiser, 9 July 1941. As well as his father and brother-both Alexander-his own sons were called Malcolm Douglas and James Donald.

[6] Wellington Journal, 13 September 1879.

[7] Wellington and Shrewsbury News, 4 August 1883.

[8] This appointment was recorded in the Headmaster’s log book on his appointment at Bedford (see below). 

[9] Evidence for MDN’s teaching career in Bedford comes from the school records preserved in the Bedfordshire and Luton Archives, especially the minutes of the Committee of the governors appointed by the Trustees (Beds Archives reference HT5/8/2) and the log book kept by George Bates (HT9/7). He had been headmaster since 1875 and retired only shortly before his death in 1912 (Bedfordshire Mercury, 7 July 1912). 

[10] Beds Archives reference HT 5/8/2, pages 44, 101 and 130. He had been advanced from £60 in 1889. 

[11] See https://www.measuringworth.com/calculators/ukcompare/relativevalue.php 

[12] Bates copied all the reports from the Inspector into his log book, referred to above.

[13] Oswestry and Border Counties Advertiser, 24 April 1889, 18 September, 6 November and 18 December 1889. I haven’t been able to trace a report of the last match.

[14] Oswestry and Border Counties Advertiser, 9 April 1890.

[15] Bedfordshire Mercury, 27 September 1890

[16] 6 October 1890.

[17] Bedfordshire Mercury, 1 November 1890. 

[18] Unknown correspondent in the Bedfordshire Times, 14 August 1931

[19] Bedfordshire Times, 9 May 1891, reporting the club’s annual dinner. 

[20] Sporting Life, 1 April 1891.

[21] Bedfordshire Times, 9 May 1891

[22] Albion! A complete record of WBA 1879-1987 by Tony Matthews and Colin McKenzie (Breedon Books, 1987)

[23] Bedfordshire Times, 14 August 1931

[24] The Luton Town Story 1885-1985 by Timothy Collings (Luton Town FC, 1985).

[25] Statistics and quotations about MDN’s WBA career are taken from Matthews and McKenzie, Albion!, except where otherwise stated.

[26] Sporting Life, 2 September 1891

[27] Sporting Life, 10 March 1892.

[28] Sporting Life, 21 March 1892.

[29] Birmingham Daily Post, 4 April 1893.

[30] Birmingham Daily Post, 6 March 1893.

[31] Walsall Advertiser, 3 February 1894.

[32] Athletic News, 16 and 30 October, and Nottingham Post, 25 November 1893. 

[33] According to Crockford’s Clerical Directory (available on Ancestry.co.uk) Reed had previously been a missionary in Northern Queensland, and his former parishes included Kangaroo Flats, Victoria. Perhaps he was used to more rugged sport.

[34] Manchester Evening News, 1 March 1894, and Manchester Courier, 3 March 1894.

[35] Manchester Evening News, 5 March 1894.

[36] Manchester Evening News, 8 March 1894.

[37] Bedfordshire Advertiser, 23 February 1984

[38] Bedfordshire Advertiser, 25 May 1894

[39] Bedfordshire Advertiser, 12 October 1894.

[40] Bedfordshire Times, 5 and 13 October 1894.

[41] Bedfordshire Advertiser, 10 May 1895. The Wellington Journal and Shrewsbury News reported on 19 January that year that MDN had already left for Egypt.

[42] Luton Times, 4 and 18 October 1895

[43] See http://thestrawplaiters.com/gallery-luton-town/

[44] Documents available on Ancestry.co.uk 

[45] https://www.wikiwand.com/de/Mark_Nicholson gives much useful information about his time in Vienna, although it may be the source of the confusion about his first name.

[46] Orion Books, 2008

[47] Daily Telegraph, 3 April 1899. The same tour included matches in Berlin and Prague.

[48] The Herald, 3 February 1900

[49] https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FC_Wien

[50] Article by Dr Ernst Schwab in the Yorkshire Evening Post, 11 December 1935 (written in the context of a visit at that time by FC Wien to play Leeds United).

[51] Eg Lancashire Daily Post, 1 November 1901

[52] Oswestry and Border Counties Advertiser, 9 July 1941

[53] The Sportsman, 8 August 1908

[54] For example see the scorecard for a match between “Belgium” and MCC in Brussels in 1910 on https://www.cricketarchive.com/Archive/Scorecards/103/103066.html. Nearly all the names in the “Belgian” team appear to be English. No scorecard for MDN’s appearance for France seems to have survived.

[55] Date shown on the 1939 Register on Ancestry.co.uk

[56] Birmingham Gazette, 15 April 1931. Albion won 2-1.

[57] Again Joyce gets the date wrong, putting it in 1943

[58] Oswestry and Border Counties Advertiser, 9 July 1941

[59 London Gazette, 29 October 1940 and 5 February 1943.