A while back, a chap named Martin O'Connor knocked on my door, bearing two boxfuls of photocopies of FA professional registration and transfer records made between 1894 and 1920. It took me about three years to transcribe them into a searchable spreadsheet format. The sheets are quite chunky, and have two tabs, one each for registrations and transfers. Registrations are shown by player and by club; transfers are shown by player, by club joined and by club left.
I have transcribed the records directly as I saw them, but have noted a few obvious mistakes in a "comments" box. See April 1895 registrations, "Lierney" for an example of this. Some variations in club names have been addressed; for example, "Wellington St. George's" and "St. George's, Wellington" always appear as the former.
Barrow, Barrow-in-Furness and Barrow Association might for all I know be different names for the same club, but I have tried to type what I see. It may have been that clubs in rugby strongholds styled their team "Association" to differentiate it from a rugby club. These suffixes have usually been recorded here.
Royal Rovers and Sunderland Royal Rovers are the same team, and Sunderland Rovers may be, too, but there were several "Black Watch" sides in that area and it is therefore more difficult to be more precise with that name. "Auto-complete" was usually more of an ally than an enemy, but (for example) there may be the occasional "Wilkins" who has slipped through as "Wilkinson" without my picking it up. If you see any obvious howlers, please email me to suggest corrections.
On fairly rare occasions, clubs registered a player for more than one season's duration. Such registrations are noted, but if a player was registered for part of 1908-9 and all of 1909-10, say, then the registration will only be recorded in 1908-9's list. So if you know a club had a player and you can't find him on a list, have a look at the year before.
These transcriptions are supplied free to football historians for research purposes, and must not be copied for private gain.
A small number of lists are missing; check the list of available records to see what's there and what isn't.
At the bottom is a link to a file of applications for permits to play as amateurs made between 1921 and 1937. These are extracts only, for applications made by players in the Derbyshire, Sheffield & Hallamshire and Nottinghamshire FA areas.
THE RECORDS
RECORDS AVAILABLE and RECORDS MISSING
1894-5 registrations & transfers 1895-6 registrations & transfers
1896-7 registrations & transfers 1897-8 registrations & transfers
1898-9 registrations & transfers 1899-1900 registrations & transfers
1900-1 registrations & transfers 1901-2 registrations & transfers
1902-3 registrations & transfers 1903-4 registrations & transfers
1904-5 registrations & transfers 1905-6 registrations & transfers
1906-7 registrations & transfers 1907-8 registrations & transfers
1908-9 registrations & transfers 1909-10 registrations & transfers
1910-11 registrations & transfers 1911-12 registrations & transfers
1912-13 registrations & transfers 1913-14 registrations & transfers
1914-15 registrations & transfers 1919-20 registrations & transfers
1920-1 registrations & transfers