Glamorgans Roll of Honour

Glamorgan’s Vitality Blast match against Surrey on August 17th is the Welsh county’s designated ‘Thank You’ match, supporting the movement organized by The Royal British Legion as the Welsh county, like so many other high-profile organizations, pays tribute to its players who were killed during the War besides remembering those – both military and civilian - who played their part on the home front and returned to build a better life for the benefit of future generations.

Norman Riches who led Glamorgan in their final match before the First World War returned home after serving as an Army medic and led the Welsh county during their inaugural season as a first-class county in 1921. So many others though failed to return home and gave their lives for King and Country, with Glamorgan’s Roll of Honour including:

• Archer Windsor-Clive (Glamorgan 1908-1912) , a man tipped to be a future Glamorgan captain, died on 25^th August, 1914 at Landrieces from wounds after being struck by a shell whilst serving with the Coldstream Guards.

• Frank Dunn (1911) was killed on 16^th August, 1915 in crossfire whilst serving with the 5^th Battalion, Welsh Regiment at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli.

• Charles Donnelly (1899) was killed on 9^th May 1915 during a gas attack whilst serving with the King’s Royal Rifle Corpsduring the Battle of Frezenberg at Flanders.

• Humphrey Bircham (1893) died on 23^rd July 1916 after being struck by a shell, whilst commanding the 2^nd Battalion , the King’s Royal Rifle Corps at Pozieres during the Battle of the Somme.

• Charles Davies (1913) died whilst in captivity after being badly wounded serving in the Battle of the Somme with the Royal Dublin Fusiliers on 9^th June 1916.

• David Cuthbert Thomas (1914) died at Freicourt on 3^rd March 1916 of wounds after being hit by a sniper whilst undertaking reconnaissance serving in the Battle the Somme with 1^st Battalion, Royal Welch Fusiliers.

• Tom David (1913) was fatally struck by a shell at Ypres on 27^th July 1917 during the Battle of Passchendaele whilst a member of the 15^th Battalion, the Welsh Regiment.

• William Edwards (1913-1914) died of shrapnel wounds on 1^st November 1917 at Beersheba, Palestine whilst serving with the 4^th Dismounted Brigade of Riflemen in the 24^th Welsh Regiment.

• Alan Boswell (1914) was killed after being shot down over Belgium on 2^nd October 1918 whilst undertaking a sortie with 108 Squadron of The Royal Flying Corps.

• William Carrington (1896) was killed in Flanders on 28^th April 1918 whilst fighting with the 1^st Battalion the Leicestershire Regiment during The Hundred Days Offensive.

Other leading lights in Welsh club cricket to lose their lives included Tom Dunn of Cowbridge CC, Douglas Robathan of Radyr CC  and Swansea CC, Edward Phillips of Newport CC and Monmouthshire, Billy Geen of Monmouthshire,  Richard Garnons-Williams of Breconshire, and William Odell of Cardiff. But there were war-related fatalities in the years after the hostilities with Dyson Bransby Williams who played for Glamorgan between 1901 and 1921, and served as the Club’s Treasurer, committing suicide in April 1922 having never fully recovered from acting as second-in-command of the 14^th (Swansea) The Welsh Regiment during which he witnessed the horrors of Mametz Wood.

Others thankfully recovered from their mental injuries with Jack Mercer, the only Glamorgan bowler to take all ten wickets in an innings, recovering from shell-shock whilst serving with the 12^th Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment in the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The British Legion’s “Thank You” campaign also remembers servicemen like Jack, as well as Freddie Mathias, who played for Glamorgan during the 1920s , who in September 1918 at the age of just 20, won the Military Cross for gallantry in completing many hours of successful reconnaissance over the Western Front with the Royal Flying Corps.

Jack Bevan, Glamorgan’s Chairman when the Welsh county won the Championship for the first-ever time in 1948, also won the Military Cross in September 1918 whilst serving as a Colonel with the Royal Field Artillery during the Hundred Days Offensive when Allied troops crossed the Somme River and broke German lines.

The contribution of all of the above will also be remembered in a series of special displays during the coming months in the CC4 Museum of Welsh Cricket, together with work undertaken by local schoolchildren, including those from Mount Stuart Primary School who are working on a project focusing on the work of former Glamorgan cricketer Frederick  de Courcy Hamilton and his legacy for the residents of Butetown after the First World War, in particular the creation of a multi-racial cricket team and other housing schemes to improve the lives of those who returned home.