From The Vaults

31 May 2021

USA v South Africa, 1981: International Rugby on a Polo Field

Owl Creek Polo Field in Glenville, New York State, can lay claim to being the most unlikely international rugby ground of the last 150 years. On Friday 25 September 1981 it was the venue for the inaugural test match between the USA Eagles and the South African Springboks.

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31 May 2021

USA v South Africa, 1981: International Rugby on a Polo Field

Owl Creek Polo Field in Glenville, New York State, can lay claim to being the most unlikely international rugby ground of the last 150 years. On Friday 25 September 1981 it was the venue for the inaugural test match between the USA Eagles and the South African Springboks.

22 May 2021

He Saved Many Lives But Not His Own. Lest We Forget- Kit Tanner

On this day 80 years ago, Kit Tanner lost his life after rescuing 30 people from the wreckage of HMS Fiji. Here Malc King of the Gloucester Rugby Heritage archive pays tribute to a remarkable man.

18 May 2021

Remembering the 1996 Peace International

On the 18th May 1996 Lansdowne Road hosted a special fixture between Ireland and the Barbarians called the Peace International

12 May 2021

The 1971 British and Irish Lions tour of New Zealand

On 15th May 1971, the British and Irish Lions began their tour of Australia and New Zealand. Barney Burnham reports on the tour from a tent in Henley-on-Thames...

03 May 2021

New book documenting the history of rugby in East Germany

In 1948, Erwin Thiesies, a former German national player, moved from Berlin to Hennigsdorf, an industrial city with a steelworks in the north of Berlin. He gathered schoolboys around him and introduced them to rugby.

26 April 2021

The One and Only Whistle

When JD Dallas blew his whistle for a scrum, not a try, in 1905, he ignited a dispute that continues to this day. Here, in his own words, he seeks to set the record straight...

19 April 2021

Selected but never played Part 2 (1920-1996)

In the days before substitutes were introduced into international rugby, many players faced a dilemma following their selection to play for their country for the first time.

12 April 2021

The Cavaliers tour of South Africa 1986

The rivalry between the New Zealand All Blacks and the South African Springboks had been intense ever since their first meeting in 1921. The generation of leading players in the mid-1980s were almost without exception keen for that rivalry to continue despite the growing public awareness of the injustices that were occurring daily in apartheid South Africa.

05 April 2021

Selected but never played Part 1 (1871-1914)

...there were over 90 players who had the misfortune to be selected to play for their country in a test match but who never took the field and so remained uncapped.

27 March 2021

27th March - A Red Letter Day for Rugby

On 27th March 1971, England and Scotland stepped out at Murrayfield for their second international test-match in the space of a week. The previous Saturday, both sides had completed their 5 Nations campaign at Twickenham, where Peter Brown's conversion had secured a 16-15 victory for Scotland.

26 March 2021

Meet the 1871 Captains...

When England and Scotland took the field for the first time on 27th March 1871, they were led by Francis Moncrieff and Frederick Stokes. At 21, Edinburgh born Moncreiff was the senior of the two and, as a former pupil of Edinburgh Academy and captain of Edinburgh Academicals, was in the most familiar of circumstances as the two teams ran out at Raeburn Place.

25 March 2021

Spotlight on Raeburn Place

It all began at Raeburn Place on March 27th, 1871, when an English Twenty arrived to meet the challenge of Scottish footballers. A series of ‘international football’ matches had taken place in 1870 and 1871 but none of them has satisfied the Scottish sporting public, firstly because the players selected to represent them were local to London not Scotland and secondly because they were playing the wrong football.

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