Page 34 - QARANC Vol 17 No 1 2019

32 QARANC THE GAZETTE
The Fallen Heroes of Newcastle United Football Club
Newcastle United Football Club’s fallen heroes of World War 1 and 2 have been commemorated at St James’ Park, Newcastle upon Tyne. The club unveiled a new memorial on Saturday, 10 November 2018 during the Armistice weekend marking one hundred years since the end of the Great War; the memorial bears the names of 30 former players who died on active service during the two world wars.
The memorial was unveiled by former Team Captain, Bobby Moncur, and shows the original memorial encapsulated in a much larger black marble effigy. On it are etched the names of 23 Newcastle players killed during World War 1, and another section displays the names of seven more ex-Magpies who died serving during World War 2.
One of the players, Donny (Donald Simpson) Bell, was the only professional footballer to be awarded the Victoria Cross. He entered France on 25 November 1915, initially serving as Lance Corporal 15722, and was quickly commissioned. He was serving as a 2nd Lieutenant with the 9th Battalion of the Yorkshire Regiment, (Green Howards), when he was killed in action during the Battle of the Somme on 10 July 1916, repeating his heroic actions from five days earlier against a German machine gun nest that was holding up a British advance, which
Memorial to the fallen heroes of Newcastle United Football Club
earned him a posthumous VC. He had crept through a communications trench, then sprinted across no man’s land (open ground), before throwing a bomb into the nest from twenty yards, then he shot the gunner. He had some leave in May/June 1916, and married Rhoda Margaret Bonson, his sweetheart, on that visit, just two days before he left for France again. Rhoda received his VC from King George V at Buckingham Palace on 13 December 1916. She never married again.
The service was conducted by Reverend Cecil Dick, ex-6th Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, at noon, ahead of Newcastle’s game against AFC Bournemouth, with the Deputy Lord Mayor, relatives of those who died, military personnel and other guests present. The tribute was unveiled
behind the Milburn Stand next to the Alder-Sweeney Memorial Garden.
Newcastle’s Armistice centenary commemorations continued until kick-off on Saturday, with members of the 5th Battalion of the Regiment of Royal Fusiliers leading the teams out together with four standard-bearers; I was extremely honoured to be one of the four.
Special thanks to Paul Joannou and Mark Hannen from NUFC for their hard work and excellent hospitality. Newcastle won 2-1 on this occasion, so I hope I get many more invites back as a lucky mascot.
Photographs are courtesy of NUFC and Ian Johnson.
Fiona Mitford Newcastle Branch
5th Battalion Royal Regiment of Fusiliers with the Standard bearers on the NUFC pitch