Edward Carleton Holmes the Younger, (12 February 1843 – 9 April 1932)[1] was one of three practising solicitors who drew up the first rules of Rugby Football Union.
Early life
editHolmes was born in St Pancras, London, England, to Edward Carleton Holmes (Snr), a practising solicitor from Arundel, and Elizabeth Carleton Sayres, from Worthing. At the time of Edward's birth, his parents were living in 31 Bedford Row, Camden Town, London, WC1, close to Gray's Inn Fields. Edward was the eldest of six children.[2]
Drawing up rugby's rules
editEdward Carleton Holmes (Yngr) was a practising solicitor with offices in Bloomsbury. He was captain of Richmond Rugby Club between 1866 and 1871[3] and later became its president. The club was hugely influential in London's rugby scene in the early 1870s, as was Holmes himself.[4]
Rugby's first 59 rules
editOn 26 January 1871, the Rugby Football Union held its first meeting to discuss rugby's future with the aim of drawing up some rules of play and to clean up the game. The meeting was held at the offices of Edward Carleton Holmes situated at 31 Bedford Row, Camden Town, the house where Holmes had grown up. The meeting appointed a committee of three persons to draft the rules of rugby.[5] The committee comprised three practising solicitors: Algernon Rutter, Leonard James Maton, and 28-year-old Edward Carleton Holmes (Yngr). Holmes, Rutter and Maton (draftsman) were chosen because they were all former pupils of Rugby School and were therefore knowledgeable about the subject of rugby. This committee eventually drafted the first 59 rules of rugby and had them accepted by the Special General Meeting of the RFU on 24 June 1871.[6] Their most important decision was the elimination of the practise of hacking.[7]
Marriage
editTwo years later, in 1873, Edward Carleton Holmes (Yngr) married Frances Rosa Davies in Aberystwyth, South Wales where Davies was from, but the couple made their married home in 47 Springfield Road, Marylebone, London, but later moved to Beckenham, Kent.[8]
Holmes owned Tregullow Offices
editIn 1889, aged 46, Edward Carleton Holmes (Yngr) bought the 'Tregullow Offices' (later Zimapan) from Sir William Robert Williams,[9] the 3rd baronet of Tregullow, Cornwall, and then sold the property to barrister Charles Augustus Vansittart Conybeare.
Death
editFollowing the death of Holmes's father in 1909 – who left his three surviving children a sizeable fortune – Edward Carleton Holmes (Yngr) moved from Kent to a Regency town house at 31 Brunswick Square, Hove, East Sussex, where he died on 9 April 1932 aged 89. In his will, he left £5,378[10]—equivalent to £180,000 in today's money—and a small bequest to his nurse Edith Muriel Wright.[11]
References
edit- ^ https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspapers/Digitised/Article/straitstimes19320429-1.2.139.aspx Obituary of Edward Carleton Holmes, The Straits Times, London, 23 April 1932
- ^ Smith, Peter King, 'The Bloomsbury Lawyer Who Co-drafted Rugby Rules' (Feb 2011), a biography of Edward Carleton Holmes in The Zimapanners (www.zimapanners.com), the history of a 19th-century Cornish count house, including biographies of its owners, occupants and all those who had a legal interest in it.
- ^ Obituary of Edward Carleton Holmes, The Straits Times, London, 23 April 1932.
- ^ Mike Roberts, researcher of the history of the Rugby Football Union and author of a forthcoming book The Same Old Game. Barcelona, Spain, 2011.
- ^ Mike Roberts, 2011.
- ^ (a) First 59 rules: Mike Roberts; (b) Date: http://www.rugbyfootballhistory.com/timeline1870s.htm
- ^ "Hacking was basically kicking your opponent. Around this time, rugby was a pretty rustic game, which was essentially one constant scrummage. Players (usually 20 a-side in those days) just gathered in a mob around the ball...and kicked away at it. Hacking was the refined art of kicking the opposition in the shins." Mike Roberts, 2011.
- ^ The Zimapanners, Smith, Peter King, (2009-2011).
- ^ Sir William Robert Williams, 3rd-Bt[permanent dead link] at www.zimapanners.com.
- ^ National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills & Administrations) 1861-1941. See The Zimapanners, Smith, Peter King, (2009-2011).
- ^ The British Journal of Nursing, June 1932. Browse journals (Vol. 80, page 132) in: http://rcnarchive.rcn.org.uk