James Young was born in the early hours of the morning at 15 Kirktonholme Street, Kilmarnock on January 10 1882 to William and Annie Young. Anne’s maiden surname was Gilmour, and sometimes Jimmy would sign official documents as James Gilmour Young, but his Birth Certificate definitely says that his name is James Young.
His father William had a good job on the railway as a Goods Porter, and he was literate, for he was able to sign the Birth Certificate. In 1882 literacy could not always be guaranteed, although following the Education Act of 1872, it was becoming more likely than not. The couple had married in Loudoun on July 15 1864.
No certain trace of the family can be found in Kilmarnock in the 1881 census, so it is likely that they had just recently moved into the town, but by 1891 when James was 9 years old, the family had moved to 7 Nursery Street, Kilmarnock where we find that William was now a Warehouseman rather than a Goods Porter and that the William and Annie now had eight children still living with them, of whom James was the second youngest. In order they were William jr, Anne, Sarah, Jeannie, Maggie, John, James and Nancy. The eldest five were working but John, James and Nancy were described as “scholars”.
Kilmarnock is in East Ayrshire, and like most places, was small and insignificant, built round a Church, until the Industrial Revolution of the early 19th century when miscellaneous industries sprung up. But Robert Burns from nearby Alloway had already immortalised the place. In 1786, the first edition of Burns poetry “Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect” was published there by John Wilson, and this work has become known to posterity as “The Kilmarnock Edition”.
Moreover, Kilmarnock is mentioned several times in Burns poetry, notably in the Elegy of Tam Samson.
Has auld Kilmarnock seen the deil?
Or great Mackinlay thrawn his heel?
Or Robertson again grown weel,
To preach an’ read
“Na, waur than a’!” cries ilka chiel
“Tam Samson’s dead!”Kilmarnock lang may grunt an’ grane
An’ sigh, an’ sab, an’ greet her lane,
An’ cleed her bairns, man, wife an’ wean,
In mourning weed;
To death, she’s dearly paid the kane,
“Tam Samson’s dead!”but the news turns out to be false!
Go, Fame, an’ canter like a filly
Thro’ a’ the streets an ‘ neuks o’ Killie,
Tell ev’ry social honest billie
To cease his grievin’,
For yet, unskaith’d by Death’s gleg gullie,
Tam Samson’s livin’!
What usually determined the progress and growth or otherwise of a town in the nineteenth century was the arrival of the railway. Not only did the railway itself provide employment to people (like William Young) and encourage them to settle in the town, but it meant that local industry could thrive, knowing that goods could be readily transported to potential markets.
It also meant that people could choose to live in a town and not necessarily work there, and the town could provide a “dormitory” facility. Moreover, there was a feeling of well-being, civic awareness and prosperity associated with having the railway in town!
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Kilmarnock did well from the railway. A line opened to Troon in 1812 (even before the arrival of steam locomotion, so horse power was required) for the transport of both goods and passengers, but the real boost came in 1843 when the Glasgow, Paisley, Kilmarnock and Ayr Railway was opened. Such was the success of this company that three years later in 1846 a bigger and better station was opened, and this station still exists to serve Kilmarnock today.
Lines would open to Dumfries and the South in due course, (a massive railway viaduct, still in existence, being built for this purpose) but it was the link to Glasgow and the Clyde that was the important one. Glasgow would soon become the “Second City of the Empire”, and the whole Clyde valley area would be described as “the crucible of the British Empire”.
In truth, west central Scotland was as busy a part of the world as any, with people flocking to Glasgow, Lanarkshire, Renfrewhire, Ayrshire and Dunbartonshire in a way that was totally amazing to the rest of the country and the world. The Irish potato famine sent many Irish men and women, (something that had a huge impact, of course, on the genesis of Celtic Football Club), the Highland Clearances brought in the Highlanders, and various others from diverse parts of Scotland and England came to this part of Scotland to find work.
Kilmarnock was on the periphery of this huge expansion, close enough for people to travel to Glasgow but with some country and green fields between Kilmarnock and the huge metropolis that was Glasgow. Kilmarnock was fortunate in that it was not over-dependent on any one industry in the way that Motherwell, for example, was always associated with steel or Dundee with jute.
Textiles, heavy engineering, carpets and shoes were all made there, with iron turners being particularly required by the form of Andrew Barclay and Sons for the making of locomotives. The Titanic, apparently, went to the bottom of the Atlantic in 1912 with carpets made by Stoddart Carpets of Kilmarnock.
Sport had started early in Kilmarnock. Organised team games only really started in Great Britain in the early part of the 19th century, but Kilmarnock Cricket Club was founded as early as 1852 (making it one of the oldest in the country) and Kilmarnock Football Club was founded in 1869, making Kilmarnock Scotland’s second oldest football club (of those who are still with us) with only Queen’s Park in 1867 claiming a longer history. There was thus in the town of Kilmarnock loads of opportunity for a young man to play sport.
Another stimulus for the development of sport was of course the proximity to Ayr and the inevitable struggle for local supremacy. Rivalry can of course be a very good thing, but this particular rivalry was not always friendly. From an early stage, we hear of fights between youths of Kilmarnock and Ayr at cricket matches, on one occasion the constable being compelled to use his “cudgel of office” to restore order, and several times Kilmarnock Cricket Club had to put an advertisement in the local paper to discourage youths from attending.
There is of course nothing new or unusual about thick-headed youths fighting each other. Such tribal behaviour is endemic, particularly with the added spice of sport and local rivalry as there undeniably was in Ayrshire between Ayr and Kilmarnock, or as they would have been pronounced them “Err” and “Kullie”. It was a by-product of the Industrial Revolution. The town, perhaps, had replaced the tribe or the clan as the focus of where one belonged.
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By 1901, the Young family had moved to 1 McLelland Drive and James had followed his elder brother John into the Iron Turner trade. But James now 19 was like most Scottish boys of that age, utterly obsessed with football. Unlike most however, he was good at it, (the Bible perhaps would put it “many are called, but few are chosen”) and he cut his teeth with quite a few of the juvenile and junior football teams which abounded in the locality. He played for Lilliemount Juveniles, Dean Park, Kilmarnock Rugby XI, then, hoping to turn professional, he had an unsuccessful trial for Kilmarnock FC, before playing for Stewarton and Shawbank.
In February 1902, he felt that he should move on, leave the area and perhaps turn professional in England. It was of course a huge leap in the dark to become a professional footballer. It was not guaranteed that a living could be made from it, and it was undeniably a short life with no professional footballer likely to be plying his trade beyond the age of 35, and of course, injury could cut it shorter than that. But it was what he wanted to do. He tried his luck for a short spell in early 1902 with Barrow, and I am grateful to Phil Yelland and Mike Gardner for their help.
It is of course possible that his motive for moving to Barrow-in-Furness was to ply his trade as an iron turner, and that football was an added extra. There would certainly have been a job for him there, because Barrow in 1902 was a hive of industry, specialising in steel and shipbuilding. Sometimes called the “English Chicago” because of its rapid growth, its metamorphosis in the 19th century was truly phenomenal. There are Scottish parallels in places like Coatbridge and Airdrie which barely existed in 1800, yet were bustling, thriving hives of industry by a hundred years later.
Henry Schneider’s discovery of hematite steel and the Furness Railway led to Barrow developing quickly on a grid plan – one of the largest planned towns in the British Isles. By 1901, there was a population of over 67,000 when a hundred years previously, there had been less than 2,000 living in the town at the end of the Furness peninsula, sometimes called the “longest cul-de-sac in Britain”.
Barrow were a very young team, founded only the previous year in 1901 and played at a ground with the unlikely name of “The Strawberry”. In 1902 they played in the Lancashire League, and Young joined them in time to play six League games and two friendlies at least (possibly another one against the Edinburgh side St Bernard’s) between February and the end of the season. The League games were against Stalybridge, Workington, St Helens, Darwen, Wigan United and Southport, and the friendlies were against Workington Black Diamonds and Bolton Wanderers. He was clearly good enough to attract the attention of Bristol Rovers.
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It was midsummer 1902 (8 July to be precise) when James Young joined Bristol Rovers. He was 20. 1902 was of course the end of the Boer War and the summer of the Coronation of King Edward VII. The Coronation itself had to be postponed from June until August because of the King’s health and his being obliged to undergo the then very dangerous operation for appendicitis.
Back in Scotland, although Young would then have had only a passing interest in such things, Celtic won the British League Cup (sometimes called the Coronation Cup) by beating Rangers 3-2 after extra time with a young fellow called Jimmy Quinn scoring a hat trick. Football of course had been rocked by the Ibrox Disaster on April 5 1902. Over 20 people had been killed when a stand collapsed at the Scotland v England game, as people swayed from one side to another (so it was claimed) to see Kilmarnock man Bobby Templeton run up the wing.
Bristol was a huge city in 1902, although the feeling persisted that Bristol had perhaps passed its peak. If Glasgow was the “Second City of the British Empire” in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Bristol had had that role in the eighteenth century, being the chief city and port for the Americas and, in particular, the West Indies. It was a sad and uncomfortable fact that a large part of Bristol’s wealth and glory had derived from the slave trade, but slavery had been abolished for almost a hundred years now thanks to the strenuous efforts of William Wilberforce and others, and it was only the slightly more respectable trade of tobacco that held sway now.
The railways had made a great difference to Bristol as well, with the GWR (the Great Western Railway, or as it was more commonly referred to, “God’s Wonderful Railway”) had opened up the south west for Londoners, who were thus able to establish business contacts and enjoy holidays in the beautiful countryside of Gloucestershire, Somerset, Devon and Cornwall. The famous engineeer Isambard Kingdom Brunel had also built in Bristol the Clifton Suspension Bridge, a remarkable feat of Victorian engineering, and to this day a scary-looking walk and drive across.
But Bristol never has been a great footballing city. Rugby was strong there even as early as 1902, and cricket in the summer, but even so, the records of the two teams Bristol City and Bristol Rovers have never really made as big an impact on English football as their population and fan base might have led us to expect.
Birmingham is another under-performing footballing city, but Aston Villa, for example, have had their moments. In comparison with Liverpool and Manchester (and Newcastle long ago) Bristol has been a sad disappointment with the FA Cup and and English League Trophy yet to make an appearance in the great city of the south-west, although City came close in 1907 and 1909.
A visit to Bristol on a match day can be a disappointing experience. There is little sign that there is a game on, few supporters’ scarves or colours, no excited animation of anyone asking whether injuries have healed up or whether the team will be third in the League by tonight.
Asking a passer-by for details of the way to the game can see one being directed, politely and courteously, to the wrong ground! This is in total contrast to a city like Newcastle for example. Similar prolonged and chronic under-achievement have not led to similar apathy there. Black and white scarves are ubiquitous, enthusiasm is prevalent – and how one wishes that they had a worthy team to support! But Bristol is different. It is not, by nature, a footballing city, and probably was the same in 1902 when Young arrived.
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Bristol Rovers, founded in 1883, is the more senior football team in the city, but they were not known as Bristol Rovers until 1898, having previously been known as the Black Arabs, Eastville Rovers and Bristol Eastville Rovers. Their nickname is “the Pirates”, for no other reason than the seafaring connections of Bristol, but they have also been known as “the Gas” because of a gasworks near their Eastville ground.
They joined the Southern League in 1899 having played in the Bristol and District League, which became known as the Western League. In season 1902/03 they wore a black and white vertical strip, and would do so until 1919. They joined the Football League in 1920, the major moment of triumph in the Southern League coming in 1905 when they won it. (I am grateful to Mike Jay and Stephen Byrne, two Bristol Rovers historians, for supplying this information).
The manager of Bristol Rovers was a man called Alf Homer. He had been in position since 1899 and would stay in some capacity until 1928. Rovers owe a great deal to him. He was welcoming and encouraging to Young, and like most English teams of the day, Bristol Rovers employed many Scotsmen, so Young did not exactly feel lonely, even though he would not have been human if he had not been a little homesick. Bristol was a long way away from Kilmarnock.
The big sporting interest of that summer in Bristol was of course the Ashes between England and Australia. It was one of the epic series won 2-1 by Australia as Joe Darling and Victor Trumper took on Archie McLaren, Wilfred Rhodes and Ranjitsinghi. Gloucestershire’s moment of glory came in the Fifth Test when their local hero Gilbert Jessop “the croucher” hit a century in 85 minutes to help England to a famous victory at the Oval.
It was the day when the two Yorkshiremen George Hirst and Wilfred Rhodes, England’s last two at the crease, edged home to win by one wicket. According to legend (but almost certainly without foundation) Hirst said to Rhodes “we’ll get’em in singles, Wilfred”.
On that particular day (August 13 1902), Young made his home debut at right half at Eastville as Cartlidge, Dunn and Griffiths; Young, McLean and Lyon; Muir, Howie, Corbett, Wilcox and Marriot beat Watford 5-1 in the First Division of the Southern League, with Fred Wilcox scoring a hat-trick before 5,000 spectators. It was a good start to the season, for the previous week, they had beaten Northampton Town 2-1 at Northampton.
The Southern League contained teams like Tottenham Hotspur, West Ham United and Queen’s Park Rangers, and although it was still probably considered inferior to the Football League, the fact that Tottenham Hotspur had won the FA Cup in 1901 and Southampton had reached the final in 1900 and 1902 showed that the standard of football played in the Southern League was quite high.
Tottenham Hotspur were the biggest team in terms of support, (110,280 had attended the first game of the 1901 FA Cup final at Crystal Palace between them and Sheffield United) and Young celebrated (if that is the right word!) his 21st birthday on January 10 1903 at White Hart Lane on the wrong end of a 0-3 defeat before a crowd of 12,000. Southampton won the Southern League in 1903. Young was out of the team on November 29 1902 when Southampton beat Rovers 3-1 at the Dell, but he played a creditable part when Southampton came to Eastville on March 14 1903 and were, by all accounts, lucky to get away with a 1-1 draw.
The FA Cup campaign lasted no longer than one round, as far as Bristol Rovers were concerned, in season 1902/03. Yet it took Millwall three games to get the better of the Pirates. A 2-2 draw at Eastville on December 13 was followed by a trip to London to play a 0-0 draw at North Greenwich (the Den would not be opened until 1910) on the following Thursday afternoon, and the tie was finally resolved on Monday December 22 at the neutral venue of Villa Park, Birmingham when the Pirates went down 0-2 before a minuscule crowd. Young played in all three games. The Cup was won by Bury that year, beating Derby County by the record score of 6-0 in the final before 63,102 fans at the Crystal Palace.
Young played a total of 19 League games that season,in all three half back positions, although mainly as a right half. He was more of an asset than a debit however, in his 19 games. he won 9, drew 5 and lost 5. His final League game for the club was against Kettering Town on April 4 1903. But in spite of having met and courted a young Bristolian lady, Young was wanting home to Scotland.
To be continued tomorrow…
David Potter
An extract from David Potters 2013 book, Sunny Jim Young – Celtic Legend.
