Nov 22, 2017

‘Remembering Reading’s Heroes’ – a talk at Haslams Estate Agents for Reading FC and ABF The Soldiers’ Charity


Last week I gave a talk on behalf of Haslams Estate Agents and Reading Football Club in Haslams’ flagship office in Friar Street, Reading. The talk was part of a fundraising evening for ABF The Soldiers’ Charity and was attended by over 80 people.
The evening started with drinks and canapés (based on wartime fare which included such things as spam fritters and Maconochie’s steak pies) before 25 minutes from me discussing Reading in the Great War.

Canapés were based on a wartime theme

Most of the audience had little knowledge of this period of history and I was able to explain some of the more interesting stories I had found in my research. These included the story of Max Seeberg, a former Reading FC player from the 1912–13 season who, by the time was declared in August 1914, had retired and was working as a publican. Despite being a well-known and liked member of Reading’s community his German ancestry ensured he was locked up for the duration of the war. Remarkably, he seemed to bear no malice to Britain, becoming a naturalised British subject in 1920.

Talking about Max Seeburg, a former Reading FC player who was locked up for the duration of the war due to his German nationality

I also spoke about Ronnie Poulton Palmer, the England rugby player, Trooper Fred Potts VC and the tragic case of the Sutton family (of Sutton Seeds) whose five boys went off to war. By the end of March 1918 four of them had been killed, leaving Leonard Sutton (a wartime mayor of Reading) with his sole remaining son, Noel who survived the conflict despite being torpedoed mid-channel by a German U-Boat.

After a break for more drinks and canapés an auction and raffle was held. A weekend on the battlefield with me was auctioned off by local resident, Chris Tarrant. Over £3,000 was raised for ABF The Soldiers’ Charity.

Chris Tarrant auctions a weekend on the battlefield with me to raise funds for ABF The Soldiers’ Charity

An extract from the Reading Mercury of 12 August 1916 listing players associated with Reading Football Club serving in the forces

The second half of my talk focused on telling the story of a number of Reading FC players and their wartime service. Nine former players died in the conflict whilst others such as Joe ‘Bubbles’ Bailey achieved remarkable success as a fighting officer. In Joe’s case this resulted in the award of the DSO and three Military Crosses, all in a period of just seven months in 1918!

Speaking about Joe Dickenson, ‘the Footballing Grenadier’ who served in the 2nd Grenadier Guards and was killed at the Battle of Festubert in May 1915

My thanks to BBC Radio Berkshire’s Graham McKechnie, military historian Jon Cooksey and Reading FC historian Alan Sedunary who conducted a great deal of research on these players back in 2014.

The entire evening was a great success and I look forward to working with Haslams and Reading FC again in the future.

A selection of images from the evening (courtesy of Ben Hoskins http://www.bhoskins.com/) are shown below.

With Steve Woodford of Haslams, Brigadier Peter Walker of ABF The Soldiers Charity and serving soldiers

Pre-talk drinks and canapés

The audience seemed to enjoy the talk

More audience shots

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