The following article was written by Willie Whitesmith the Kenilworth RFC President and published on the KRFC website in November 2019:

After a long absence Kenilworth RFC will be taking part in the 2019 Kenilworth Town Remembrance Day activities and the following is a list of the casualties in World War 2 and subsequent conflicts, and military exercises.

As a start it is worth summarising the history of Kenilworth RFC in the run up to WW2. The club was formed in 1924 and had a bit of a nomadic period (with grounds at Kenilworth Cricket Club & Fieldgate Lane) before settling down at a site in Borrowell Lane (now known as Castle Farm) in 1929. A 14 year lease was signed at £30 per annum. It was adjacent to the original home of Kenilworth Golf Club. A pitch was created and the first game played was against Burton-on-Trent. There were no changing facilities and the players changed and bathed at the Abbey Hotel, stables area where tin baths were installed. After much fund raising a new wooden stand was erected and opened for 180 seated spectators in 1932. In 34/35 an entry charge of 4d was levied for each game with a further 2d to sit in the stand. At the start of the 38/39 season the captain was Ron Meredith, with John Proctor as President and towards the end of the season there was a steady exodus of players to the Auxiliary Services as Volunteers for the impending conflict. A fixture list was drawn up for the 39/40 season but, due to petrol rationing, fixtures were limited to a 25 mile radius and finding players was difficult. In January 1940 all rugby stopped. The pitch that Kenilworth had created was dug up and planted under the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign and the stand went into a state of disrepair and collapsed, helping a local vagrant keep warm in the cold winter. The rugby posts were saved and carried back to the Abbey Hotel to be stored until the end of the war.

From the club’s own records and with the help of Susan Tall who has spent many years researching Kenilworth War Memorial in both WW1 and WW2 the following ex Kenilworth players were killed in WW2 and subsequent military action:

Lieutenant Terence Flynn, (Royal Warwickshire Regiment) 23, from Station Road, was one of three brothers who were all to die in the war. He was killed at Dunkirk in May 1940.

Sergeant Ronald Hope Meredith (RAF), 32, went to Bablake School and was captain of Kenilworth RFC in the seasons before the war. He died on active service in March 1942.

Sergeant-pilot Raymond W K Clarke (RAF Volunteer Reserve), 23, went to Bablake School and also represented Warwickshire, Nuneaton & Leicester. He was killed in early December 1938 before the war started when his plane nosedived half a mile from Ansty Aerodrome.

Lieutenant Arthur Geoffrey Davies, (Royal Artillery) 28, lived in Balsall Common but played for Kenilworth and died on active service on 9th December 1942. He is buried at Cromer.

Also on the Kenilworth war memorial is Oscar Frank Wheatley. Although he never played for Kenilworth Oscar was the father of Chris & Mick Wheatley, both Kenilworth players. He played for Coventry and Warwickshire RFC. Oscar was a LieutenantCommander on HMS Khedivi, an aircraft carrier. He was a pilot in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve and was killed on 20th June 1945.

Another member who didn’t die but was awarded a Military Cross for conspicuous bravery was Second Lieutenant A. D. W. Ross of the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers.

Slightly closer to home for one of our current members, Paul Fountaine, is Paul’s late brother, Lieutenant Mike Fountaine, Royal Marines, who was lost during an SBS diving accident in 1989, aged 26. Mike was the second eldest of four brothers, (three of which played at Kenilworth). A number may remember Mike, who played colts at Kenilworth with Lawrence Sibley, Charlie Westrope & Dave Edwards before going off to University and the Royal Marines.

Following WW2 the club was quickly resurrected with all games being played ‘away’. The club then leased an 8 acre piece of land at Kenilworth Cricket Club with changing facilities at St John’s Church School rooms. This lasted till 1947 when the lease on our current ground on Glasshouse Lane was signed.

The club would like to thank Mick Wheatley, author of ‘Black & Blue – the History of Kenilworth RFC’, Susan Tall and Paul Fountaine for information used in this piece.

W J Whitesmith

Further information about KRFC can be found on the Clubs website - HERE.