SACSRUGBY

The first player on the list of South Africa’s international rugby players is a SACS man. If you like he is Springbok No.1. Except of course that they were not yet called Springboks.

The first British Isles team came to South Africa in 1891. They were sponsored by Sir Donald Currie, the boss of Union-Castle Lines, and bought with them the Currie Cup. The tour received financial guarantees from Cecil John Rhodes, then the prime minister of the Cape and Southern Africa’s richest man.

They bought ,besides the Currie Cup, the most successful team ever to tour South Africa. They won every match and had only a solitary point scored against them. (A try counted one point in those days)

The first test was played on Thursday, 30 July 1891 in Port Elizabeth and Ben Duff was chosen at fullback, thereby becoming South Africa’s first international player. More than that he played in all three tests in the series, one of only five players to do so for South Africa. In all he played eight times against the tourists, always on the losing side!

Ben Duff, whose father came from Stirling in Scotland, was Western Province’s first rugby captain and also played cricket for the province. His brother Colin, also of SACS, played rugby for Western Province and Rhodesia and cricket for Rhodesia.

Ben Duff later farmed in the Zeerust District and played rugby for Transvall. He dies in Pretoria on 25 June 1943.

The oldest player to play for South Africa in 1891 was Martinus Versveld who was 31 at the time. His nickname was Oupa, though he was only 61 when he died in Plumstead in 1931. His brother Hansie also played for South Africa. Hansie, whose name was really Charles, had the distinction of scoring that solitary try against the tourists. Two of their brothers also played against the touring team, John and one whose first name was Robert. Robert’s full name were Robert Loftus Owen Versveld, and he was generally known as Loftus.

 

The British – largely an Anglo-Irish side – came again in 1896, the year South Africa first won a test. SACS men played again. Five of them were amongst South Africa’s leading forwards.

Paul Scott played in all four tests, regarded as the best forward in South Africa at the time. Scott had an interesting life. His father, Colonel John Scott, was a soldier born in Inverness. Paul Alexander Scott was born in New Brunswick on 26 October 1872. The Scotts came to South Africa where Colonel Scott founded the Cape Town Highlanders in 1885. Paul Scott was educated at the Diocesan College and then the South African College. He, too, saw action as a soldier – in the Anglo-Boer War, during which he was awarded five medals, World War I when he was a major in the Rifle Brigade and in World War II, when he again joined up.

From the Cape he went to the Transvaal where he was a miner and a speculator. Later he went further north still as a speculator.

Paul Scott, then a Transvaal player, was one of four SACS men who played in the dramatic test at Newlands in 1896.

John Wessels was not one of them, though he had played in the first three tests and was a Western province man, though born at Boshoff in the Orange Free State.

He was usually known as John Wessels though his names were in fact Johannes Jacobus, and he was nicknamed Scraps. Later he, too, went up to the mines and played for Diggers and Transvaal. When he died of miner’s phthisis in Benoni on 6 April 1929, he was the manager of the Robinson/Nigel Deep Mine.

Allan Beswick came to the South African College from the Eastern Cape. He was born on 30 June 1870 in Queenstown where his father was the first headmaster of the school which became Queen’s College. He played in three tests that year, including the glorious fourth. He was playing for Border at the time, though he had also played for Griqualand West and Transvaal as he followed the mines. Allan Menzies Beswick died at Newport Pagnall in Buckinghamshire on 6 September 1908, a young man.

The son of a Dubliner who became Cape Town’s chief magistrate, James Huskisson Crosby, born in Cape Town, also followed the mines and ended up a mining magnate. He was not one when he played in the second test at the Wanderers in Johannesburg in 1896. He died in Johannesburg on 25 February 1960.

His son says that Pieter Joseph Dormehl had grown up as a lonely child, born in malmesbury, the descendant of a German who came from Hesse. He was educated at SACS, played in the last two tests in 1896, became a forester in George and died there on 1 September 1958.

A SACS man actually scored in the glorious fourth – Tom Hepburn. It followed a historic – and controversial – passage of play. Ferdie Aston sailed into JF Bryrne, the Englishman playing centre for the british Isles. Up flashed Biddy Anderson. He snatched the ball from Byrne’s grasp, drew AWD Meares at fullback and passed to Alf Larard, the South African halfback who was an Englishman who had come to fight in the first Anglo-Boer War and stayed. Red-haired Larard scored. The British protested. They complained for many years but Alf Richards allowed the score and it has stayed ever since. Tom Hepburn kicked the conversion. The final score, the day South Africa first wore green jerseys and won a test.

Tom (not Thomas) Brown Hepburn was born at Shoshong in Bechaunanland where his father was a missionary to the Khama family. The Rev. James Hepburn, who died in Newcastle, England, also made forays into Rhodesia, where Tom Hepburn also went and played. Eventually he died in Bulawayo on 13 September 1933. He played in only one test but what a great occasion.

Charles Barker Brown’s father, the Reverend John Brown, came to South Africa with the London Missionary Society and went to work in Kuruman, the famous mission station in the Northern Cape. His wife Elizabeth was a parson’s daughter. There Charlie Brown was born on 29 January 1878 and from there he went to Blackheath College and then to the South African College. When he left the SAC he played for Hamiltons. In 1903 he was a sterling forward in all three tests against mark Morrison’s touring team. That historic tour provided South Africa with its first victory in a series. Charles Brown died in Boksburg on 18 June 1944.

John Duke Jackson came to South Africa from East Lexham in Norfolk and eventually died in East Lexham. His son John Scafe Jackson, who at one time had a shop in Victoria West, married Hannah Hodgson, a cousin of Benny and Stanley Osler. Their son, who was born in Victoria West on 1 October 1878, was John Scafe Jackson who played against the British Tourists in 1903. After school he came to the SAC and later played for gardens. He became a magistrate and died in Robertson on 30 June 1954.

The first South African team to tour overseas was chosen after the Currie Cup tournament in Johannesburg in 1906. Bertie Mosenthal of Transvaal was chosen as a forward in the side but was forced to withdraw. In his place came Billy Millar, one of South Africa’s most remarkable sporting characters. That he was able to make the side was a wonder. The later heights he achieved were a miracle.

Billy Millar was born in Bedford on 6 November 1883. He was lucky to survive as he contracted typhoid fever as a baby, fatal for many adults. Eventually he came to the South African College but ran away at the age of 16 to join the Cycling Corps in the Anglo-Boer War. He was so badly wounded that he nearly lost an arm. He was saved by a dedicated nurse at the Wynberg Military Hospital, and then worked as a labourer to strengthen his arm. To strengthen himself against other war injuries he took up walking and boxing, at both of he became champion, winning the Cape Colony Amateur heavyweight title. And he played rugby, till he was selected for South Africa in 1906.

In 1910 the British Isles toured. They played three tests. Douggie Morkel was captain in the first test, which South Africa won, and then Billy Millar became captain, first at the Crusader Ground in Port Elizabeth, when South Africa lost, and then at Newlands when South Africa won 21 – 5, a huge victory for those times. The Port Elizabeth defeat was surprising as it was not a strong touring team, winning only 13 of its 24 matches.

He nearly did not make the 1912-13 side to Britain, but ended up as captain. He was sent off the field in a club match at Newlands but the players prevailed on the referee not to send in a report, for he would not have toured otherwise. The SA Rugby Football Board then did not want him as captain but the selectors insisted and he took that vastly successful side to Britain and Ireland, the first overseas team to beat all four Home Unions. On that tour the Springboks first took a head for presentation to the first non-test side to beat them. The head is in a museum at the Newport club to this day. It is a custom which still persists.

After that World War I broke out, and Billy Millar of the Coldstream Guards was wounded seven times before being taken prisoner of war. He was repatriated from a POW camp.

Later Billy Millar became the first general manager of the KWV, and died in Paarl on 18 March 1949 – a great man.

The name Luyt has figured prominently in South African rugby. There were three, all brothers, in Billy Millar’s team – Fred, who was South Africa’s first specialist scrumhalf and possibly the first man to use a dive pass, Richard and John. They are the only  trio of borthers to have played together in the same test. They played together against Scotland (16 – 0) and Wales (3 – 0). The three Bekker brothers and the three du Plessis brothers have also played for South Africa at rugby, but not in the same test. Fred was Paddy Carolin’s partner in a law firm in Moorreesburg. His son, Clive, was also an ardent SACS man who played at fullback for Western Province.

Richard’s son, also Richard and of UCT but not of SACS, may well have played for South Africa if his father had not wanted him to achieve academically instead. He later led the platoon in World War II which rescued Haile Selassie, later to become Sir Richard for his work as governor of British Guyana and eventually vice-chancellor of UCT. Father Richard, who also captained Western Province at rugby, took ill and died in Worcester on 14 January 1967 on his way home from the second cricket test between South Africa and Austrailia, which Australia won.

Fred played for South Africa in 1910. So did Nick Crosby, who came to SACS from Tarkastad, and died in Postmasburgin 1938 when he was the compound manager of the manganese mine there.

Cliff Riordan also the son of an Irish Doctor who settled in Colesberg and married there. The Riordans had ten children, of whom Clifford Atherton was one, born on Christmas Eve 1885. During World War I, handsome Cliff Riordan rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Army service Corps after retaining at Aldershot and saw action in the horrible Dardanelles. Later he became a magistrate in Pietermartzburg, a sports journalist in South America and a specialist in ice skating equipment in London where he died on 7 February 1958.

Like Billy Millar, Peter Maxwell Davison was also born in Bedford and also came to SACS. His father was a Davison, his mother a Davison. He also played for South Africa in 1910. He returned to the Eastern Cape and died in Port Elizabeth on 14 November 1931. His daughter married the 1912-13 Springbok, Arnold Knight whose nickname was Saturday.

Also playing in 1910 and on the 1912-13 tour was Wally Mills who played for South Africa in 1910 before he had even played for Western Province. In World War I he fought in German South West Africa and then in the Royal Artillary before going off to India as a permanent soldier. He was persuaded to return on the death of his brother. Later in life he was chief judge of the SA Turf Club in succession to Vollie van der Bijl. He died in Somerset West on 23 February 1975.

Clive Berrangé van Ryneveld, whose mother’s maiden name was Berrangé, played at scrumhalf in two tests in 1910. He died at his home in Rondebosch on 25 August 1969. Both his sons, Anthony and Clive, were Rhodes Scholars and rugby Blues. Clive played flyhalf for England and later captained South Africa at cricket.

Tobie Moll, born in Woodstock and educated at SACS, also played in 1910. Later he played for Hamiltons and then migrated to the Transvaal where he played for Randfontein. He played for Western Province and Transvaal. He joined the Leicestershire Regiment in World War I and, as 2nd Lieutenant Tobias Mortimer Moll, died of wounds at the front on 14 or 15 July 1916. He was not the only South African to have played international rugby and died in that ghastly war. Others were Mike Dickson, SSL Steyn, Sep Heyns, Adam Burdett, Jackie Morkel, Reg Hands amd Gerald Thompson.

If you have been paying attention you will have realised that a vast number of SACS men played for South Africa in that 1910 series of only three tests – Billy Millar, Max Davison, Cliff Riordan, Wally Mills, Tobie Moll, Clive van Ryneveld, Fred and Richard Luyt and Nick Crosby – nine in all, out of 26 Springboks that year.

Of them Billy Millar, the Luyts and Mills toured in 1912. So did Ernest Shum, born in Estcourt and educated at Maritzburg College before he came to SACS. His father William had come to South Africa from Scotland to build the railway line at the point in Durban, South Africa’s first railway line, built in 1860. Shum went to the Transvaal as a miner and was playing for Transvaal when he toured with the Springboks, playing in the 9 – 3 victory at Twickenham, England’s first-ever defeat at that ground.

Ernest Hamilton Shum died in Welkom on 27 June 1952.

As if SACS had spent its all just before World War II, its representation in international rugby tended to peter out after the war, though not without producing two men who had great impact on South African rugby.

The first was Frank Whitmore Mellish, who was born in Rondebosch on 26 March 1897 and who died in Groote Schuur Hospital on 21 August 1965. In between he had a most eventful life. He was educated at Wynberg BHS, Rondebosch and SACS. During World War I, he reached the rank of major. After the War he played for Blackheath and was elected a Barbarian in the 1919-20 season. In 1920 he played for England in all four Five Nations matches. Against Scotland he played against a SACS man studying at Oxford, Denoon Duncan. In 1921 Frank Mellish became unique. That year he played for England, against Wales and Ireland. Then he returned to South Africa and was chosen for the first Springbok tour to New Zealand. Nobody else has ever achieved that and, with current IRB regulations, nobody will.

His rugby effort did not end with the end of his playing career. He took over as the convener of the national selectors after Bill Schreiner and was the manager of the 1951-52 Springboks, a remarkably happy and successful side. Danie Craven rated him the best Springbok manager of all time.

Frank Mellish’s ashes were scattered on the rugby ground at Newlands.

In 1924 and again in 1928 Dr Jack van Druten of Pretoria was in the Springbok side. He had Been born in Griquatown and was educated at SACS, UCT and Trinity College before settling in Pretoria where he played for Harlequins, Transvaal and South Africa. He was 91 when he died on 16 January 1989.

Frank Waring’s contribution was not only to rugby football, but to all sport for he later became a cabinet minister as Minister of Sport. He had a good career as a centre three-quarter, playing seven tests in the Thirties when Springbok rugby was certainly the best in the world. He was on Bennie Osler’s tour to the UK and Ireland in 1931 and then played in all five tests against the Wallabies in 1933, the only five-test series in the history of the game. Against Ireland he scored a famous try when he broke and drew the fullback with a man on his outside. Instead of passing he cut inside and scored. Lucky for him it came off! He was one of the great three-quarters of his time.

Frank Walter Waring was born in Kenilworth on 7 November 1908. He went to SACS and then on to UCT. He played provincial rugby for Western Province, when his clubs were UCT and Maitland, who were called the Butcher Boys from the colours of their jerseys, and Transvaal when he played for pirates. Later still, he played for Collegians in Durban.

The other SACS man who trod deeply in South African rugby was Cecil Moss. He was born in Riversdale in 1925 and educated at SACS and later at UCT where he qualified as an anesthetist. During the War he served in the 6th Armoured Division, for whom he also played. In fact he also played for Western Transvaal during the war. Afterwards he played for UCT and Western Province before moving up to natal, a smoothly fast centre. But he was chosen for South Africa as a wing and was Felix du Plessis’s vice-captain in that series that saw the All Blacks white-washed.

Afterwards Cecil Moss coached UCT, western Province and South Africa, and naturally he a selector, a man of passionate loyalty.

Players were not SACS’s only contribution to South African rugby.

Vivian Herbert Neser, whose nicknames were Boet and occasionally Knoppies, was, till the arrival of Freek Burger, South Africa’s most capped referee. In those days of scattered tests he refereed eight – one when the British Isles toured in 1924, all four when the All Blacks toured in 1928 and four of the five when the Wallabies first came in 1933. Two of the other tests in 1924 were also refereed by a SACS man – the great Billy Millar.

After the Union of South Africa was formed in 1910, Schreiner became president of the SARFB. He successes Sir David Graaff as High Commissioner.

Schreiner was succeeded by another SACS man, Jack Heyneman, the Master of Supreme Court for 13 years and later a steward of the SA Turf Club, who died on 28 May 1927. Like Schreiner, John Godlieb Brink Heyneman was the descendant of a German missionary.

Heyneman was succeeded by another SACS man, Andries Jacobus Pienaar who is better known as Sport. He was the son of a dominee

Jack Heyneman

in Aliwal North. The road between Newlands and the breweries is Sport Pienaar Road. A legal man, he worked for parliament as a composer of bills. He was in office when he died 12 October 1953, to be successes by Edgar Tudhope.

There was also a SACS succession in selecting. The great Bill Schreiner, Sport Pienaar’s great friend, was a selector from 1912 to 1951 and the convener of the selection committee from 1921 to 1951 – a world record that will not be equalled. He was then succeeded by Frank Mellish, who became a selector in 1937 and was one in four decades.

The first man to broadcast a rugby match in South Africa was Archie Shacksnovis, and the man who most put personality into rugby

broadcasting was the late CK Friedlander who was born on 20 August 1912 and died 29 July 1995.

These are just top performers. Heavens, there have been many others.

-Paul Dobson