After our last post regarding shareholdings we were sent some very interesting 1910, 1911 and 1914 registers of shareholders.

While various sources on the net have alluded in the past to Glasgow Rangers holding shares in The Arsenal, these lists show that they did purchase 2 shares sometime in [...]]]> By Mark Andrews and Andy Kelly

After our last post regarding shareholdings we were sent some very interesting 1910, 1911 and 1914 registers of shareholders.

While various sources on the net have alluded in the past to Glasgow Rangers holding shares in The Arsenal, these lists show that they did purchase 2 shares sometime in the latter part of 1910 and early 1911. They still hold shares, but their current holding is either a continuation of these early ones which due to share splits has now become a total of 16 shares or alternatively they were gifted some in the 1930s for assisting when Woolwich Arsenal were in financial straights, which they certainly were in 1910. This initial purchase was possibly prompted by George Morrell the Woolwich manager at the time and fellow shareholder, who had been at Rangers previously.

Whatever the real reason for their accumulation of 16 shares, their current parlous state suggests they would do well to sell, as financially Rangers appear to an outsider to be in a similar position to Woolwich Arsenal 100 years ago.

However two other teams felt that Woolwich Arsenal were the kind of football company they wanted to be a part of. 

The first team was Fulham who at around the same time as Rangers purchased one share. They disposed of this share sometime between  the first and second world wars. Their purchase was understandable as at this period Hall and Norris were heading up both clubs. 

The second team may be a surprise, but not if you read the title, for they were none other than our old friends: Tottenham Hotspur, who purchased one share sometime between May and July 1910. (The July date is our best assumption of when they sold it, but their name was still in the logs in 1916 with the total crossed out).

This purchase was not from a friendly team helping out another as at this period the teams were rivals; they had replaced Millwall as Woolwich Arsenal’s chief adversary for the past few seasons.

On the other hand if it was a hostile attempt to take over it was pretty poor as they only purchased one share and would have needed approximately 600 to gain control from Hall, Leavey and Norris. 

In the past Tony has requested information from readers who knew or thought they knew that their relatives played for Woolwich Arsenal.

As we are nearing the drafting section of the book, this is a similar request but concerning anyone whose relative was a director or who has been told their ancestor was a [...]]]> Hello,

In the past Tony has requested information from readers who knew or thought they knew that their relatives played for Woolwich Arsenal.

As we are nearing the drafting section of the  book, this is a similar request but concerning anyone whose relative was a director or who has been told their ancestor was a shareholder. We have the full list of the 1893 shareholders so can easily check to see who was a shareholder.  We have noted that amongst the original 923 shareholders was Charlie Buchan’s dad, as well as the great-great grandfather of one of the authors wives, who was a librarian at the Royal Arsenal.  

In particular, but not exclusively,  we are looking for any family or other information on the following directors who all served the club at Plumstead:

George Lawrance

George Leavey

James Cavey

Arthur Kennedy

William Craib (included as he was also the landlord of the “Who’d a thought it”, which was my local when living near Plumstead Common)

Dr John Clarke

Alfred McQueen

There are a few other publicans of interest

Thomas Loader (landlord of the Royal Oak)

John Bailey and his son Walter Bailey (Landlord of the Lord Derby)

George Pike Weaver (owner of the Green Man in Plumstead High Street and the Invicta Ground) 

We are also looking for family information about committee men from the Royal Ordnance Factories

Alf Singleton

William Reid

Henry Stewart (sometimes Steward)

George Champion

Please leave a comment or contact either Mark at mark.andrews33@ntlworld.com or Andy at: andrewkelly@ntlworld.com if you have any details you think may be of interest.

Want to contact Arsenal History Society or this blog? See important note at the foot of this article.

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Iconic moment 6: the appointment of Chapman

By Tony [...]]]> ——————————-

Woolwich Arsenal, the club that changed football.  Have your name in the book as an official sponsor.  Updated information here

Want to contact Arsenal History Society or this blog?  See important note at the foot of this article.

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Iconic moment 6: the appointment of Chapman

By Tony Attwood

Spring 1925.  It is almost Easter and Arsenal are in a bad way.

Having slid down the table through a set of six consecutive defeats across January and February in which we scored two and let in 14, Arsenal needed a really good Easter. But defeats to West Ham, Sunderland and Villa in late March in which one goal was scored and eight let in, meant the pressure was really on.  Relegation was likely.

A 1-1 draw with Cardiff on the Saturday before Easter offered a fraction of hope, but a defeat 2-0 to Preston who were already relegated followed by a 2-0 loss to WBA on Easter Monday made life in the first division next season look unlikely.

Two wins and two defeats in the last four matches however left Arsenal in 20th place – just one place above the relegation zone.  Crowds had sunk (just 10,000 turned up to the West Ham home game) and it was clear this could not go on.

Tom Ratcliff, the club’s trainer for 13 years, left the club of his own accord.  The club started to advertise for players, and then the manager, Leslie Knighton, was sacked or resigned (sometime between 4 May and 9 May 1925.)

Knighton is the source of a lot of the commonplace chit-chat about Lt Colonel Sir Henry Norris, and for some reason Knighton’s comments (mostly in his autobiography) have been taken as the gospel truth about Sir Henry.  But much of what Knighton said can be shown to be wrong (as with, for example, his comment about never being able to buy a player for over £1000 – when in fact he signed a number of players for more than this).  In his last four years with the club Knighton had taken Arsenal to 17th, 11th, 19th and 20th.  He was an abject failure.

On 11 May Arsenal advertised for a manager.  Herbert Chapman, who had just won the league with Huddersfield, and whose team had smashed Arsenal 5-0 at Highbury on February 14, applied.  We don’t know for sure why he applied – maybe he had talked with Sir Henry on February 14, or maybe he fancied London, or maybe he wanted to prove himself again, or…

Knighton worked out his notice and left on 16 May 1925.  Chapman’s Huddersfield were on a tour of Scandinavia, and returned on 4 June, and there was clearly then some talk between Chapman and Arsenal even if there had not been earlier.

At this moment the ludicrous and ultimately fruitless enquiry into the Voysey contract by the FA happened (I have covered this in an article in the Arsenal Uncovered series in the club programme), and on 8 June the Football League voted to change the offside law to two defenders behind the ball, rather than three.  (A couple of matches experimenting with this had been tried at Highbury in recent weeks).

Sir Henry Norris then opened discussions about the transfer of Charlie Buchan.  This was before Chapman signed for Arsenal – but Buchan claimed later that he was told about the transfer possibility by Chapman, which suggests the discussions started before the Scandinavian tour, and included the option of buying Buchan.  Maybe Chapman made signing Buchan one of his demands for taking the job.

On 10 June Hudersfield’s directors met with Chapman to discuss the move to Arsenal, and on 10th or 11th June 1925 Chapman called Sir Henry to accept a job offer.  Arsenal then bought a house in Hendon for Chapman and his family and they moved in the following year.

Around June 15 Arsenal announced that they had bought Highbury and some extra land from the College that was leasing it to the club.  Yet another new era was starting.

On Monday 22 June 1925, exactly 32 years to the day after Jack Humble took the chair for the first ever AGM of the newly formed Woolwich Arsenal Football and Athletic Club Ltd, Herbert Chapman took up the job of Secretary Manager of Arsenal FC.  An iconic moment if ever there was one.

On 15 August 1925 a crowd of 11,406 came to Highbury for a pre-season practice match.  On 22 August at the second such game 13,269 turned up.  Interest was growing.

But then on 29 August the season kicked off with….  a 1-0 home defeat to Tottenham.   Using much the same team as collapsed last season Chapman then produced four wins and two draws, ultimately taking Arsenal to its highest ever position in the league thus far: 2nd.  It was also the season that saw the dramatic change to the way in which Arsenal lined up – but that perhaps is best level for another occasion.

For now it is fair to say that the new era had begun.

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Current Series: The 10 iconic moments that defined Arsenal’s history

Part 1: Opening the club to all comers

Part 2: The Great Conspiracy – when they tried to shut Arsenal down

Part 3: Death and rebirth in 1910

Part 4: 100 years since moving to Highbury – our next anniversary and our fourth iconic moment

Part 5: Gaining promotion in 1919

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Want to contact Arsenal History Society?

I’m dropping out of site for a short while, but will be back mid-February.  If you want to contact the AISA Arsenal History Society please email Paul.Matz@aisa.org    If you have a comment on the site, please leave it in the normal way – Andy and Mark will be keeping an eye on the site.

Click here to become part of the definitive history of Woolwich Arsenal FC

Follow us on Twitter @Untold Arsenal

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By Tony Attwood

While we see promotion and relegation based on final league positions as normal today, for much of the existence of the Football League and [...]]]>  ————————————————————–

Click here to become part of the definitive history of Woolwich Arsenal FC

Follow us on Twitter @Untold Arsenal

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By Tony Attwood

While we see promotion and relegation based on final league positions as normal today, for much of the existence of the Football League and other leagues in England, this has not been the case.

Indeed even today it is not the case throughout football, for just as I write this the news has come in that the FA wants to reorganise some of the lower leagues in English football.   The idea is to change the number of leagues at a lower level and the FA is inviting clubs to apply to be in one league rather than another.  No relegation or promotion just applications.

On fact drom the very start until 1986 in fact, entry into the Football League always resulted from clubs by being voted in by other league clubs.  Similarly, expansion of the leagues – which inevitably meant promoting some clubs from a lower league to make up the numbers, was by a voting process on a club by club basis, rather than automatically being based on the final position in the league the previous season.

Sometimes the system worked smoothly, but sometimes it was fairly chaotic.   For example, in 1907 when Port Vale were in severe financial problems the club left the football league.  This was moderately common, and had gone on since the earliest days when Accrington left the league rather than face life in division 2.

But what then happened was more strange.  In October 1919, Port Vale returned mid-season.  Leeds City was thrown out for financial irregularities, and clubs applied for the right to take over the fixtures of that club.  Port Vale won the vote – and took over Leeds’ record to date.   Leeds City then reformed and were admitted back into the League as Leeds United a year or two later – again on a vote.

Clubs could also appear in the league out of nowhere, rather than be voted in after a good season outside the Football League.  The happened with Chelsea in 1905.  There was no Chelsea, just an empty sports stadium and an idea.  So an application was made to the Southern League on the basis that if a place could be found for the newly invented club, Chelsea would be formed, players found, and they would play at Stamford Bridge.

The Southern League said no (after an objection from Tottenham who were in the Southern League at the time) so Chelsea put in an application for the Football League instead and got a place.  The League did the same with other clubs – most notably Bradford City who got a place in order to establish football in a rugby dominated part of the country.

Some teams were also given places in the League because they had large grounds, even though they were not doing well elsewhere – Thames Association and New Brighton Tower were examples, although both failed to attract crowds and quickly folded.

It was not even the case that to be voted in or out of a league that clubs had to win the lower league.  Tottenham came 7th in the Southern League in 1908, and were given a place in the Football League, for example.

And into modern times when clubs at the foot of the 4th division had to re-apply each season to play in the league, it was not the bottom club that always got voted out (in fact most of the time no one got voted out, as the 3rd and 4th division clubs tended to vote for the incumbents in the hope that when they one day finished up in the bottom four, they too would be voted back in.  It was called “The Old Pals Act”).

But it could go wrong.  In 1960 to take just one example, Gateshead ended up 3rd from bottom of the 4th Division, but were ejected from the league on the chairman’s vote while the clubs ending up five and six points below them were re-elected.

I give this long background because the election of Arsenal to Division I in 1919 is often misunderstood.  The First Division was expanded by two for this season, and the phrase “everyone expected the bottom two of the First Division to be re-elected” (or something like that) is often used as a preliminary to suggesting something odd happened.  In fact it didn’t – all the normal procedures were followed (just as they were a little later in the season when Leeds City’s fixtures were taken over by Port Vale).

It is true that in the previous expansion in 1905 the bottom clubs in the First Division had been re-elected, but it was not agreed  beforehand – it was as a result of a vote that happened to go that way.

Certainly such precedents can give rise to expectations and this probably happened between 1946 and 1958, when every club applying for re-election to the Third Division South and the Third Division North was re-elected.  Each year by the 1950s everyone expected the bottom clubs to get re-elected – but the process still had to be gone through.  Gateshead probably thought it was a foregone conclusion that they would be re-elected, and were probably very surprised when it didn’t happen.  Maybe they called it a fix.  But it was a process.

But the fact is that that in 1919 there was no 12 year continuous history of what happens at the end of a season other than the fixed rules of promotion between division 2 to 1 of the top two, so most people would have been aware that the due process had to happen – and so lobbying took place, as we shall see below.

But we must note that 1919 had three issues to consider.   First, there had been no Football League since 1915, due to the war.  Second, the leagues were expanding.  Third the final season before the war had faced a match fixing event involving Manchester United and Liverpool.  They fixed an end of season match so Man U won and so ended up with one more point that Chelsea and thus avoided relegation.

The League had recognised this as fact in its enquiry before the outbreak of war, but nothing was done, so when discussions began in March 1919 about the new season there were several items on the table:

1.  What to do about Chelsea who had been unfairly relegated because of match fixing

2.  What to do about Manchester United and Liverpool who were guilty of match fixing

3.  How to expand the First Division to 22 clubs

4.  How to expand the Second Division to 22 clubs, taking into account that Glossop were not going to continue in the Second Division because of financial troubles.

It is sometimes written that Henry Norris fixed the promotion issues at the AGM of the Football League but in fact if Norris did anything it was that he became a better lobbyist than the other chairmen.

The debate started months before that, particularly in Athletics News, the highly esteemed weekly which dominated football journalism at the time.

This magazine was the first to take up Arsenal’s cause, this being the journal that wrote about Arsenal’s claim to one of the extra first division places through its heritage of having brought the professional game to the south, having seen off the opposition of the Kent FA and London FA who had tried (unsuccessfully to have Arsenal ejected from the associations for going professional) and who had been a successful first division club for many years before 1913.

Other clubs put in their bids for the extra first division places and they too lobbied.

Chelsea said that they should not have been relegated at all.  They came one point behind Manchester United, and that club had been found guilty of match fixing.

Tottenham said that they had been in the First Division in 1915, and despite coming bottom with just 8 wins in 38 games, they should be allowed to stay up having been in the top league for five consecutive years.  They also cited what had happened the last time the league was expanded.

Derby County and Preston North End pressed their cases on the basis that they had come in the top two in 1915, and so automatically would have had promotion.

This left the clubs below the top two, also putting in bids: Barnsley, Wolverthampton, Arsenal, Birmingham and Hull.  It is sometimes suggested that just Arsenal bid for a place in the top league at the expense of either Chelsea or Tottenham, but in fact all these clubs asked to be considered.  If Birmingham would have won the bid, and Tottenham had been defeated, then Tottenham would have had to argue that “Birmingham stole their place”.

But before the vote the League took a decision.  The outcry against Man U and Liverpool was so strong, Chelsea were given place, although it was decided not to take action against Manchester United and Liverpool and leave them in the first division on the grounds that too much time had gone since the event!

Second it was decided that the promoted clubs would go up as normal.  So that meant Tottenham, Barnsley, Wolverthampton, Arsenal, Birmingham and Hull were thrown together in a vote of league chairmen.  Only the top club would go up. Meanwhile, in a separate vote the chairmen had to vote on who would join the second division.

In the end Arsenal got the extra place in the first division and West Ham,  Coventry, Gateshead, Rotherman and Stoke made up the numbers in the second.

As always the club chairmen took into account anything they wanted to take into account, and this would have included the lobbying, their personal friendships, plus the crowds that promoted or newly entering clubs would bring – both home and away.  (As we show in our book on Woolwich Arsenal, Arsenal were the first team to create an away support, and this would have helped their cause.  Also Norris had built Arsenal a large stadium, and in those days match income was shared between home and away clubs.   And the ground had very easy access for teams from the Midlands and North which they appreciated).

The bad news was that the evil of the match fixing remained, and Man U and Liverpool went unpunished, knowing they could do what they liked with impunity.  As I said in an earlier commentary, if Tony Blair had been alive and working for the League he would have said that a line should be drawn under the events and we should move on.  It was that sort of deal.

Tottenham was not happy and spoke of Arsenal stealing their place, and perhaps many years later other clubs voted up and down, in and out thought much the same, but that was the system, both before and after the vote.  And sadly the fuss Tottenham made removed the pressure on the League to deal with Manchester U and Liverpool once and for all.

But Arsenal got their place in the first division, and have been there ever since.  It was an iconic moment for the club, for it encouraged Henry Norris to press ahead with his plans for the club, and working with Jack Humble he was then able to bring a certain Herbert Chapman into the club.

Current Series: The 10 iconic moments that defined Arsenal’s history

Part 1: Opening the club to all comers

Part 2: The Great Conspiracy – when they tried to shut Arsenal down

Part 3: Death and rebirth in 1910

Part 4: 100 years since moving to Highbury – our next anniversary and our fourth iconic moment

Arsenal’s 125th anniversary celebrations continued in the Jubilee Committee Room at the House of Commons in London on Thursday 12th January in a meeting hosted by Islington North MP Jeremy Corbyn, whose constituency includes the Emirates Stadium, and who is an Arsenal supporter.

Guest of honour was Philippa Dawson, the great great [...]]]> ———————–

Arsenal’s 125th anniversary celebrations continued in the Jubilee Committee Room at the House of Commons in London on Thursday 12th January in a meeting hosted by Islington North MP Jeremy Corbyn, whose constituency includes the Emirates Stadium, and who is  an Arsenal supporter.

Guest of honour was Philippa Dawson, the great great grand daughter of Jack Humble, the founding father of Arsenal FC – and to the surprise and delight of everyone present Philippa revealed the existence of a previously unknown cache of historic material concerning the life of Jack Humble, and of Arsenal.

Jack Humble was one of the men who founded Arsenal at the Dial Square Cricket Club in 1886.   He was also a player for the club, and from the early days a member of the committee that ran the club.

In 1891 he was part of the committee that proposed the historic motion that Royal Arsenal FC should become a professional club and two years later was elected the first ever chairman of Woolwich Arsenal FC as Arsenal entered the Football League.

In 1906 after 20 years service to the club as player, administrator and director Jack retired from his position, but four years later when the club was taken over by Henry Norris, Jack was the only one of the early directors that Norris sought out and brought back to the club.

Jack was immediately installed as a director once again, and in 1913 he effectively ran the club while Norris travelled across London seeking a new ground for Arsenal to play at.

Jack Humble continued as a director once Arsenal had moved to Highbury.  In the first world war he served his country using his expertise gained from his years working at the Royal Arsenal factories, before returning once again as a director in 1919 with Arsenal back in the First Division.

He was also still on the board with Norris (by then Lt Col Sir Henry Norris) when the historic invitation was put out for Herbert Chapman to take over as manager, and Jack continued to serve on the board until 1927, living to see Arsenal’s first triumph, in the FA Cup.

As such Jack Humble was the only man who was directly and centrally involved with Dial Square, Royal Arsenal, Woolwich Arsenal, The Arsenal and Arsenal FC – from the very foundation to Herbert Chapman.

In her speech Philippa Dawson revealed that after Jack’s death members of the family had moved to America and had taken with them many of Jack’s mementos and papers, and it is believed that they are still extant, in the United States.

This is obviously extremely exciting for all Arsenal historians and we are all hoping that the detail of these documents may be revealed for the first time in the near future.

The Celebration at the House of Commons was part of the activity of the AISA Arsenal History Society, which has been active over the past three years in unearthing the detail about Arsenal’s past.  At the launch copies of the cover of the Society’s next book, “Woolwich Arsenal: the club that made history” were on show, and one of the recent discoveries about the club’s early days (the battle with Royal Ordinance Factories FC) was revealed.  The hope was expressed that through the offices of Mr Corbyn the meeting might become an annual event.

There was also general agreement that the next big commemoration for the club should be September 2013 with the 100th anniversary of the move of the club to Highbury, and the hope was expressed that the club and the AISA Arsenal History Society will work together to make this a major event in the club’s calendar.

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This blog is dedicated to discussing and debating all issues from Arsenal’s past.  The current series is…

The 10 iconic moments that defined Arsenal’s history

Part 1: Opening the club to all comers

Part 2: The Great Conspiracy – when they tried to shut Arsenal down

Part 3: Death and rebirth in 1910

Part 4: 100 years since moving to Highbury – our next anniversary and our fourth iconic moment

There is a full index of past series and recent news items on www.blog.woolwicharsenal.co.uk

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By Tony Attwood

This is a series about iconic moments in the history of Arsenal, not about anniversaries that the club or the fans might like to celebrate but with Highbury the [...]]]> ———————————

Click here to become part of the definitive history of Woolwich Arsenal FC

Follow us on Twitter @Untold Arsenal

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By Tony Attwood

This is a series about iconic moments in the history of Arsenal, not about anniversaries that the club or the fans might like to celebrate but with Highbury the two combine.   Because Woolwich Arsenal FC moved to Highbury in the summer of 1913, and in September 2013 – just 20 months hence – we will have the 100th anniversary.

Does that anniversary matter, given that we don’t play there any more?

It certainly does, and the move to Highbury was iconic for a very simple reason.  Without the move to Highbury from the Manor Ground in Plumstead there would be no Arsenal today.

In Plumstead Woolwich Arsenal was dying through a combination of factors.

1: The crowds were declining dramatically because of lay offs in the Royal Arsenal factories (and in particular the closure of the torpedo factory), because the club had failed to build on its successes in earlier years when it had reached the FA Cup semi-final two years running, and because the board had had a long period of selling off top players in order to reduce losses.

2: The people of Plumstead and surrounding areas had never given Henry Norris the credit he deserved for paying off all the club’s debts and saving it from extinction in 1910.  As a result they would neither turn up in large numbers to the matches in Plumstead nor would they buy shares in the club in order to take power away from Henry Norris.

3: The club was failing on the pitch, and in fact in 1912/13 had the worst ever season in the history of the club.

In 1910 Henry Norris had given his word that he would keep Woolwich Arsenal at Plumstead for a year.  He had then extended that to two years, and then three – but seeing the way the club was crumbling, in 1912 he started to look for a new ground.

The story of how he came upon Highbury, of the opposition put in his way from Tottenham Hotspur who tried every possible maneouver to get other clubs in the league to object to the move, of the local residents who formed the Highbury Defence Committee, and the antics of the local council who tried to block the move, are all told in “Woolwich Arsenal: the club that changed football” which will be published in April.

But for now we might focus on the huge success of the move.  The last few games in Plumstead saw Woolwich Arsenal play to tiny crowds (around 3000 for the last match), whereas the opening matches at a half built Highbury played to over 20,000.

Today if anyone thinks of Norris they see him through the bitter words of Leslie Knighton, a poor manager who was sacked by Norris, and angry Tottenham supporters who didn’t like an invader on their patch.  But in fact here, as in 1910, Norris was incredibly forward looking.  What’s more he risked huge chunks of his personal finance to help the club and to turn it into what it became in the 1930s – the dominant force in football.

Highbury was chosen by Norris because he understood that the new era of football needed grounds near channels of transport, and Highbury was that, with its underground and overground services.

On September 6, 2013 we shall celebrate 100 years since the opening match at Highbury (we beat Leicester Fosse 2-1, opening the season with three straight wins).  I really do hope the club will join with the Arsenal History Society in making that day, and the home fixture which occurs nearest to that day, a very special moment so that all of us who watched matches at Highbury can remember just what that stadium meant, and what Henry Norris did for us all, in building it.

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The 10 iconic moments that defined Arsenal’s history

Part 1: Opening the club to all comers

Part 2: The Great Conspiracy – when they tried to shut Arsenal down

Part 3: Death and rebirth in 1910

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Arsenal History Society will be meeting at the House of Commons this week.

By Tony Attwood

On January 12 2012 in the historic setting of the House of Commons, the AISA Arsenal History Society will hold its first social. And as part of that event my colleagues and I in the Society will take the opportunity to launch the forthcoming book written by three of the officers [...]]]>  

By Tony Attwood

On January 12 2012 in the historic setting of the House of Commons, the AISA Arsenal History Society will hold its first social.  And as part of that event my colleagues and I in the Society will take the opportunity to launch the forthcoming book written by three of the officers of the Society.

There is also a chance for anyone interested in Arsenal’s history to take a step into the history of the club by being a sponsor of the book.

WOOLWICH ARSENAL, THE CLUB THAT CHANGED FOOTBALL aims to be the ultimate definitive history of the club from 1893 to 1914.

And I say “definitive” because for the first time in well over 100 years we have been back to the original material relating to the club during this period and verified the history of the club.

In doing this we have turned Arsenal’s history upside down.  We’ve discovered a huge raft of stories and issues, that have either never been reported before, or if they have been reported, have been reported wrongly.

My belief, having now been involved in co-writing the book for the past year, is that it is just about impossible for anyone to write a volume about  Woolwich Arsenal FC which will supersede this book.

Of course it is always possible that there are things we have not yet found – items that are buried so deep in the archives that even all the hours, days and weeks that Mark Andrews and Andy Kelly have spent researching the original material have failed to turn them up.

But these documents will not only be buried deep, they will also relate to issues that no other document refers to.   Which, I suggest, means they will be rather obscure details, rather than major events.

In short I truly believe this is going to be the ultimate Woolwich Arsenal story, and this is going to be the book that people refer to for all time.

So all things told we think we have written the definitive history of the club, its struggles, its triumphs, its directors, its fans.

This is how you can be part of the project…

The book should be published in April 2012 and will retail at £12.95, but if you order a copy now, you will also get your name (or any dedication you want) in the book on the “Sponsors” page.  That page will then be part of this definitive book through all its editions.

We will also reprint that list of sponsors on the Arsenal History home page and on a separate site which will include details of all the sources of data and information that we have used.

The book will be sold via the publishers’ web site and we very much hope will also be sold through Amazon, the Arsenal superstore at the Emirates, and Arsenal.com’s on line service.   (We can’t guarantee the latter, because Amazon and Arsenal will make their own decisions, but “Making the Arsenal” is sold through these routes and there is not reason to believe that “Woolwich Arsenal” won’t follow.)

There is no extra charge for being a sponsor and having your name (or the name of a friend or loved on) in the book – all that happens is you pay for your copy of the book now, rather than on publication.  That of course helps us pay some of the development costs.

To find out more please take a look here

You will also see a rough of the cover of the book as well as details of how to become a sponsor.

I do hope you find the book of interest and will want to have your own copy.

If 1893 was traumatic, with Arsenal fighting corruption and intrigue in the form of Royal Ordnance Factories (whose sole purpose was to close down Arsenal and set up a rival Plumstead club), 1910 was, in a very real sense, the end.

Arsenal had risen, and risen fast. True they had not won [...]]]> By Tony Attwood

If 1893 was traumatic, with Arsenal fighting corruption and intrigue in the form of Royal Ordnance Factories (whose sole purpose was to close down Arsenal and set up a rival Plumstead club), 1910 was, in a very real sense, the end.

Arsenal had risen, and risen fast.  True they had not won anything, but the club was by 1910 a Division I team with two FA Cup semi-finals behind them, and an established reputation as the club that brought league football and professionalism south.

Other copy-cat clubs had followed.   Fulham, which was actually formed before Royal Arsenal, had followed the route into professionalism and ultimately the football league.  Chelsea had been given a place in the Football League without ever playing a game and without having even got a single player registered on their books.  Tottenham were one of a number of clubs that from outside the league had actually reached the FA Cup final, and had also later followed Arsenal into the league, as had near neighbours Clapton Orient.

But, unknown to many of those who paid their 6d to stand on the Manor Fields terraces, by 1910 Arsenal, the trailblazers and forerunners of professional football in the south, was in real trouble.

Jack Humble had retired from the board in 1906 after 20 years of dedicated service to the club, and Mr Leavey, the stalwart benefactor of the club who had done so much to keep it afloat in the past had indicated that he could no longer manage to do so.

After the two FA Cup semi-finals the policy of the club began to change with top players being sold, and raw recruits coming in.   If the idea was to make cash out of the expanding transfer market, Arsenal chose the wrong moment, for after years of hugely increasing transfer fees the rise in the cost of players started to decline.

With competition from across London, with a failure to capitalise on the excitement from the FA Cup semi-finals, and with an adoption of a policy that could not work in the long wrong, Arsenal started to sink, and in 1910 the awful truth emerged.  The club was close to the end.

The man who came in to rescue the club was the Mayor of Fulham, Henry Norris.  He had several plans – the first being to form Fulham Arsenal playing as a united team at Craven Cottage.

When the League allowed this, but only with the club playing in Division II, Norris moved on to plan B – which was to have Arsenal playing every alternate saturday at Craven Cottage as a separate club from Fulham.

There was merit in this plan since Craven Cottage was more accessible than the Manor Ground and with only one ground’s expenses to provide for, the plan could have seen both clubs in profit.

But this plan was turned down by the existing board.  So Plan C was adopted.  Norris would take over the club, pay off all the debts, and guarantee that the club would stay in Plumstead for at least a year.

In fact he did more than shell out a lot of money from his own pocket.  He brought back Jack Humble, who rejoined the board in 1910, and he actually kept the club in south east London for three years rather than one.

Arsenal thus survived their second major crisis, and Norris stayed with the club for 17 years, being involved at the heart of three further iconic moments in the club’s history, as we shall see in subsequent episodes of this series.

The 10 iconic moments that defined Arsenal’s history

Part 1: Opening the club to all comers

Part 2: The Great Conspiracy – when they tried to shut Arsenal down

Reference points

• The AISA Arsenal History Society
• Making the Arsenal
• Arsenal Uncovered
• Untold Arsenal

Twice in the first 25 years of its existence Arsenal football club came to the very brink of going out of existence.

Yet in virtually all the histories of the club the first of these disasters (in 1893) is written (if at all) as a minor incident of no [...]]]> By Mark Andrews and Tony Attwood

Twice in the first 25 years of its existence Arsenal football club came to the very brink of going out of existence.

Yet in virtually all the histories of the club the first of these disasters (in 1893) is written (if at all) as a minor incident of no particular significance.  The second (in 1910) is mentioned more often, but again only in a line or two.

But in fact what happened in each case was that not only did Arsenal avoid collapse and disintegration, it emerged each time far stronger than before.

The 1893 issue focused on Royal Ordnance Factories FC – a vanity project run by ex-directors of Royal Arsenal who couldn’t get their way at Royal Arsenal FC, and who perceived themselves to be of the gentlemanly class.  They were very vindictive in their attempts to halt Royal Arsenal FC, their tactics including working with the landlord of the Invicta ground in a programme that included doubling the rent, demanding their own representative within the club who would be the sole arbiter of whether the club was being run properly or not, bribing the landlord of Royal Arsenal’s alternative choice of home so that he would not sub-let the land to the club, and even setting up a complex scheme whereby Royal Arsenal might be induced to rent the alternative ground (the Manor Fields), spend a fortune upgrading the ground,  and then nullify the lease, leaving Royal Arsenal both without a ground, and bankrupt.

ROFFC was in fact a spoiler outfit which almost immediately ran its course, once it was obvious RAFC had seen off their challenge in purchasing the Manor Field.  Indeed they only lasted afew years and were disbanded by late 1896.

From the evidence, Woolwich Arsenal Football and Athletic Company Limited came about due to the quick thinking of the directors of Royal Arsenal, and their recognition of just what they were up against in Royal Ordnance Factory Football Club.   George Weaver, the scheming landlord of the Invicta ground looks today like a pantomime villain, and yet the threat he and his gang posed in terms of Royal Arsenal Football Club was very real.

The planning to start up ROFFC was underway from late 1892. Around this period there are allusions in RAFC meetings that Weaver had not spoken to Royal Arsenal about ground lease renewals for up to 7 months, and is difficult to see the subsequent events in any other way other than a concerted effort between the three ROFFC leading lights and Weaver to remove RAFC from the Invicta ground from the latter part of 1892 onwards

This resulted in the Royal Arsenal Football club forming a limited company and changing their name to the aforementioned Woolwich Arsenal Football and Athletic Company Limited, taking over the assets of the Royal Arsenal Football Club on 3^rd May 1893. This stock flotation enabled them to raise money with the intention of renting a new ground and allowing them to move away from the Invicta Ground.

However, the real credit must go to George Lawrance who at a critical time, when it appeared ROFFC were going to purchase the Manor Field themselves and thus leave Royal Arsenal’s newly formed Woolwich Arsenal club high and dry, ensured the freehold of the Manor Field was obtained by arranging contracts and the deposit with the freeholder of the Manor Ground in early June. It was later in the year that all the directors signed the “joint and several mortgage” which was a personal loan against the body of directors as individuals not the company.

This was an incredible thing to do, for these men risked everything in their lives – their homes, their possessions, their bank accounts, everything – to protect the club that they had formed just seven years earlier.

This action is as critical to the survival of the club as the later financial support given by George Leavey and then Henry Norris, and it is important to note that all the 1893 directors were personally involved.

Had there been no concerted attack, it seems very unlikely that Royal Arsenal Football Club would have changed their name, formed a new company, moved from the Invicta Ground and purchased a new ground, the Manor Field, all in the space of a few months in early 1893.

There is one final point we should note about this iconic moment.  In Alan Roper’s book, David Danskin is alleged to have supported Royal Ordnance over Woolwich Arsenal football after 1893. This event made us re-evaluate Danskin’s role in Arsenal’s formation, as for him to support a team whose sole aim was to destroy Royal Arsenal FC would have placed him in a different less favourable light than currently portrayed by the club. We can confirm that there is no evidence from the sources we have utilised that he was involved in any way at all.

My thought in this new series is not to find the 10 greatest moments (3 cup and league doubles and that sort of thing) but rather the moments that defined Arsenal as a club, and set out the way things would go in the future.

It is fairly obvious that in such [...]]]> By Tony Attwood

My thought in this new series is not to find the 10 greatest moments (3 cup and league doubles and that sort of thing) but rather the moments that defined Arsenal as a club, and set out the way things would go in the future.

It is fairly obvious that in such a series one has to start with the beginning – the foundation of Royal Arsenal on 1 December 1886.

Prior to that date it is possible that the group of men who founded the Royal Arsenal club on 1 December did play a game in October.  That might be the case because there is a record in the press in 1887 of Arsenal beating Eastern Wanderers “again”, combined with the fact that in that inaugural season Arsenal played four clubs home and away, and one club (Eastern Wanderers) at home.  That Eastern Wanderers away game would add to the symmetry.

But we don’t know when the game was played, if it was.  I won’t go into all the details here of why some dates are ruled in and others out, but if there was such a game (as Elijah Watkins reported) it was almost certainly either played in on a saturday in early October 1886, or during the Christmas closure of the factories in Woolwich between Christmas and New Year.

However to return to the defining moment in 1886.  For me that was the moment when, after the club was set up as a sub-section of Dial Square Cricket Club the decision was taken to throw open membership to anyone in Woolwich Arsenal and the surrounding area who was interested in football.

Had this not happened there is every chance that the club would have remained a tiny non-entity, and could well have gone the way of Eastern Wanderers and Woolwich United into utter obscurity.

That simple decision to open the club to all-comers (to be fair, combined with the decision to call the club by the incredibly powerful and iconic name “Royal Arsenal FC”) in a moment created the club that could rise to pre-eminence in Kent and south London.

So, that’s my first iconic moment.  Next up, the battle with Royal Ordnance Factories FC.

The Chronology of Arsenal – the start of our project to build a chronology of the club’s key moments

Christmas scheduling: when Arsenal played four games in five days

History in the Making: why we keep changing the Arsenal story

After the 125 celebrations – when is the next significant anniversary for Arsenal FC

Previous news items

Reference points

• The AISA Arsenal History Society
• Making the Arsenal
• Arsenal Uncovered
• Untold Arsenal