We are going to mostly discuss the successes this week, and close with the losses. And we are starting closest to home, being part of the British mainland, though Cornish readers may wish me to say that they believe it to be an island, separated from us by the river Tamar. And as so it is only fitting that they have a language all their own.
So here we have John Gilbert Cock, footballer, who was born in Hayle, in Cornwall, on the 14th of November 1893. The Trading Card Database has him on fourteen cards
His first, amateur, sides, were West Kensington United, Forest Gate and Old Kingstonians, and then in March 1914 he started playing for Brentford; he even scored a goal for them, and they were keen for him to sign with them, but instead he chose to sign up with Huddersfield Town. However the date is the key for his footballing strip was replaced by khaki, and he joined the British Army, in the 17th Middlesex Regiment, better known as "The Footballers Battalion". He would eventually rise to Acting Sergeant-Major, being mentioned in dispatches, and even winning the Military Medal for "Bravery in the Field". In fact he was also reported missing, and thought to be dead for some time.
On his leaves he returned to football for Brentford, and his talent still shone through. He was even chosen to play in in the Victory International in 1919, which pitted Scotland, Wales, and Ireland against England over six rounds. However his appearance on the team was very important as he therefore became the first Cornishman to appear in an England Squad.
He wanted to return to Huddersfield once proper football commenced, but they were in financial difficulties and so they sold him, to Chelsea. They transferred him to Everton in 1923. So far he had scored fifty three goals in a hundred and ten appearances (between 1919 and 1923), and, in that year he was chosen to play himself in a movie "The Winning Goal". This was a comedy and is often cited as being the first football film. That is not true, because in 1911 a film called "Harry the Footballer" was released - and this is not proven to be the first footballing film either, it may just be the oldest which survives. Curiously, it was based on a play set in Lancashire, but it was filmed at Brentford F.C.`s ground, his old stomping grounds.
Perhaps that was why, in March 1925, he returned down south, to Plymouth Argyle. He was very successful with them and netted seventy two goals in just ninety games. He then moved to Millwall, and is generally regarded as being a major factor in their winning the Division three (South) title in 1927. In fact his name as their top goal scorer was only beaten in 1973. It was whilst he was at Millwall that he appeared in another movie, "The Great Game" (1930), again featuring many footballers in the cast. But if you look at the credits you will see the name "Rex Harrison", and that was the first time his name ever appeared on screen.
He would also return to Millwall later, at the end of the Second World War, and manage them through to the end of the 1940s. And he did not move far away after, for he ran a pub in New Cross. He died in April 1966, aged seventy-two.
His two younger brothers, Donald James (1896-1974) and Herbert (1900-1977) were also football players, and both of them played for Brentford, though Herbert only played in one match, in 1921, before joining QPR and then Arsenal, neither of which seem to have ever given him a proper game. Donald appears on seven cards, maybe more, but I have not found any of Herbert.
And there is an excellent biography online at ReadTheLeague.com/JackCock
Back to the subject of today`s card, Cornish, or Kernewek, which originated, some say, in France, was spoken by half the population of Cornwall in the Middle Ages, but died almost completely in December 1777, along with one of its last speakers, Dolly Pentreath, of Mousehole.
One of the reasons for its decline was that the Tudors made the Cornish speak only English, as retaliation for their uprising against the Crown in 1549. And though it almost certainly remained, to spite them, it was an underground language and almost certainly hidden from the public eye.
However in 1904 a man called Henry Jenner, rather a rebel, wrote a book on the language, which he had been intrigued by as a child on hearing odd snippets of a forgotten world, spoken by farmers and the like . Yet it was not until he was twenty-two, and working at the British Museum, that he discovered there was a poem in the collection. That fired him up, and he was determined to learn more. This became his lifetime passion, along with restoring many of Cornwall`s traditions and customs, though by the time he wrote the book he was almost sixty.
At the same time he started a campaign which wanted Cornwall to link up with other Celtic languages. In fact there was an International group called the Celtic Congress, and he applied to join. He thought they may say no, but they not only said yes, they sent him the reply, in Cornish. This led to him becoming President of the Old Cornwall Society, which had been founded by his friend, and fellow enthusiast for the Cornish way of life, Robert Morton Nance. Together they also started Gorsedh Kernow in 1928, which aims to preserve the county`s Celtic roots and Cornish spirit. And none were prouder when the first church service to be held in Cornish for two hundred and fifty years took place, in 1933.
Sadly, the following year, Henry Jenner died, aged eighty-five.
I have actually been told something really interesting, and that is that this card also appears in Gallaher`s "Famous Footballers" which you can see at the New York Public Library/GJGC. There were two versions of that Gallaher set, one with backs in green, which was issued in 1925, and one with brown backs, issued in 1926.
On the Gallaher version, the text reads "No. 18 JOHN GILBERT COCK the International centre-forward, who joined Plymouth Argyle in March, 1925, is a native of Hayle, in Cornwall, and played first as an amateur with Old Kingstonians. Then he was transferred to Huddersfield Town assisted Brentford periodically during the War, when he won the M.C. and was wounded, and became Staff Sergt. Major at Aldershot. After the War, Huddersfield transferred him to Chelsea for £2,500, and they passed him on to Everton in January, 1923. A scrupulously fair player and a crafty leader."
I said I wished that the inscription on our card was clearer, and that if anyone had a more readable version that they would like to scan, it would be much appreciated. So with many thanks to Mr. Price, we now have this much better scan. And that means you can clearly see the difference in lines one and two,where our card says "the Everton centre forward, who has been twice capped by England" and the Gallaher card says "the International centre forward, who joined Plymouth Argyle in March, 1925, "
Though I have not yet found his Military Cross, I can report that he was in the Duke of Cambridge`s Own (Middlesex Regiment) as part of the Seventeeth (Service) Battalion, also known as the First Football Battalion. And you can read a lot more about them on Wikipedia/FootballBatt.
As far as the card, this is one of three groups that appear in our original British American Tobacco reference book, RB,21, issued in 1952. However the listing includes a really useful table comparing the two buff background sets, so I will scan that some time and insert it - plus there are a hundred names to type out.
In the front of the book it adds that these sets were all issued in the Channel Islands, and also gives a date, for each, Set 1 being from 1923, Set 2 from 1924, and Set 3 from 1925.
In our original World Tobacco Issues Index the three versions are listed together, but not under British American Tobacco; instead they appear at the back of the book with the "Z" codes anonymous issues, under section 1.2.C - "Anonymous Issues (1) with Letterpress on back - English Language Issues Without References to Tobacco - Issues 1919 - 1940".
Their entry reads :
FAMOUS FOOTBALLERS. Sm. 64 x 39. See RB.21/458 ... ZB6-27
- Set 1. Grey background. Nd. (50)
- Set 2. Buff background. Nd. (50)
- Set 3. Buff background. Nd. (50)
This is identical in our updated version, but there is a new code, of ZB07-300