We continue our tribute to the eight players with Bristol Rovers connections who were killed in the First World War.
GEORGE ELMORE
b JAS 1880 Northwich, Cheshire
d 1.7.1916 France
Début: 5.9.03 v Swindon Town
Career: YMCA; Witton Villa; 1897 Northwich Victoria; 1898 Broadheath; 1899 Winnington Park; 1900 Witton Albion; August 1902 Broadheath; September 1902 Burton United (trial); December 1902 Manchester United (trial); January 1903 West Bromwich Albion [4,1]; August 1903 Bristol Rovers (£40); 9.9.04 Witton Albion; 10.11.04 Altrincham; 25.10.07 Glossop [35,16]; 25.5.09 Blackpool [34,7]; 25.8.10 Partick Thistle [52,18]; 3.6.12 St Mirren [62,17]; 25.8.14 Witton Albion; August 1915 St Bernard’s; 22.10.15 Broxburn United.
A travelling footballer, George Elmore scored on his West Brom début against Sheffield United on Valentine’s Day 1903 and his five goals in 21 Southern League matches as Rovers’ inside right included a brace at Upton Park in October 1903.
A labourer in the salt trade in Northwich, he had won the Crewe and District Cup in 1901 with Witton Albion and the Cheshire Senior Cup the following year, Elmore scoring in the final as Sale Holmfield were defeated 2-1.
Against Kettering in January 1904, he ignored a whistle from the crowd and, as hesitant defenders around him stopped, calmly scored what proved to be Rovers’ winning goal. Some records credit him with a hat trick against West Ham in October 1903, scoring after 15 and 25 minutes – the 60th minute third, though, is often credited to Daniel Wilson.
When a leg injury curtailed his time at Eastville, he headed back to Cheshire, scoring a hat trick in Altrincham’s away win at Oughtrington Park and helping his side win the Cheshire Senior Cup two years in succession. Elmore was top scorer in both 1904/05 and 1905/06, hitting four goals in a 6-0 victory over Newton Heath Athletic and was made club captain at Altrincham before returning to the Football League with Glossop and Blackpool.
He was in the Glossop side which defeated top flight Sheffield Wednesday in the FA Cup in February 1909, going out in the next round to eventual finalists, Bristol City; he scored in Glossop’s remarkable 7-3 win at Chesterfield in Division Two in December 1907 and added a brace against both Stockport County and Orient over Easter 1909. The following season
JOSEPH ARTHUR HULME
b 18.12.1877 Leek, Staffordshire
d 3.10.1916 Gueudecourt, France
Début: 7.9.01 v West Ham United
Career: Leek Pickford Vale; Leek Town; 2.11.96 Macclesfield; 23.6.97 Lincoln City [29,12]; 13.5.98 Gravesend United; April 1899 Wellingborough; 24.4.01 Bristol Rovers; 11.8.02 Brighton; 1907 Denton; 3.7.08 Macclesfield; 1910 Hooley Hill.
A Corporal in the 7th Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment (G/4581), Joe Hulme was one of over a million men of all nationalities killed during the Battle of the Somme and is one of the 72,195 names to those whose bodies were never found, inscribed on the Thiepval Memorial to the Missing.
His name is inscribed on Pier and Face 7c. Ostensibly a defender, his Southern League return had been 22 games for Gravesend, top scoring for the club in 1898/99 with nine goals, two goals in 101 matches at Brighton and, unable to break into the side at Wellingborough, four games with Rovers.
He was in the Brighton side which faced Rovers in seven separate Southern League encounters. Having played in 12 Combination matches, scoring four times, in his first stint with Macclesfield, he scored nine times in 29 Manchester League games during his second spell at the club, including the penultimate goal in his final game as Newton Heath were defeated 6-0 in February 1910.
He also had Football League experience under his belt, having scored twice each in home wins over Gainsborough Trinity and Luton Town in Division Two in the autumn of 1897, although his goal in the return fixture with Luton could not prevent a 9-3 thrashing. “A dashing player who did fine work”, as a contemporary handbook described him, he stood five feet seven inches tall and weighed in at 11 stone four pounds.
Joe Hulme married Mary Ellen Lilley (1877-1955) in 1905 and they had two daughters, Doris and Ethel and a son, Joseph and lived at 5 Copley Street, Tunstall.