You're going to hear a lot about All Blacks and Springboks rugby this year – after all, it is 100 years, on August 13, since the first Test match was played between the two future rivals.
The 1921 tour to New Zealand by the South Africans had been anticipated since the All Blacks team of 1905-06 had their footsteps followed by the Springboks in 1906-07.
But, while the All Blacks lost the one Test in an otherwise triumphant tour, the South Africans lost to Scotland 0-6, and to Cardiff 0-17 while drawing 3-3 with England.
South Africa toured again in 1912-13, this time completing a grand slam of Test wins 65 years before the All Blacks did it, but losing to Newport 3-9, London 8-10 and Swansea 0-3.
It had been hoped the two southern hemisphere giants could meet, but it wasn't possible before the outbreak of the First World War. New Zealand's first invitation to South Africa for a tour was made in 1907 but was declined. In late-1911 another invitation was issued for a tour in 1912, but South Africa said it didn't have time to raise the money to tour, while a similar invitation was declined in 1913.
The world-changing Great War did ensure representative teams from the two countries, albeit service sides, did meet to provide an early assessment of how things might turn out when the sides were at full strength.
New Zealand servicemen played rugby at every opportunity throughout the conflict, most notably in 1917 when a team known as the 'Trench Blacks' won the Somme Cup, which could equally have been called the Survivors Cup, a series played against other Allied divisions along the Western Front. The series was played possibly as a morale-boosting pick-me-up soon after the Somme campaign ended. New Zealand lost around 7400 men killed or injured during the First Battle of the Somme that opened on July 1 and continued until November 18, claiming a million casualties among all nations.
The Trench Blacks, NZ Rugby Museum
Field Marshal Earl Haig felt physical fitness would be a requirement to outlast, and defeat, the Germans so the emphasis went on developing a sports programme while the armies regrouped over winter.
New Zealand, naturally, turned to rugby for the majority of its troops and set up a training camp before challenging any division to a game. A ready supply of superior food was an incentive for players to be involved.
The Trench Blacks, between February and April 1917 beat: the British Division Select 74-3, the British Division Select 44-0, the Royal Engineers 22-0, the Welsh Division 18-3, the Irish Division 49-3, the Royal Flying Corps 82-0, the Welsh Division 3-0, France 40-0 and NZ Hospital 44-0.
The French game was especially significant. It was played the day after the United States of America entered the war, and there was a carnival atmosphere surrounding the game played at Vincennes, the same stadium that had hosted the 1900 Olympic Games.
New Zealand had enjoyed the advantage of time together, whereas the French were pulled from the trenches, the result of a letter sent to 23 French generals to request specific players be released. Eight internationals took their part as a result of the requests being answered.
One of the New Zealanders, flanker Reg Taylor, was capped for the All Blacks against Australia before the war. He had survived Gallipoli, the Somme and the first two weeks of the Battle of Messines but, two months after the Paris game he was killed, on June 20, in action with the 1st Battalion of the Wellington Regiment.
Arthur 'Ranji' Wilson, of West Indian descent, was regarded among the best flankers playing before the war and was a key player in the side.
The players were feted by the game's sponsor Le Journal afterwards, but it was soon back to more mundane things, the day-to-day drudgery of war.
Once the war was over, time needed to be filled before troops could return to New Zealand and sport, again, filled the void. The King's Cup was arranged and two New Zealand Army XVs toured Britain and Ireland. They played 32 games, winning 28, losing once 3-4 to Monmouthshire, and drawing three.
The best of the two teams were selected to take part in the King's Cup. They beat the RAF 22-3. Canada 11-0. South Africa 14-5, at Twickenham, and England 6-3. They were beaten 6-5 by the Australian Imperial Forces side but still had done enough to qualify for the final on April 16 where they beat England again, 9-3. They followed that with a win over a French Forces XV at Twickenham. They had a three-game visit to France winning the first game at Colombes Stadium 16-10, the second at Pau 16-6 and the third at Toulouse 14-13, the last game being notable for France leading until late in the game before the New Zealand forwards applied their power to ensure the win was secured.
King George V presents the King’s Cup to NZ Army team captain James Ryan. NZ Rugby Museum
The New Zealanders made a big impression wherever they went and their attitude was shown when Gunner M.P. Naughton, the team's secretary, sent a farewell message to the Yorkshire County Committee:
As regards our share in the bigger game 'over there' we do not claim to have done very much, but we gave of our best, and sometimes when my mind runs back to some of those 'treks' up that immortal Ypres-Menin road, and I remember the many good men who went up to their end, I am not speaking idly when I tell you I will curse the Hun all the days of my life. On my last day in the field, and coming back from the line, I went to look for a decent place to bury a sergeant friend of mine who was killed the night before, and I ran up against a little cross which proved to mark the resting place of poor old David Gallagher [sic], the captain of the original All Blacks. Though he was no personal friend of mine, still he was one of us, and I am telling you the truth when I saw the Huns paid heavily for that life."[1]
South Africans realised a tour by a New Zealand team could revive interest in rugby after the war. Now, there was much more interest among South Africans about the New Zealand game. Research done by South African scholar Floris J.G. van der Merwe, of the Department of Sport Science at Stellenbosch University, showed the South African Rugby Board (SARB) decided, at its annual general meeting on 31 March 1919 to invite a New Zealand Defence Force team to tour. It cabled the South African High Commissioner in London on April 1, asking if it would be possible to arrange a team from Australia or New Zealand to break their journey home in Cape Town to undertake a six-week tour. South Africa would pay travelling and hotel expenses.
It happened that the High Commissioner was William Philip Schreiner a notable liberal who was a former president of the SARB, and a Prime Minister of the Cape Colony. Schreiner advised on May 19 that the arrangements for a tour had been completed, provisionally, for a team of 29 from NZ Services. The team was due to leave England at the end of May on a voyage that would take three weeks.
As it turned out, the team was to leave on June 7 and expected to arrive on June 28.
On June 2, the same day as the message on the travel details was sent, the SARB met in Cape Town, where it was realised the visiting team might include Maori.
Referring to the notes of the meeting, van der Merwe highlighted the comments:
The Board then discussed the question of the visit clashing with the Cape Universities tour in the Transvaal, and also the question of procedure in view of the fact that the New Zealand team was believed to contain one or more Maoris. After a long discussion, it was decided by Mr [Bill] Schreiner [the ambassador's son] that the following cablegram should be sent to the High Commissioner in London:-
'Confidential if visitors include Maoris tour would be wrecked and immense harm politically and otherwise would follow. Please explain position fully and try arrange exclusion'.[2]
Van der Merwe wondered whether the SARB stance and that of his son in supporting the motion to exclude Maori might have contributed to Schreiner Senior's death on June 28. He had been unwell since 1917 and went to Wales to recuperate after an agreement had been reached with the New Zealanders to tour.
In time, it was learned two members of the New Zealand team were excluded on racial grounds. Maori Parekura Tureia, a five-eighths who would later play for Hawke's Bay-Poverty Bay and captain the Maori All Blacks, within four days of each other, against the 1921 Springboks, and kicked a conversion in each game. Serving as a captain in the 28 Maori Battalion in the Second World War, Tureia was killed in action at Alamein in November 1941. It was published by Tureia's home town Poverty Bay Herald that he had returned home having missed the boat the team was on, literally, not figuratively, as happened. Mixed European/West Indian Nathaniel Arthur 'Ranji' Wilson, born in Christchurch, and who played 10 Tests from 1908, later serving as a New Zealand selector, was also omitted from the team as a result of the South African request.
Wilson sailed home later, meeting up with some of his teammates in Durban when his ship was in port and the team were playing in Natal. The Natal Witness described him as a Pacific Islander and said since he was 'perhaps' the greatest player in the team, it would be good if he could be included.
Their treatment was the first of many disgraces that would be foisted upon New Zealanders as a result of South Africa's racial attitudes.
The 1919 NZ Army team.
South African journalist Paul Dobson later claimed the NZ Army team captain Charlie Brown played for the Maori in 1913. The team management said at the time he had played as a guest player. But later, New Zealand commentator Winston McCarthy, said he believed Brown was a Maori. More recently, statistician Clive Akers said Brown was one of two non-Maori players who appeared in the NZ Maori team against Australia, in an unofficial game in Auckland. The Australians were awaiting a ship to take them home while the Maori had just returned from a tour of Australia and the game was played as a benefit for a Maori player who broke his leg in the opening game of the tour.
The N.Z. Army team selected was:
Fullbacks: Sergeant-Major J.G. O'Brien (Auckland), Sergeant W.L. Henry (South Canterbury.
Three-quarters: Sergeant J. Stohr (Taranaki), Lieutenant E.W. King (assistant manager, Wellington), Sergeant Eddie Ryan (Wellington), Sergeant W.A. Ford (Canterbury), Staff-Sergeant P.W. Storey (South Canterbury).
Five-eighths: Sergeant R.W. Roberts (Taranaki), Lieutenant G.J. McNaught (Wanganui), Sergeant-Major James Ryan (N.Z.P.S., vice-captain, Wellington), Sergeant W.R. Fea (Otago).
Halves: Staff-Sergeant Charles Brown (captain, Taranaki), Sergeant D. McK. Sandman (Canterbury).
Wing-forwards: Sergeant A.A. Lucas (Auckland), Sergeant A.P. Singe (Auckland).
Hookers: Sergeant M. Cain (Taranaki), Staff-Sergeant H.G. Whittington (Taranaki), Sergeant S.J. Standen (Wellington), Staff-Sergeant E.W. Hasell (Canterbury).
Locks: Lieutenant J.E. Moffitt (Wellington), Sergeant J.A. Bruce (Wellington and Auckland).
Packers: Sergeant J. Kissick (Taranaki), Sergeant A.H. West (Taranaki), Sergeant E.H. Bellis (Wanganui), Sergeant A. Gilchrist (Wellington), Staff-Sergeant R. Fogarty (Otago, Taranaki and Auckland), Staff-Sergeant E.J. Naylor (Otago), Lieutenant E.L.J. Cockroft (Southland).
Manager: Lieutenant R.W. 'Wally' Baumgart.
So far as the 1919 tour was concerned, New Zealand's specialisation of positions in the forwards was a new concept to the South Africans. Used to playing a 3-2-3 scrum formation, the South African sides packed down as they arrived for scrums with no set order. New Zealand was more rigid in having specific positions in their 2-3-2 scrum.
Interest in the tour was immense with large crowds in attendance at all venues. It was acknowledged the New Zealand game was more enterprising than the South African version. The ability of New Zealand's forwards, in attack and defence, made a big impression and the lessons were absorbed. The ability of the New Zealand forwards with the ball in hand was an alien concept to the South African fans. The running of the ball was the job of the South African backs.
The tour record was: v Western Province Country Clubs won 8-6; v Western Province Town Clubs 3-3; v South-Western Districts 23-0, v Eastern Province 15-0; v Orange Free State 16-5; v Griqualand West 3-8; v Witwatersrand 6-0; v Mines 24-3; v Pretoria 5-4; v Transvaal 5-3; v Natal 17-3; v Western Province Universities 8-9; v Western Province 6-17; v Western Province XV 20-3, v Natal 11-4.
Their opening game, in Cape Town, was against a Western Province Country XV and was won 8-6, the team captain Charlie Brown scoring the first try of the tour while Dick Roberts scored the second. Up 8-0 at the turn, the NZ Army side conceded a penalty goal and a try to Versfeld, a fine forward who had played against the side in the King's Cup. A feature of the game was the captain of the home team was T.B. Pienaar, who would become the captain of the 1921 Springboks to New Zealand.
The next game against Western Province Town was a tougher affair setting the trend for many of the contests between the two nations. However, the New Zealanders won praise for the way they played the game.
Heavily tested in every department, it can be written without fear of contradiction that cleaner players and better sportsmen than the New Zealanders it would be impossible to meet. They came with comparatively new methods and original ideas; in a conservative community the task of the missionary is not an easy one, but by the absolute fairness of their methods they have disarmed all criticism, and proud indeed is South Africa to have them with us.[3]
The Army backs disappointed in the contest against a side including four members of the great Springbok side that toured Britain and Ireland in 1912. Including Jack Immelman, who captained the Western Province side, and the Morkels, Gerhard, Royal and Harry.
Their better effort in beating South-West Districts at Oudtshoorn 23-0 drew comparisons with the 1912 Test against when South Africa beat Scotland 16-0, with the forward display being ranked even better than the Springboks displayed.
When South Africa has developed its forwards like the New Zealanders, who can run like three-quarters, are untiring in every quarter of the game, and are never at a loss to know what to do, and in the process of development its backs do not suffer, then and only then would the No.3 Springbok team (1921) be capable of approaching New Zealand form and tour the All Black country with success.[4]
Eastern Province provided the fourth game with a record crowd at St George's Park. NZ Army won 15-0 but the general consensus was they should have done much better. Among the try scorers was Don Sandman, the New Zealand cricketer while Eddie Ryan, the five-eighths, landed a penalty goal from halfway. Sandman, toured Australia with the New Zealand cricket team in 1913-14 and with 41 wickets from his leg-spin bowling he proved the most successful bowler on tour. He gained his place ahead of future Australian leg-spinner Clarrie Grimmett. He played 55 first-class cricket games and took 170 wickets at 26.66.
After the game, home captain Tom Van Vuuren, a 6ft 4 ½ inch and 15 stone forward who toured with the 1912 side said:
My opinion is that it's up to us to adopt the style of the New Zealanders, for as long as we retain the present one there's no hope for us.[5]
A 16-3 win over Orange Free State in Bloemfontein followed before they ventured to Kimberley to play Griqualand West – an experienced side led by F.J. 'Uncle' Dubbin, who had toured as a back with the 1906 and 1912 sides to Britain and Ireland, and with forward F.A. Bennetto, who had played against the New Zealanders in the King's Cup tournament. Bennetto scored the first try when the Army side tried to run the ball from their own 25-yard area and were caught by the fast home defence. A further blow occurred when fullback [Bill] Henry left the field with a damaged knee. Down 0-8 at halftime, the Army side could land only a penalty goal in the second, losing 3-8.
Moving to Johannesburg to play Witwatersrand (Rand) they came up against their toughest forward opponents to date but came away with a 6-0 win. Four of the 1912 side played while another, J. van Rooyen would tour New Zealand in 1921. However, the combination in the Army side was back to its best, also in Johannesburg, against the Mines team with van Rooyen playing again as well as three more members of the 1912 team, but they were unable to contain the New Zealanders as they ran in four tries in their 24-3 win.
Against Pretoria, they squeaked a 5-4 win although some of the comments were interesting.
The football was absolutely disappointing. The visitors, who are magnificent athletes and good sportsmen, play a game of their own. They cover up wonderfully, and obstruct immensely, and their interpretation of the rules of the scrum is widely divergent from the accepted tenets of the game.[6]
Transvaal was next, back in Johannesburg, where the NZ Army defence denied the home team, in spite of their determined efforts to score. What surprised in this game was the home team tried a 2-3-2 scrum before adopting a 3-4 pack in the manner employed by Wales. Transvaal used Trubelhorn as a wing forward to counter the Army team's, Snowy Lucas. This came about as E. Riordan, the Transvaal captain, had played against the New Zealanders in the King's Cup, and in the Rand and Mines games. Apart from Trublehorn, he also employed support player Joffe to spoil the New Zealand play. The change eventually took its toll on Trublehorn, and Lucas was able to dominate through the final stages. But the win came at a cost as Moke Belliss, who locals believed was one of the best forwards ever seen in South Africa, dislocated his shoulder.
Five of the Natal team in Durban would be on the 1921 tour with the Springboks. But the 14-0 lead they conceded to the New Zealanders proved costly. Percy Storey continued his outstanding try-scoring feats on the tour, bagging a hat-trick as the Army side won 17-3.
A local report said, "It's difficult to single out any New Zealander but Storey, because they're a team that plays as one unit."[7]
Also on the tour was 1905-06 All Black E.E. Booth who turned to journalism after the war. He commented,
I witnessed most of the New Zealand Army matches in England, Wales and Scotland, and can see a very marked deterioration of vim, dash, and determination and general stamina – due no doubt to the great amount of long-distance train travelling, and lengthy fixture-list, to say nothing of the lavish hospitality extended to them throughout South Africa.
But taking the New Zealanders and comparing their form with that shown in the inter-services tourney, I am of opinion that (after allowing for the footsoreness and general staleness palpably evident) they have a very much improved side, particularly the inside or centre backs. This was their weakest point in the great classic struggles for the King's Cup. [John] O'Brien, the nearest resemblance ever seen to Bancroft, the famous Welsh full-back, was, as usual, cool, safe and resourceful.[8]
Heading back across to the Western Cape they next played Stellenbosch and South African Universities at Newlands. The New Zealanders were up against a strong backline, all from the highly-ranked Stellenbosch club, while they took the field without their captain Charlie Brown, and also Jimmy Ryan. The captaincy was in the hands of Dick Roberts, who played second five-eighths. He had captained the 1914 All Blacks to Australia. It was an exciting game, contested all the way through with the students scoring three unconverted tries to two, one converted, for the Army side, to claim a 9-8 win.
The Universities scored first, just before first five-eighths Jack McNaught, who would serve for a time as Commanding Officer of 29 Battalion and be awarded a DSO in the Second World War, left the field with an injury to an already weak knee. However, McNaught returned and made the difference after halfback Sandman's pass sent Roberts towards the line only to be held out. After several scrums, forward Alec Bruce secured the ball for fellow packman Dick Fogarty to go over beneath the posts to claim a halftime lead of 5-3. Roberts created a chance with a dummy before drawing the defence to give wing 'Jockey' Ford a try wideout.
The Army side had the winning of the game when leading 8-3, with local player five-eighth Albertyn off the field with an injury. As they hammered the line it seemed inevitable the students would falter. Instead, as the South Africans attempted to run the ball, Krige sold a dummy and wing Attie van Heerden ran away for 50 metres to score. They claimed the lead with a strong rush and it was forward Dr G. Roos who scored. However, the New Zealanders secured a mark in a handy position. Jack Stohr, who kicked well throughout the tour, was unable to find the goal as the kick sailed just wide. In the game, the contest between van Heerden and Percy Storey was a feature with one report claiming Storey's efforts were 'the finest example of courage ever seen in South Africa.'[9]
Two games were then played against Western Province. In the first, the home team led 5-3 at halftime. The New Zealanders rued a missed chance early in the second half after Western Province lost the ball on attack for New Zealand to pounce. Home defender de Kock tried to gather the ball for a clearance, but Belliss pushed him aside 10m out, took the ball and ran around behind the posts only to drop the ball. They did claim the lead when Ford took an opportunistic chance to cross. The lead was short-lived as Gerhard Morkel attempted a dropped goal from 35m out and it was successful. While the two teams battled away it was the home team that emerged strong scoring two late tries, one each to van Heerden and Henry Morkel for a 17-6 win. Storey had another outstanding game in defence at one stage saving three certain tries within five minutes. But for the South Africans, the win by their champion province represented a victory over New Zealand's system – eight forwards will always beat seven, they maintained.
The New Zealand team had a chance for redemption and they took it in full. Bruce, Storey, Roberts and Jack Kissick each scored tries with Stohr converting all four, two of them from wideout, for a 20-3 win.
Local sportswriter Leslie Cox said,
The All Blacks [sic] may have learnt something as a result of their visit to South Africa, but in the Western Province: 'We've had a jolly good lesson, and it serves us jolly well right.' Twenty points to three, a victory for the New Zealand Military Service fifteen, which does not flatter them in the slightest degree, the most sensational defeat that a Western Province representative team has ever sustained. The defeat is the more remarkable in that the All Blacks had to rearrange their team at the last moment. With such great players as McNaught, O'Brien, Brown (their captain), Ford (their brilliant three-quarter), to say nothing of one or two of their best forwards not being available, they might well have been forgiven had they sustained still another reverse. But so far from that they played dazzling Rugby from beginning to end, and we shall have to learn our lesson anew.
The brilliant play of the All Blacks has caused no surprise to the writer. There were certain periods in their tour when their form was bewilderingly subtle, full of initiative and resource, daring and yet sound, but it is doubtful if they ever performed with such all-round skill as they did when they overwhelmed a representative Western Province fifteen yesterday.[10]
What was more significant in Cox's comments was his assessment of the basis for New Zealand's success and how much it became a byword for much of what followed over the next 100 years.
The whole secret of New Zealand's success is built up on the control of the scrum, and the All Blacks had gone out determined to prove to South Africa that the New Zealand scrum formation was capable of enabling seven forwards to beat eight…Ours not to reason why, but to recognised that we've got a very long way to travel in forward play before we can launch our forwards against the All Blacks with confidence…We have seen the real All Black Rugby. It has come a little late, perhaps, but it's just as well it has come now, and that we are prevented from getting too inflated an opinion of South African football. In revealing their 'full-hand' the All Blacks have rendered a great service to South African Rugby, which they may regret when 'the day' dawns.[11]
A final game with Natal was played, as their ship from Cape Town stopped off briefly at Durban, the NZ Army side winning 11-4. As they took their rest across the Indian Ocean on their return to New Zealand they could reflect on a 55-game programme that had resulted in 46 wins, five losses and four draws.
Dick Roberts said upon the team's return to Auckland that a South African team would give New Zealand a good go at any time. They played a hard game with a bullocking style that would probably be out-generalled in New Zealand but their backs were fast, nippy and clever. The university wing Attie van Heerden was one of the fastest and cleverest three-quarters he had ever seen. [He would run for South Africa at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp]. The South Africans were keen to tour New Zealand and play the All Blacks at home.
The Cape Times quoted SARB president J. Heynemann saying, the New Zealanders would never realise the great service they rendered to South Africa by their visit.
Their play had come as a revelation, particularly in respect to their handling and tackling. In administering the hiding as they had done, they had done the game a world of good. It had taught the players a good, sound, honest lesson.
It was from this tour, the lessons given, and taken, that the impetus for a tour by South Africa of New Zealand developed.
Next page: A rivalry begins.
Sources:
Race and South African Rugby: A review of the 1919 'All Black' Tour, Floris J.G. van der Merwe, South African Journal for Research in Sport, Physical Education and Recreation, 2010, 32 (2), 161-169
The Visitors, R.H. Chester and N.A.C. McMillan, MOA, Auckland, 1990
New Zealand Rugby Register, 1870-2015, Clive Akers, New Zealand Rugby Museum, Palmerston North, 2016.
Rugby's Greatest Rivalry – South Africa vs New Zealand, Paul Dobson, Human and Rosseau, Cape Town, 1996
Papers Past, The Poverty Bay Herald, 5 November 1919, p.2; The Star (Christchurch) July-August 1927, New Zealand Times, 14 July 1919.
[1] Gunner M.P. Naughton, letter to Yorkshire County Committee, published by Special Correspondent, New Zealand Times, 14 July 1919
[2] J.G. van der Merwe, Race and South African Rugby: A review of the 1919 'All Black' tour, South African Journal for Research in Sport, Physical Education and Recreation, 2010, p.161-169
[3] Unidentified South African newspaper report, quoted by 'Ponty', The Star, Christchurch, 23 July 1927
[4] ibid
[5] Tom Van Vuuren, quoted by 'Ponty' ibid.
[6] Ponty, ibid, 30 July 1927
[7] ibid
[8] E.E. 'General' Booth, quoted by 'Ponty', The Star (Christchurch), 30 July 1927
[9] Ponty, The Star (Christchurch), 8 August 1927
[10] Leslie Cox, quoted by 'Ponty', The Star, Christchurch, 8 August, 1927
[11] ibid