 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Birth name | Louis Moritz Speirs | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Date of birth | 23 October 1885 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Place of birth | Glendevon, Perthshire, Scotland [1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Date of death | 21 April 1949 (aged 63) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| School | George Watson's College | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rugby union career | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Louis Moritz Speirs was a Scottish rugby union international who played ten times for his country and was part of the first official British & Irish Lions team that toured South Africa in 1910.
Louis Moritz Speirs was born on 23 October 1885 in Glendevon, Perthshire, Scotland, the son of Ebenezer B. Speirs, the minister of Glendevon Parish, and his wife Marie, born in Ronilly, West Prussia. Sometime between 1891 and 1901 his father died and the family moved to the Morningside area of Edinburgh. [2] Here, the young Moritz, as he was referred to, attended to school.
Speirs played for the Watsonians, originally the club for the old boys of George Watson's College. He was part of the clubest historically greatest side that won five Scottish Unofficial Championships between 1908 and 1914. In the 1909/10 season he was a member of the team that was undefeated against Scottish opposition during that entire season.
He was capped for Edinburgh District to play against Glasgow District in the inter-city match of 1906. [3]
That same season, Speirs was further capped byt the Cities District side in early 1907. [4]
He played for the Blues Trial side against the Whites Trial side on 21 January 1911 while still with Watsonians. [5]
Speirs made his Test debut for Scotland vs South Africa at Glasgow on 17 November 1906. He played in a further nine matches for his country between 1906 and 1910 all of which were in the Five Nations tournament. His last Test being a Calcutta Cup match against England at Inverleith on 19 March 1910. [6] In 1910 he was selected for the first official British tour to South Africa (in that it was sanctioned and selected by the four Home Nations official governing bodies).
In 1912 Speirs emigrated to Canada. However, during the First World War he enlisted in the Canadian 16th Battalion and found himself back across the Atlantic. On 16 January 1915 he captained a Canadian Army rugby union side against a Bath XV during which he dislocated his shoulder. However, he was able to later join his teammates at the Red House where Bath Football Club were entertaining them before going on to a pantomime. [7] He was captured during the war and escaped from a POW camp in 1918.
Watsonian Football Club is a rugby union club based in Edinburgh and part of the Scottish Rugby Union. The club is connected with George Watson's College as a club for former pupils, and changed its policy in the 1980s to be a fully open club, welcoming players of all abilities regardless of whether they attended the school or not. It is one of a small number of rugby union clubs entitled to call itself a 'football club', rather than a 'rugby football club'. Watsonians run a number of sides; the top male side plays in the FOSROC Super 6 tournament, the Women's side plays in the Tennents Scottish Women's Premiership Scottish Rugby's Women's League
Henry James Stevenson was a Scotland international rugby union player. He played at Full Back. He also played first-class cricket.
Lt. James Young Milne Henderson was a Scottish rugby union player and British Army officer who was killed in World War I.
Thomas Arthur Nelson MID was a Scotland international rugby union player. He later became a book publisher in his family's firm of Thomas Nelson and Sons. He was killed in the First World War.
Alexander "Alex" William Angus was a Scottish international rugby union and cricket player.
Cameron "Cammy" Glasgow is a former Scotland international rugby union player.
Charles Douglas Stuart was a Scotland international rugby union player. He often added Junior to his name; to differentiate from his father who had a similar career path.
George Roberts was a Scotland international rugby union player, who died working on the Burma-Siam Railway at Kanchanaburi in Thailand.
Drumchapel RFC was an early twentieth-century East Dunbartonshire-based rugby union club; the town – after being annexed in 1938 – now resides in Glasgow.
The 1910–11 Scottish Districts season is a record of all the rugby union matches for Scotland's district teams.
Roger Davidson was a Scotland international rugby union player.
Aberdeen Nomads RFC were a nineteenth and twentieth-century Aberdeen-based rugby union club. It provided Scotland international players as well as North of Scotland District players but it folded at the Second World War as it lacked players to continue.
Robert Scott was a Scottish rugby union player. He became an international referee and later the 61st President of the Scottish Rugby Union.
Lt. Col. Frank Moffat (1894-1978) was a Scottish rugby union player. He became an international referee and the 66th President of the Scottish Rugby Union. He had a distinguished military career with the Gordon Highlanders in the First World War.
John MacCallum was a Scotland international rugby union player.
John Dobson was a Scotland international rugby union player. He played at the Hooker position.
Robert Dryden was a Scotland international rugby union player. He played as a wing.
William Peterkin was a Scotland international rugby union player.
Thomas Bowie was a Scotland international rugby union player.
John Tod was a Scotland international rugby union player. He was nicknamed 'The Prince of Dribblers' and it is said that he introduced the dribbling game to rugby union. Tod, himself, rated the later Watsonian player and Scotland international William Cownie as a much better dribbler of the rugby ball than he was, saying that Cownie was the prettiest dribbler he had ever seen touch a rugby ball.
|title= (help)|title= (help)    | This Scottish rugby union biography article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |