| The history of Northampton Rugby Football Club goes back to 1880. A local clergyman, the Reverend Samuel Wathen Wigg, was credited with starting the Saints. He formed a rugby team from something called the church improvement class as a way for some high-spirited boys to let off steam.
Long before his death, Rev Wigg, father to nine children, was to see the side develop into one of the main clubs in England. The clergyman was curate of St James Church, hence today’s nickname of Saints or Jimmy’s.
Franklin’s Gardens was formerly a pleasure gardens and small zoo owned by hotelier, John Franklin. At one stage it was considered one of the finest grounds in England, particularly when the Main Stand was completed in 1927.
The first Northampton player to be capped was local farmer Harry Weston from Yardley Gobion, who made a single appearance against Scotland in 1901.
The first Saint to captain his country was Edgar Mobbs, who led England against France in the last of seven international appearances. He also played against the touring All Blacks side that came to Northampton in 1905 – it was the first match in whish the Saints wore black, green and gold, having worn just black and green previously. Mobbs also went on to form his own corps after enlisting in the First World War, having been refused a commission on the grounds of his age – he was 32. He was killed in action on July 29, 1917, and a town mourned.
Four years later, a 20ft statue was erected in the centre of Northampton and the Mobbs Memorial Match began between East Midlands and the Barbarians, a fixture that survives today but one that has declined in stature since the era when it was an unofficial England trial.
In the 1920s and 1930s the Saints gained a reputation for producing big, bruising forwards, several of whom played for England, notably Billy Weston (son of Harry), Ray Longland and Freddie Blakiston, later Sir Freddie, an Ian Botham swashbuckler of his day.
After the Second World War, the reverse applied as Northampton had a string of talented backs, such as Louis Cannell, Jeff Butterfield and Dickie Jeeps, as well as flanker Don White – all under the fatherly guidance of Jerry Gordon and Doc Sturtridge, who made sure the club survived the war era and have been remembered through the names of the Gordon Terrace and Sturtridge Pavilion. Butterfield, Jeeps and prop Ron Jacobs all captained England.
More great names followed in the 1960s, including Bob Taylor and David Powell, but gradually the Saints waned as a major force in English rugby and with the advent of leagues, they looked set to slip into obscurity, despite the manful efforts of fine players like Jacko Page, Rodger Arneil, Vince Cannon and England international Gary Pearce.
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