Players who swapped rugby pitches for battlefields

They served together with the British Army in India, joined Bradford Northern Rugby League club and when war broke out in 1914 they returned to their old battalion in the West Riding Regiment.

They were part of the British Expeditionary Force sent across The Channel and soon found themselves in the thick of the action during the Battle of Mons.

But here their paths parted. Laycock was captured by the Germans and sent to a prisoner of war camp and didn’t return home until December 1918. His friend wasn’t so fortunate. Simpson was initially among those listed as missing but a few months later he was pronounced missing presumed dead and today his name can be found on the Menin Gate memorial at Ypres.

Neither man got the chance to play for Bradford Northern’s first team before the war, although Laycock played his one and only game for the club in February 1919, in what must have been a poignant match against Halifax.

More than 270 men played for Bradford Northern between 1913 and 1920 at Birch Lane and yesterday, prior to Bradford Bulls’ match against London Broncos, a project was launched to find out what happened to the players and staff who went off to fight during the Great War.

Birch Lane Heroes is a three year Heritage Lottery funded project led by the Bradford Bulls Foundation, which aims to uncover the stories behind the players and staff caught up in the conflict.

Originally there was only one name on the club’s war memorial, Harold James Ruck, but already the names of another four players have been added to the roll.

James Simpson is one and Howell Rees is another. He signed with Bradford Northern in October 1915, following the closure of the Keighley club. Just a couple of months later he enlisted with the Durham Light Infantry and was killed in action in May 1917.

There is a tragic symmetry between the fate of the other two men. Arthur Turner was killed early on in October 1914, and four years later Harry Basil Wray died while fighting on the Italian front, less than two weeks before the Armistice.

In June, a new memorial will be unveiled that includes these additional names along with space for more to be added as further information comes to light.

Staff at the Bradford Bulls Foundation, along with volunteers, are combing through newspaper archives to find out more details about the men who played for the club during the war, as well as some those on its books who never got the chance to play before they went off to fight.

As part of the project plaques are being installed in and around the ground and an interactive learning zone will be set up to encourage younger people to get involved in local history.

To coincide with this, the club is hosting a special heritage evening this week that includes the chance for fans to see the Rugby League Heritage Touring Exhibition and find out more about Birch Lane Heroes.

The project is being led by Heritage Officer Dr Kathryn Hughes. “Not much is known about who all these players were, never mind what happened to them during the war,” she says.

“We want to find out more about their stories and to share them, because by doing this it adds to our understanding of what this horrendous war was really like.

• Birch Lane Heroes Heritage Evening, Wednesday, Provident Stadium, Odsal, from 6-10pm. Tickets are free. Go to www.bullsfoundation.org/-heritage-evening/