For Poulton and England - James Corsan

Ronald Poulton was acknowledged by contemporary observers as the greatest and most exciting rugby player of his generation and quite possibly in the history of the game. An exceptional and elusive runner – to the point of genius – he was so unorthodox that at the beginning of his first class career he was sometimes excluded from teams in favour of ‘safer’ selection options. Nevertheless he first played for England at the age of nineteen and in his Varsity Match debut for Oxford in 1909 – exactly one hundred years ago – he scored five tries, an individual record that still stands today.Poulton possessed every possible advantage in life. Son of an Oxford professor and grandson of George Palmer of the Huntley and Palmers biscuit business, he was an outstanding athlete, handsome, intelligent and privileged. He was educated at Rugby School before winning a science exhibition to Balliol College, Oxford. Perhaps influenced by his nonconformist (Quaker) ancestry on his mother’s side, from an early age he took a keen lifelong interest in social work and in bettering the lives of those less fortunate than himself.An outstanding leader and personality in every respect, Poulton captained England to what is now called a ‘Grand Slam’ in 1914 – the last season before the First World War. Once war was declared he spent seven months training in England with his battalion of the Royal Berkshire Regiment before crossing to Belgium via France at the end of March 1915. Five weeks later he was shot dead by a sniper in the trenches, still aged only twenty-five.Containing several rarely seen photographs and illustrations, James Corsan’s extensively researched biography sheds revealing new light on one of the heroes of the ‘Lost Generation’ of 1914–1918.