Northamptonshire County Cricket Club, Northampton: The Steelbacks Who Went to War

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Three Northamptonshire cricketers were killed in World War One, yet there is nothing to remember them by at their county ground. One hundred years on the club is making amends, erecting a new war memorial at the ground bearing their names. James Ryan was the first Northamptonshire cricketer to die in the war – he was a regular soldier, killed in September 1915 while serving with the 1st Battalion, The King’s Liverpool Regiment. Tommy Askham died at the Battle of the Somme in August 1916, aged just 19, while serving as a young officer with the 9th Suffolk Regiment. Charles Tomblin died in the latter months of the war, in June 1918, with the 2nd Northamptonshire Regiment. Club chaplain David Chawner and cricket journalist and historian Andrew Radd are behind the move to have a permanent memorial in place and Wantage Road to coincide with the centenary of the outbreak of the war. Location: Northamptonshire Country Cricket Club, Wantage Road. Northampton NN1 4TJ Image: Tommy Askham, courtesy of Andrew Radd