THERE was exciting news for Huddersfield Rugby League fans in August, 1930.
The club was getting another colonial. Robert Edwin Walker, a 22-year-old New Zealander, would soon be playing at Fartown. ";
He has been highly recommended by the club's agent in New Zealand and has accepted the terms offered to him,"; reported the Examiner. ";He will leave for this country at the earliest opportunity. The arrangements for sailing are now in hand.".
Walker, a Wellington man who had been playing for the Pecone Rugby Union club, weighed 13 stone and was capable of running 100 yards in 10.15 secs. He was a three-quarter who could play on either wing. ".
Huddersfield have not sought the services of colonial players to the same extent as some clubs,"; reported the Examiner. ";Walker will be the fourth to be signed on since the war."; That was the 1914-18 war.
Walker duly arrived at Southampton on the White Star liner Corinthic. He was met by two members of the Fartown committee, Milford Sutcliffe and Fred Wright. Walker said he had kept fit on the long voyage by boxing with Scotty Skally, a ten-stone-four Liverpool man who had been fighting professionally in Australia. ";I like to have the gloves on,"; said Walker with a joyous grin.
An Examiner reporter who travelled with Walker and the club officials on a train from Sheffield to Huddersfield found him ";a modest and interesting young athlete. ";His chief preoccupation was with the landscape. The green of the fields, the hedges and the walls, the stone-built houses, and in particular the tiny size of the paddocks (by paddocks he meant fields) all impressed him.";
Walker told the Examiner that he had not yet played Rugby League. In his part of New Zealand they would not let them have a field on which to play the game. When asked why he wanted to come to England he replied: ";I wanted to see the Old Country. I had a good job, that of a lorry driver in the Government employ, but I thought it would be nice to see a bit of the rest of the world whilst I was young.";
He said he had chosen to play for Huddersfield because an old Fartown supporter who had gone out to live in New Zealand recommended the club to him. Walker actually signed on for Fartown when the SS Corinthic called at Colon in the Panama Canal. The club had mailed out the appropriate documents. They were eager to get his signature before a deadline so that he could play in Yorkshire Cup games.
In the event the New Zealander was ruled to be ineligible for cup games. He made his first appearance in a claret-and-gold jersey for the A team on October 18, 1930, according to Mick Rhodes, the official historian of the Fartown club. Mick provided statistics on Walker's playing career. and provided the pictures of him with his Fartown colleagues which appear on this page.
Walker made his first appearance with the senior team on December 6, 1930, scoring two tries in a 13-3 victory over Bramley. Between 1930 and the end of 1932 he made 56 first-team appearances, scoring 33 tries. He was on the left wing in every game but one, when he played centre.
In March 1932 he was placed on the transfer list for £300. He had suffered a series of injuries, the worst being a broken arm. He signed for Bradford for an undisclosed sum in January, 1933.
While in Huddersfield he met and married Dorothy Wood. She was born in Mirfield but spent most of her younger days in Birkby. The wedding took place in Cowcliffe Hill chapel in July, 1931. The Walkers had four children, three girls and a boy, all born in Huddersfield. They were living then in Lowerhouses.
In 1945 they returned to New Zealand, settling in Palmerstone North. Bob Walker got a job as a saw doctor with a timber company. Mr and Mrs Walker died within three months of each other in 1982.
Their children all live in New Zealand. Lorna Leighton, aged 66, lives in Himatangi, Glenys Bennett, 62, in Whangamata, Lorena Walker, 57, in Thames and Robert Edwin Walker, 55, in Greymouth.
Lorena, who was three when the family left England, is compiling a scrapbook of her father's days as a rugby player. ";Dad used to talk about his time in England,"; she says. ";There was a scrapbook but I'm afraid it fell to bits. ";I want to compile another so his grandchildren can know what their grandfather achieved.";
She is keen to hear from anyone in the Huddersfield area with memories of her father.
Her e-mail address is nigel.rena@xtra.co.nz
The postal address is 105A Hays Place, Thames, New Zealand.
Article originally published 15/1/00