copyright: andy carroll 2006-07

Founded in 1879 for the purpose of playing Rugby Union

Affiliated to The Rugby Football Union, The Middlesex County Rugby Football Union and the London Society of Rugby Referees.  Associated with the Essex County Rugby Football Union.

Leonard Harris Cowper

Son of the Rev. Herbert William Cowper and Teresa Cowper of Baskerville Rd, Wandsworth Common, London

Second Lieutenant 20^th(1^st Tyneside Scottish) Bn, Northumberland Fusiliers.102^nd Brigade 34^th Division.

Died of wounds Tuesday 7^th November 1916 aged 19.

Cowper was awarded a Commission on the 3/6/1916 after receiving training in the Artist Rifles O.T.C and joined the Tyneside Scottish 0n the 14/9/1916.

The 102^nd Brigade was made up of four battalions of Tyneside Scots, its sister Brigade the 103rd comprised four battalions of Tyneside Irish, all Northumberland Fusiliers.

This Division was to take a major part in the opening day of the Battle of the Somme, where it would attempt to storm the fortified village of La Boisselle and would suffer 6,380 killed.

Cowper was wounded on the 6^th November 1916 and died the next day, in a quiet sector of the line.

A recent history of the “Tyneside Scottish” records his death as follows:

”A 5.9” shell landed on B Company Headquarters dug-out” and “ Second Lieutenant Cowper was wounded, dying of his wounds later”.

His parents received a letter from a fellow officer 2^nd Lieut G. A. Riding - ”All who knew him showed the deepest sorrow”...the fair young officer who was always smiling” was the way they described him and as a man said “He had a smile and a word for everybody: its always the finest chaps that are taken and the officers here from the Colonel downwards are genuinely distressed”.

He is buried in Trois Arbres Cemetery, Steenwerck Nord, France. This was a Australian Casualty Clearing Station and burials were made there from July 1916 to March 1918.

1704 servicemen are buried there.  Cowper lies in row I.C.6.

At the start of their 2005 tour to Holland, the UCFC Under 17 squad paid their respects to Leonard Cowper. Captain Ed Nicholson is shown below laying a wreath at Cowper’s grave at the Trois Arbres Cemetary.