'Sport' from KenR : Jimmy Speirs

It took a while to get things moving for this Bonus Round, I had an idea or definite plan on all the others but was a bit stumped when it came to the Sport Round.

I threw it open to my regular gaming crew and the following week, Rob, bless him turned up with these two figures which had laid, unpainted in his lead pile since 2014. The miniatures in 28mm had been given away, free on entry, to visitors to the Partisan Wargames show in that year.

The figures were to commemorate the Xmas truce of 1914 and the stories of soldiers from both sides playing football in no man's land, it all fell into place from there. Rather than just do a straight paint job I noticed that the British Solider had a scarf around his neck which is were Jimmy Speirs came to mind.

Jimmy Speirs

I usually waste my Saturday afternoons watching my local football team (that's proper Football not the one where you throw it !) Bradford City and I have painted the scarf on the figures neck in the club colours, Claret and Amber in honour of Jimmy.

Bradford have always been one of the strongest teams in English Football, mostly because they are usually at the bottom of the league holding the others up ! However their one moment of glory came into being in the 1911 FA Cup Final (the English premier knockout trophy) when they won the cup, after a replay with Jimmy being the Captain and scoring the winning goal.

The winning Team, Jimmy sat in the centre with the Cup

At the end of the 1914–15 season, Speirs returned to his native Glasgow and enlisted in the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders on 17 May 1915, he was posted to the regiment's headquarters in Inverness where he joined the 3rd Battalion, a reserve battalion, for training. Speirs was posted overseas on 29 May 1916. He was awarded the Military Medal for bravery in a year later, before he was promoted to Sergeant in June but sadly he was killed during the Battle of Passchendaele on or about 20 August 1917, aged 31.He is buried at Dochy Farm New British Cemetery, near Ypres in Belgium.

He is fondly remembered at the club and his Cup Winners and War Medals were bought by one of our former Chairman in 2003 for a record £26,000. Bradford did a great job during the Centenary of the War to Remember Jimmy and the other 7 ex City players who lost there lives in the First War.

2 x 28mm Figures at 5 pts a piece plus the Brucie Bonus of 50 for a nice little 60 points.