Ian Buchanan
President, International Society of Olympic Historians
To describe Great Britain's representatives at the 1896 Olympic Games as a `team', in the sense that any selection process was involved, would be a mistake. The British competitors in Athens had all entered individually and made their own travel and accommodation arrangements. All-rounder, Launceston Elliot, and hurdler, Grantley Goulding, sailed together from Marseilles aboard the SS Congo while the London Athletic Club members George Robertson and Edwin Flack of Australia, the English-born winner of the 800 metres and 1500 metres, travelled together and shared an apartment in Athens. Marksman Sidney Merlin and track athlete George Marshall lived in Greece as did the cyclists, Battell and Keeping, who both worked in the British Embassy. John Boland, the tennis player, happened to be on holiday in Athens at the time of the Games and 400m finalist, Charles Gmelin, apparently travelled independently. In view of the apparent lack of publicity in England regarding the Games, Britain were perhaps fortunate to be represented at all at the first Modern Olympics.
Considering that Britain had a considerable involvement in the revival of the Games it is surprising that the British Olympic Association was not founded until 1905; but as early as 1894 two British members, Lord Ampthill and Charles Herbert, had been elected as founding members of the International Olympic Committee. Neither of these two IOC members seem to have done a great deal to promote the Olympic cause at home but part of the blame must lie with the organizers who first issued the programme and rules in French, then in German but never in English!
Well in advance of the Games, Baron de Coubertin approached the Amateur Athletic Association with a view to soliciting British entries but it is alleged that the request apparently never went further than the AAA offices. This seems distinctly unlikely as Charles Herbert, already an IOC member and a dedicated disciple of de Coubertin, was Honorary Secretary of the AAA at the time and would surely have spread word of the Olympic gathering.
In March 1896, one month before the Games were due to start, a direct appeal was made to Oxford and Cambridge Universities. At Oxford a small announcement was placed on a College notice board and a passing reference was made to the Games in an obscure Oxford journal and no doubt the Games received similar minimal publicity at Cambridge. All of which was a great pity as the Olympic Games coincided with the vacations at the two leading British Universities and, given more time, no doubt some of the wealthy sporting undergraduates would happily have made arrangements to take their holiday in Greece.
This Oxbridge approach is chronicled in the writings of George Robertson - of whom more later - but Robertson's writings are contradictory. On the one hand he tells of the announcement displayed at Oxford1 while in another source he says that he first learned of the Games from a notice in the Oxford Street shop window of the travel agent, Thomas Cook.2 Anyway, there was clearly rather more to the whole matter than Robertson claimed. Of the five competitors who travelled from Britain, two (Launceston Elliot and Grantley Goulding) had no connection whatsoever with the Universities of Oxford or Cambridge. So one must ask how did they hear of the Games?
There is more evidence, admittedly circumstantial but to my mind conclusive, that publicity for the Games was rather more widespread than Robertson suggests. The Times and the Birmingham Post both sent their own correspondent to cover the Games and before the age of air travel this would not have been arranged in a matter of days. Similarly, the authorised Travel Agent, Thomas Cook, could not have organized and marketed their tours to Athens without adequate notice. Additional `evidence', is provided by the Englishman, Charles Perry, who was responsible for laying the track in Athens. This was a project which entailed a number of visits to Greece over a period of months and as the groundsman for the London Athletic Club at the Stamford Bridge headquarters of British athletics he must surely have told many of Britain's leading athletes, with whom he was in daily contact, of the forthcoming Games. Perry was the world's greatest expert on running tracks. Not only did he supervise the laying of the track for the 1896 Games, he organised the refurbishment of the same track for the Inter-Calated Games of 1906 and was then in charge of the construction of the tracks for the Games of 1908 (London), 1912 (Stockholm) and Antwerp (1920). It can safely be said that for one man to be responsible for four Olympic tracks is one record that will never be beaten. Charles Perry also acted as a timekeeper at the Games and his brother was coach to the Hungarian team. Eventually, nine - or possibly ten - Britons took part in the first Modern Olympic Games and, as can be seen from the following brief biographies, they represented a broad spectrum of British sport. Let us consider the two champions first.
Among the many fascinating characters to be found in British sporting history, Launceston Elliot, the weightlifting champion, must rate as one of the most intriguing. A relative of the Earl of Minto, who was Viceroy of India (1905-1910), he was born in India where his father was a magistrate. While his father, Gilbert Elliot, and his first wife were staying in a hotel in Tasmania, the first Mrs Elliot met her death in mysterious circumstances in a fall from a hotel balcony. Gilbert Elliot returned to the hotel with rather indecent haste and married the receptionist! The Olympic champion was a result of this marriage and, although he was born in India, he was given the name Launceston as he had been conceived in the Tasmanian city.
In 1887 Gilbert Elliot gave up his post as a magistrate in India and returned home to farm in Essex. Thirteen-year-old Launceston saw England for the first time where he soon became a pupil of the legendary strongman Eugen Sandow. After winning the British title in 1894, he went to Athens two years later for the Olympic Games where he won the one-handed lift and took second place in the two-handed lift. He also competed - although without comparable success - in the 100 metres sprint, the rope climbing contest and the heavyweight wrestling.
A strikingly handsome man, Launceston Elliot was the idol of the Greek crowds and was offered the hand of a `highly placed lady'. The offer was declined and in 1897 he married the daughter of a Kentish vicar. As he approached the age of 30, he became a professional `strongman' and took his popular Music Hall act all over Europe and to South America. In 1923 he settled in Australia where he died in 1930 after failing to recover from an operation for cancer of the spine.
Apart from being Britain's first Olympic champion, Elliot, because of his relationship to Lord Minto, has the highly unusual distinction of being the only Olympic weightlifter listed in Burke's Peerage.
The other British winner in Athens was John Pius Boland who was the winner of both the singles and the doubles in the lawn tennis tournament. As a Member of Parliament and distinguished academic, Boland's career is well documented in the standard reference books but some vital background information has recently come to light in a most unusual way. At the end of last year (1995), his hand-written diaries, which included his notes on the 1896 Olympics, were delivered, quite out of the blue, to the offices of the British Olympic Association. The diaries had been sent anonymously and the unsigned covering letter explained that they had been borowed from Boland so long ago that the writer was embarrassed to give his name. As Boland died in 1958 the diaries must have been on loan for something approaching 40 years!
The British Olympic Association kindly gave me the opportunity of studying the diaries before they were lodged with the Olympic Museum in Lausanne and they are a real `treasure trove'. For example, we learn that the true reason for cancelling the scheduled yachting events was not, as had always been thought, gale force winds but the lack of starters after the three yachts which arrived from Alexandria had been placed in quarantine. On a more personal note, Boland, who went to Athens with no intention of competing, tells how he was invited to take part by his neighbour at dinner the night before the tennis tournament began. He goes on to explain his difficulty in getting kit together at such short notice and how he eventually finished up playing in leather soled and heeled shoes.
Boland was educated at the Catholic University School (Dublin) and Edgbaston Oratory (Birmingham) before going up to Christ Church College, Oxford and he later studied at the Universities of London and Bonn. Called to the Bar in 1897, he served as the Member of Parliament for South Kerry from 1900 to 1918. His daughter, Honor, also entered politics (as Mrs Crowley) and another daughter, Bridget, was the author of the highly-acclaimed play, The Prisoner.3
Two British cyclists, Edward Battell and Frank Keeping, competed at the 1896 Games and they were indirectly responsible for the first major incident of the Modern Olympics. Working as servants at the British Embassy in Athens, their entries for the Games offended a number of British residents in Greece who sought to have them barred on the grounds that, because of their occupations, they could not possibly be `gentlemen' and it naturally followed, according to the logic of the time, that if they were not `gentlemen' they could not therefore be amateurs. Despite these protests, the entries of the British cyclists were accepted but the incident clearly created quite a stir in the British community. 4
The Olympic historian, Stan Greenberg (GB), visited the Public Record Office at Kew to see what the British Ambassador's report had to say about the matter. Greenberg was advised that the Reports from our Embassy in Athens for that period had been rendered indecipherable `due to rain damage'. The Boland diaries refer to Battell and Keeping as being footman and butler to the British Ambassador, Sir Edwin Egerton. I cannot trace that Sir Edwin ever wrote his autobiography - which must be rather unusual for an Ambassador of that period. Despite their lack of support from the British residents, the two British cyclists performed creditably. Battell placed third in the 87 kilometres road race which was held over an `out & back' course. On reaching the turning point, the riders had to sign a document in the presence of a Commissioner to prove that they had reached the half-way stage. Keeping went one better than his team-mate by taking second place in the 12 hour track race. The race began at 5:00 am and by mid-afternoon of the seven starters only Keeping and the Austrian, Adolf Schmal, were left. These two were engaged in a titanic struggle which was graphically described by Richard Mandell in his book on the Games. He wrote:
"Neither man had eaten and had taken only sips of liquid. Both were squalid from excreta and delerious from fatigue. their churning legs had swollen gruesomely and Keeping's arms were swollen too, but still he battled on. Both could be heard audibly weeping as they passed and were passed in turn."5
Apart from the two cyclists, two other British competitors were resident in Greece: Sidney Merlin was the son of the British Vice-Consul in Athens and after three years schooling at Brighton College in England he returned to Greece where he helped supervise the family's substantial land holdings. The Merlin family were among the leaders of Greek Society and the main thoroughfare of Athens is still known as Merlin Street. Not surprisingly for one who moved in high social circles, Sidney married Zaira, the daughter of the Greek Prime Minister, George Theotokis, although they were subsequently divorced.6
At the 1896 Games, Sidney Merlin competed in four shooting events with his best performance coming in the 200 metres Rifle Match where he placed 10th. He also entered for the two weight-lifting events but did not compete. He later took part in the 1900 Games and in 1906 he was the winner of the Clay Pigeon (double shot) and placed third in the Clay Pigeon (single shot). He was the first Briton, in any sport, to take part in three Olympic Games.
In the programme for the Games, the affiliation for George Marshall is shown as `Oxford' against his entry for the 800 metres but University is not specifically mentioned. For the 100, 400 and 1500 metresd, his affiliation is shown simply as `London' but, again, the affiliation is not qualified and in the absence of further information it is unsafe to assume that he was actually a member of London Athletic Club. Although entered for four events, Marshall ran only in the 100 metres and 800 metres and was eliminated in the heats of both events. Little is known of Marshall but there is considerable evidence that he was a resident of Greece. In his reports to the Birmingham Post, Lawrence Levy wrote (16 April) that Marshall `had never been encountered by the little coterie of British athletes'. George Robertson also wrote that one of the British athletes lived in Athens and this was surely Marshall.
Although George Marshall also entered for the lawn tennis singles and doubles he did not take part in either event. In the doubles he entered with F.Marshall, who was presumably a relative, and they entered as members of the Panachaicos Club of Patras thereby giving a further indication of Greek residency.
The British contingent was completed by the son of a Gloucester farmer, Grantley Goulding, who had begun to establish a reputation as a hurdler in 1895 when he was the winner at nine West Country meetings including a notable victory at Gloucester over the visiting South African champion, P Hunter. Later in the season, he made his only appearance in the AAA Championships when he finished last in his heat. According to Thomas Curtis (USA), the winner of the Olympic hurdles in 1896, Goulding was the most confident athlete he ever met and "strutted around Athens explaining the origins of the medals on his chest".7 His confidence proved to be misplaced as, after a poor start, he lost narrowly to Curtis in the Olympic final. In fairness to Goulding it should be said that he was running on cinders for the first time and experienced considerable difficulty in adapting to the unfamiliar conditions. Also, while practicing in Athens, he fell heavily, damaging a knee, and was unable to train for some days.
Unfortunately, nothing is known of Goulding's later life. Despite extensive searches at Somerset House and St Catherine's House, his date of death has not been traced and it is thought that he probably emigrated and died abroad.
A late entry for the Games, perhaps as a result of the last minute appeal to the Universities, was Charles Gmelin who finished fourth in the third heat of the 100 metres and, as the first Briton to actually compete in Athens, he has the distinction of being the first British Olympian. He fared rather better in the 400 metres and, after placing second in the heats to the winner of the title, Tom Burke (USA), he finished third in the final. Gmelin was educated at Magdalen College School and Keble College, Oxford and, after graduation, he took Holy Orders and became the Headmaster of Freshfields School, Oxford. Although he failed to win an athletics blue at Oxford he was a fine all-round sportsman and represented Oxfordshire at soccer and cricket.8
A three-time winner of the hammer throw for Oxford against Cambridge (1893-95), George Robertson was unfortunate that this event was not included in the 1896 Olympic programme. Instead he competed in the discus and it was reported that he "cut a very poor figure and it would have been better for his reputation if he had scratched".9 According to certain sources, he also competed in the shot putt but from a post card he sent to his mother it seems virtually certain that he did not, in fact, take part in the shot. Robertson did, however, play in the men's doubles in the lawn tennis tournament with Edwin Flack, the winner of the 800 metres and 1500 metres, as his partner. Robertson and Flack lost their first match but Robertson's most notable achievement at the Games was to compose and recite in classical Greek a Pindaric Ode before the King of Greece for which he was awarded a laurel branch by the King. Although a keen Olympian, he was not convinced, at least in his early years, of the value of the Olympic movement as a peaceful influence. Writing in 1901 of the 1896 Games, he expressed the view that "Politically, the Games undoubtedly did much to produce the subsequent War with Turkey".10 Educated at Winchester and Oxford he became a distinguished lawyer, was knighted in 1928 and, when he died at the age of 94, was thought to be the last surviving competitor from the first Modern Olympic Games.
Ture Widlund, a Swedish specialist on the 1896 Games, has traced that another British marksman perhaps competed in the Rifle Match (200 metres). Literally nothing is known about this participant and even his name has not been established with certainty. The record of his participation only appears in sources written in Greek and the nearest translation of his name into English appears to be Machonet or Mokchoinet. Hardly an English sounding name and, at least for the time being, the identity of this competitor remains a mystery.
Apart from the competitors there was quite a strong British presence at the Games. As we have already mentioned, Charles Perry supervised the construction of the track and acted as timekeeper and his brother was coach of the Hungarian team. John Graham, the coach of the Americans, had been born in England and another Englishman, Robert Finnis, the manager of the local office of the Eastern Telegraph Company, acted as an official in the stadium. Other Britons present included Lawrence Levy, who acted as a weightlifting official, and the well-known author and aesthete E F Benson whose autobiography devotes more space to the beauty of the Greek youth than to the sporting events .............. but that's another story!
Notes
1 Robertson, George. Fortnightly Review , Vol.LIX (January-June 1896).
2 Almanac of Sport, Sampson Low, London, 1966.
3 Who Was Who 1951-1960, A.C.Black, London, 1961.
4 Mandell, Richard. The First Modern Olympics, University of California Press, 1976.
5 Ibid.
6 Letter of 1 March 1979 to Ian Buchanan from George C.Courtiz of Athens who was a contemporary of Merlin.
7 Curtis, Thomas P. Sportsman, July 1932.
8 Keble College Register 1870-1925.
9 The Field, April 1896. As Robertson was the correspondent for The Field in Athens, he presumably made this comment himself!
10 Thomas, William Beach. Athletics.
The Isthmian Library, Ward Lock, London, 1901.