In the Summer of 1919, Clapton Orient was preparing for the start of the new Football League season, the first in four years. The rebuilding job required was every bit as profound as the one required in 2017, the difference being that every club was to some extent in the same predicament.
The Treaty of Versailles, signed in June, at last gave the government confidence that war was not going to break out again on the Western Front. The pace of demobilisation could therefore be stepped up, but nevertheless there were soldiers who were still unable to come home. Some were needed as an insurance policy in case war broke out with the new Bolshevik government in Russia (1). Others were still recovering in hospital, not least from the effects of influenza, of which there was a raging epidemic. Politicians were also reluctant to release men too quickly into the job market at home. The fear of unemployment added to concerns about political unrest. Would the Socialist revolution in Russia spread its contagion to other European countries, including Britain? In July, Peace Day- a national holiday intended as a set-piece celebration of victory – ended in riots in several towns and cities. In Luton, the town hall was burned down. In the end, the problem of worklessness was not as bad as some feared . This was helped by the sacking of most of the women workers who had been keeping industry going during the war to free up their jobs for returning men. There was also a brief economic boom as domestic consumption, which had been depressed by the uncertainty of the war, rapidly rose. When it came down to it, football was more popular than Bolshevism.
Clapton Orient had ended the war years in poor shape, finishing bottom of the London Combination by a large margin and only three wins out of 36- although they had beaten champions Brentford in their last game. The club had played a huge price for being in the vanguard of the war effort. Three stalwarts of the pre-war team, the two top-scorers from 1914/15, Dickie McFadden and William Jonas and midfielder George Scott had all made the ultimate sacrifice. Tragic as this loss was, they were the very worst players to have lost – the main forward power of the squad plus the man who had made the key centre-half position his own. In the 2-3-5 formation that had been the basis of the game for the previous thirty years, the centre-half was the lynchpin of any team - the play-maker as well as the man who dropped deep between the full backs when the opposition attacked. Other players had returned from the war with injuries and everyone must have been battle scarred. It is estimated that a quarter of all men returning had been physically injured in some way and nearly all who had been under fire, it is now believed, would have had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder – neurasthenia or ‘shell shock’ as it was known then. At a time when most work was physically hard, you have to assume that men expected to perform as professional athletes would have found things particularly difficult.
The decision had been made that the new season would begin on 30thAugust 1919, so time was pressing, Both Division 1 and Division 2 of the Football League – the latter where the Orient competed- had been extended to 22 clubs, meaning 42 league games to complete before the following May. Coventry City, South Shields (later renamed Gateshead), Rotherham. Stoke and West Ham United had been elected to Division 2 and Glossop North End had dropped out. Controversially, Arsenal had been allowed to join Division 1 despite finishing only sixth in 1914/15, while Tottenham Hotspur had been relegated, an apparent injustice that cemented Spurs’ grievance that Arsenal had been allowed to encroach onto its North London territory when it moved from Woolwich to Highbury in 1913. Leeds City was a club in crisis; it has been accused of paying players during the war and was now in conflict with the League over its failure to cooperate with the ensuing investigation. All of which would add spice to the new season. In the meantime there was the small matter of how to find a team.
(1) Max B Gold on the Independent Leyton Orient Forum disagrees with some of this.
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