Premier League: Leicester City remember First World War casualties with special film

Leicester City have produced a special documentary to honour the memories of a team full of former players who died during the First World War.

The premiere of the film, made open to the public, will be screened at the King Power Stadium on Armistice Day, Tuesday 11th November.

A delegation of club officials, including manager Nigel Pearson, Ambassador Alan Birchenhall, Football Director Andrew Neville and Club Historian John Hutchinson, travelled to the Somme last month, to learn for themselves the stories behind the statistics. In all, 50 former Leicester Fosse players were involved in the War, only 39 survived.

Among the stories uncovered was one from the site at Vimy Ridge in France, where former player Arthur Mounteney carried his injured teammate Tommy Codd two miles over difficult terrain, under enemy fire, to safety.

The trip was a humbling experience. Not just as a representative of Leicester City, but as people whose future was shaped by events on a scale we’re unlikely to every fully comprehend.”

As well as visiting Vimy Ridge, Pearson also went to the village of Moeuvres where in 1918, Adam Black - Leicester’s all-time leading league appearance maker - won both a Football Batallion Medal and a Distinguished Conduct Medal in the space of 24 hours.

The film makers also visited the Thiepval Memorial where among the 73,000 names of soldiers missing in action at the Somme, there are the inscriptions of two former Fosse players: William Sharpley and James Stevenson.

“The history of the First World War is a subject I have always been deeply interested in,” Pearson says. “The individual tales are fascinating stories in themselves and provide a real human insight into what the experience must have been like.”

“The trip was a humbling experience,” he adds. “Not just as a representative of Leicester City, but as people whose future was shaped by events on a scale we’re unlikely to every fully comprehend.”

Members of the film’s production team, including Nigel Pearson, will speak at Tuesday’s event in Leicester, together with family members of some of the 11 former players who died in the Great War.

FOXES REMEMBERED: The story of Leicester City and First World War will premiere at the King Power Stadium at 7pm on Tues 11th November. Tickets are £10, with all proceeds going to the Royal British Legion.