A Tale of Two Dinners: New Zealand Rugby and the Embrace of Empire, 1919–32

Abstract

This article challenges the standard portrayal of rugby as a vibrant component of New Zealand's emerging national identity during the first third of the twentieth century. Deriving from a critique of the 1905 All Blacks tour of Britain, it argues that New Zealand rugby methods and attitudes attracted more condemnation than adulation from Britain and that the Antipodean game was itself sharply divided between reformers determined to modernise the game and allow greater leniency on questions of expenses and professionalism and conservatives loyal to the International Rugby Board. By 1932 the New Zealand Rugby Football Union had been thwarted by its British masters in every campaign for reform – an outcome that reveals parallels with a broader historiographical interpretation of retreat from some earlier notions of independence and claims of superiority to an acceptance of New Zealand's junior role as a dominion within the British imperial partnership.

Keywords:

• New Zealand
• rugby union
• imperialism
• nationalism

Notes

 1. Phillips, A Man's Country?, 111.

 2. Manchester Guardian, 6 January 1936, 4.

 3. Ryan, ‘“Britishers Anxious to Appear on the Cricket Map”’.

 4. Phillips, A Man's Country?, 81–130; Sinclair, A Destiny Apart, 143–56; Nauright, ‘Sport, Manhood and Empire’.

 5. Ryan, The Contest for Rugby Supremacy, esp. 85–117; Daley, ‘The Invention of 1905'.

 6. Belich, Paradise Reforged, 29–30, 118.

 7. Vincent, ‘“A Tendency to Roughness”’, 93–9; O'Hagan, The Pride of Southern Rebels, 52–3, 56.

 8. Ryan, The Contest for Rugby Supremacy, 101–17.

 9. Athletic News, 4 December 1905, 2.

10. Ellison, The Art of Rugby Football, 53–6; Ryan, The Contest for Rugby Supremacy, 106.

11. Gallaher and Stead, The Complete Rugby Footballer, 116–17.

12. Morning Post, 18 September 1905, 3.

13. Quoted in The Cambrian, 22 December 1905, 3.

14. Ryan, The Contest for Rugby Supremacy, 178–9.

15. Ibid., 160–81; Vincent, ‘Practical Imperialism’; Ryan, ‘“A Lack of Esprit de Corps”’.

16. Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 4–10.

17. The Referee (Sydney), 14 February 1906, 9.

18. Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 10–11.

19. Vincent and Harfield, ‘Repression and Reform’, 234–40.

20. Ibid., 241–5.

21. Otago Rugby Football Union Annual 1910, 8.

22. Vincent and Harfield, ‘Repression and Reform’, 246–9.

23. The Times, 21 March 1910, 10.

24. Collins, ‘The Tyranny of Deference’, 442–3; Collins, A Social History of English Rugby Union, 170. See also Greenwood, ‘Class, Conflict and the Clash of Codes’.

25. Quoted in NZ Referee, 26 March 1919, 76. See also 7 May 1919, 76.

26. NZ Referee, 23 April 1919, 73.

27. NZ Referee, 18 June 1919, 81.

28. International Rugby Football Board Minutes, Rugby Football Union, Twickenham, 19 March 1920.

29. Collins, ‘The Tyranny of Deference’, 443.

30. Quoted in NZ Referee, 10 March 1920, 72.

31. Whitehead, ‘“The Greatest of All Games”’; Collins, ‘The Tyranny of Deference’, 442–3.

32. Collins, ‘The Tyranny of Deference’, 445. See also Collins, ‘English Rugby Union and the First World War’.

33. Palenski, Century in Black, 74–5, 78.

34. Daily Telegraph, 6 December 1925, 14.

35. Morning Post, 17 Nov. 1924, 9.

36. Quoted in Auckland Weekly News, 20 November 1924, 60.

37. Manchester Guardian, 23 October 1924, 12.

38. The Field, 20 Nov. 1924, 794.

39. New Zealand Herald, 1 December 1924, 8. See also 11.

40. Otago Daily Times, 5 January 1925, 4.

41. Ryan, The Contest for Rugby Supremacy, 42–3, 80–1, 85–6.

42. The Dominion, 29 July 1924, 6.

43. The Weston Mercury and Somersetshire Herald, 27 September 1924, 6.

44. Gloucester Journal, 27 September 1924, 18.

45. The Cambrian, 3 October 1924, 4.

46. Newcastle Daily Journal and Northern Star, 10 November 1924, 6.

47. Daily Echo, 8 December 1924, 6. Among many other examples see also The Coventry Standard, 12 December 1924, 7; Daily Telegraph, 15 December 1924, 16.

48. Report of Imperial Rugby Conference, 64.

49. Ibid., 65–6.

50. Ibid., 68.

51. Ibid., 71.

52. Ibid., 69–71, 74.

53. Ibid., 72.

54. Ibid., 73.

55. Ibid., 79.

56. Ibid., 79–80.

57. The Morning Post, 22 January 1925, 10.

58. Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 11–12; Masters, With the All Blacks, 162–3.

59. The Times, 6 December 1925, 6.

60. The Times, 20 March 1926, 7; Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 12.

61. Collins, ‘The Tyranny of Deference’, 448–51.

62. The Cape Times, 4 June 1928, 9. See also 11 June 1928, 13; 18 June 1928, 9; The Cape Argus, 3 September 1928, 16.

63. The Cape Argus, 1 September 1928, 10.

64. NZRFU, Letter to Provincial Unions, 28 November 1929; Circular to Provincial Unions, 4 June 1930; The Times, 14 May 1930, 7; Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 12.

65. New Zealand Herald, 22 May 1930, 14.

66. New Zealand Herald, 26 May 1930, 14. See also The Times, 23 October 1930, 7.

67. For example, New Zealand Herald, 26 May 1930, 8; Manawatu Evening Standard, 27 May 1930, 2.

68. NZ Truth, 5 June 1930, 7.

69. New Zealand Herald, 28 July 1930, 8.

70. New Zealand Herald, 30 July 1930, 14.

71. The Dominion, 30 July 1930, 13. See also Otago Daily Times, 31 July 1930, 4.

72. The Press, 1 August 1930, 13. See also The Sun, 2 August 1930, 8.

73. Waikato Times, 2 August 1930, 4.

74. Auckland Weekly News, 30 July 1930, 67. See also Otago Witness, 5 August 1930, 48.

75. Otago Witness, 19 August 1930, 48.

76. The Sun, 25 July 1930, 10.

77. The Dominion, 11 August 1930, 10. See also Otago Rugby Football Union Annual 1931, 5.

78. Otago Daily Times, 12 August 1930, 8.

79. NZ Truth, 14 August 1930, 16.

80. The Times, 23 Oct. 1930, 7.

81. Royds, History of the Laws of Rugby Football, 89–92.

82. The Times, 30 April 1931, 6.

83. NZRFU, Annual Report, 1930.

84. There are several reports highlighting different aspects of Adams’s address to the meeting: The Sun, 29 April 1931, 7; The Dominion, 30 April 1931, 10; The Press, 30 April 1931, 6; 1 May 1931, 10.

85. The Dominion, 15 April 1932, 17; The Times, 15 April 1932, 6; Swan, New Zealand Rugby Football Union, 33–51.

86. Quoted in Collins, A Social History of English Rugby Union, 174.

87. Watts Moses, History of the International Rugby Football Board, 14–16.

88. Manley, ‘Antidote to Depression’, 1–111.