player – Tennisarchives.com

General First nameKenneth
LastnamePowell
GenderMale
CountryEngland
Date of birth1885-04-08
Place of birthHighgate, London, England
Date of death1915-02-18
Place of deathIeper, Belgium

About

Kenneth Powell was born in April 1885 in Highgate, London. He was the third of the six children – three sons and three daughters – of James Powell (1856-1925), a leather merchant from London, and Mary Sophia Powell (née Higginbotham; 1860-1949), who was originally from Glasgow.

Kenneth Powell’s siblings were Hilda (1882-1965), Leslie, a boy (1883-1960), Vera (1889-1976), Doris (1896-1982) and Douglas (1900-52). Like their father and their brother Kenneth, Hilda, Leslie, Vera and Douglas Powell all took part in lawn tennis tournaments.

Kenneth Powell entered Rugby School in April 1899. While there, he was captain of the school’s football team in 1902 and 1903, and also represented the school at rackets in 1903 and 1904, reaching the final of the school’s rackets competition in the former year. He was also a member of the school’s gymnastics team.

Powell left Rugby in 1904 to go up to Cambridge University. While there, he was a member of the lawn tennis team in the annual varsity matches between Cambridge and Oxford in the years 1905-07. Anthony Wilding captained the Cambridge team in 1905, a role taken on by Powell in the following two years after Wilding had gone down.

While at Cambridge, Powell also represented the university against Oxford in the hurdles in 1906, 1907 and 1908. In the latter two years he won the event, setting a record of 15⅗ in 1907. He was awarded a “Blue” in both athletics and lawn tennis while a student at Cambridge.

At the Amateur Athletic Association (AAA) Championships, an annual track and field competition organised by the Amateur Athletic Association of England, Powell finished in the first three in the 110m hurdles every year from 1909 to 1914, but never actually won the title. He competed in the 110m hurdles event at two Olympics Games, in London in 1908 and in Stockholm in 1912, but did not feature among the medal winners either time.

In 1908, Powell also took part in the outdoor lawn tennis events held at the All England Lawn Tennis Club, Wimbledon, as part of the Olympic Games. In the men’s singles event he reached the third round before losing to his compatriot George Caridia. In the men’s doubles event Powell and Walter C. Crawley reached the quarter-finals before being beaten by their compatriots Reginald Doherty and George Hillyard, the eventual champions.

At Wimbledon in 1910, Kenneth Powell and his namesake, the Canadian player Robert Powell, won four matches to reach the all-comers’ final of the men’s doubles event. They were beaten at that stage by Major Ritchie and Anthony Wilding, who won the match in straight sets, 9-7, 6-0, 6-4.

After going down from Cambridge, Kenneth Powell worked in the family’s leather business in London. When the Census of England and Wales was taken in April 1911, he was living in the family home in Reigate, Surrey, together with his parents and all of his siblings except his brother Leslie; four female servants are also listed on the census return. Kenneth Powell’s profession is given as Leather merchant.

After war broke out in late July 1914, Kenneth Powell enlisted in the Honourable Artillery Company (H.A.C.). In mid-September 1914, he was sent to France. On Wednesday, 17 February 1915, he was in the trenches at the front in Ypres, West Flanders, Belgium. After leaving the trenches that night he was hit by a sniper’s bullet and was taken to a nearby field hospital where he died of his wounds the following morning. He was 29. The following report of his last hours was published in The Surrey Mirror newspaper on 29 February 1915:

“Mr James Powell, J.P., has received a letter from the Reverend Harold Peacey, chaplain with No. 7 Field Ambulance, 3rd Division, British Expeditionary Force, in which the writer states: I am extremely sorry to have to tell you that your son Kenneth was brought in here the day before yesterday (Thursday February 18th) at about 6.15 am, suffering from a bullet wound in the right arm which had perforated into his abdomen. I believe he was wounded at about 10pm, in returning from the trenches, to which he had been carrying some supplies, and so it was quite a chance shot.

“He was attended to at his regimental dressing station, and later on was brought down by ambulance wagon to the above address. The doctor here again dressed his wound, and he was then put by the side of a fire whilst others were attended to. Quite suddenly he became worse and passed away perfectly peacefully at 8.45 am. I was in a room nearby when they came for me. I hurried to his side, but he was unconscious and died a few seconds afterwards as I was reading the commendatory office over him.

“The doctor was very surprised at his passing away so suddenly, but he had no means of knowing about the internal haemorrhage, which was the immediate cause of death. He tells me that while he was being dressed he spoke quite cheerfully and told him how it happened.

“There were four bearers at the funeral. The body was covered with a Union Jack and two H.A.C officers and some of the transport men were present at the funeral in Lochre churchyard, which is eight or nine miles from Ypres in Flanders. The rest of the battalion were in the trenches or a large part of them would have been present. The grave is now marked by a wooden cross with the following inscription burnt into it: I.H.S. Private Kenneth Powell. Honourable Artillery Company. Killed in Action, February 18th 1915. R.I.P.”
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The British Lawn Tennis Association (L.T.A.) website has a tribute to Kenneth Powell featuring extracts from some of the letters he sent while serving with the British Army. The letters in question provide a clear insight into the conditions with which the soldiers had to cope on a daily basis. The extracts and the narrative thread from the L.T.A. website are reproduced below:

https://www.lta.org.uk/news/the-british-olympian-and-wimbledon-finalist-killed-in-ww1/

December 8, 1914. The British papers had reported that soldiers were receiving ‘hot baths and hot drinks’ after fighting in the trenches. Private Powell tells a different story:

“Instead of the imaginary ‘hot baths and hot drinks’ I read of in the papers to be had after the trenches, we were marched off nine miles in wind and rain, without anything to eat or drink. We had to make our water bottles last three days, and I had very little left, but had enough to give two soldiers who were both in a bad way.

“It was a most awful march, as many of our men’s feet were so rheumatic after two days under water that they could only hobble, and kept falling out. One man dropped at my feet and we had to carry him to the transport wagon. Our officers worked very hard, however, and kept the men together, and only about a dozen were left behind. Our little lot had only one fall out. During the night a man shot himself dead owing to his sufferings being so great.”

January 2, 1915. Looking back at Christmas while at war. After spending the night in an abandoned stable, Private Powell recalls what he found while staying in a deserted French village:

“The cold was very great, but we slept well, and woke on Christmas morning to find Father Christmas had filled our socks – with cold feet! Christmas Day was really a happy one, frosty and fine. In the morning we examined the village square, terribly destroyed, the château grounds, which included a fine hard court (so I did get into a tennis court, even this Christmas!) and a maze better than Hampton Court.”

January 9, 1915. The struggles of life on the frontline. Private Powell describes his attempts to cope:

“Out of the last four days I have spent three days and nights in the firing line, only 50 to 100 yards from the Germans. The firing has been almost incessant night and day, and although we have had no sorties or attacks, our artillery have twice blown the German trenches to fragments. The noise is one of the most tiring parts of the whole work.

“The actual digging, etc., I find interesting, but it is very tiring with equipment and overcoat on. The sleep problem is very difficult, but I believe I owe part of my good health in not going to sleep, as the sleepers always wake feeling ill. For two nights I had one hour each, and made up with a few hours at intervals in the day. But, of course, one feels very tired after it is over.”

February 14, 1915. Four days before he died, Private Powell paints a bleak picture of one soldier trying to care for his gravely injured brother:

“The enemy were very active on our left, and a lot of shelling went on near the close billets which are our headquarters. In the evening, instead of any sniping, a friend and I were sent out as guides to a stretcher party to find a wounded man, of our platoon, who had been hit as his section was being relieved. We found him being tended by his brother near the firing line, and the stretcher party got him safely back to the doctor.

“The wounded man was extraordinarily cheerful and made no complaint, although struck in the hip with the bullet lodged somewhere in the stomach — a serious case I am afraid. His brother was much more disturbed than he was, and we had difficulty in getting him along. It amazes me to see how much pain these poor fellows can stand without fainting.”

February 18, 1915. The final letter Private Powell sent home. He was killed the same day this letter was written after being struck by a stray bullet near Ypres, Belgium;

“Two days ago we met a stretcher party quite exhausted who asked for help, so another man and I volunteered. On the stretcher was a recruit of the last draft, who had been apparently killed by the shock of a shell in his trench, though not hit by it. We had a very heavy job to get him back as the four stretcher men were very tired, and neither of us were exactly fresh. We had to cross a brook, which was flooded owing to the heavy rain, and the first two had to put down the stretcher to get out their side while we stood in the stream above the knee until they got a grip again.

“Eventually we got him to our now overworked doctor, and yesterday I hear he came to a little for a moment, but finally died. I don’t think I have ever had a harder night’s work. Yesterday was quiet except that a close friend, poor H., was killed by a stray bullet in the neck while on sentry duty by our headquarters’ door. Frightfully bad luck, but it shows you how near the firing line these close barracks are.”

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