1894–95 New Brompton F.C. season

A view of the club's home ground in 1906. In 1894, only the spectator accommodation on the left in this photograph had been built.[1]

The New Brompton club was formed in May 1893 by local businessmen keen to organise a club which could compete in national competitions.[2] During the 1893–94 season, New Brompton entered the FA Cup and FA Amateur Cup, being eliminated in the qualifying rounds of both competitions, and played many friendly matches.[3]

The Southern League was formed in 1894 by many leading clubs in the south of England, at a time when the ostensibly national Football League included only one club outside of the midlands and north.[4] Keen to secure a regular schedule of high-quality matches, the New Brompton committee, led by chairman H.G. Croneen,[5] applied to join the new league. The club was invited to join and allocated a place in Division Two, the lower of the league's two divisions, because near-neighbours Chatham had already been placed in Division One.[6][7] Days earlier, New Brompton had switched from amateur to professional status, with the players to be paid 12 shillings per match (equivalent to £73 in 2021).[8][9]

Many players from the previous season agreed to professional terms and remained. The club also signed Joe Dickenson, a player born in Chatham,[10] who had last played for Bolton Wanderers of the Football League First Division and been in the Bolton team which lost to Notts County in the 1894 FA Cup final.[6][10][11] The concept of a manager did not yet exist; significant team decisions were made by the committee or by David Hutcheson, the team captain, and the club employed a trainer called Murray.[6][12] The players wore black and white striped shirts and black shorts.[12] Ahead of the new season, New Brompton played a friendly against Barking Swifts and won 17–0; more than a century later this remained the highest score ever achieved in any match by the club.[13] New Brompton were seen as strong contenders for the championship of the division: a writer for the Middlesex and Buckinghamshire Advertiser stated that "according to some who profess to speak with authority, the Bromptonians are likely to be at the head of the Leagueists."[14]

The New Brompton team pictured before the first match of the season.
Back row, left to right: Ashdown, Carr (referee), Jenner, Pellatt, James, Meager, Auld, Murray (trainer). Front row: Manning, Buckland, Hutcheson, Rule, Dickenson

New Brompton's first Southern League game was away to Sheppey United on 15 September 1894. In front of approximately 3,000 spectators, New Brompton were forced to begin with only ten players as goalkeeper A. Russell failed to arrive. The team played with no goalkeeper for around ten minutes until the forward Alf Jenner assumed the position and a reserve player took to the field.[3][15] New Brompton emerged victorious by a score of 6–0, Hutcheson scoring a hat-trick.[16] The first game at New Brompton's home, the Athletic Ground, took place a week later and resulted in a 4–0 victory over Uxbridge,[3][17] who played the whole game with only ten men.[18]

League play did not resume until 1 December, when New Brompton played Old St Stephen's; Fred Manning and Arthur Rule each scored twice in a 5–2 win described by the Chesham Examiner as "easy".[19] In the team's final game of the calendar year, they won 7–2 away to Chesham. A. Webb made his only competitive appearance for the team and scored a hat-trick.[20] On 19 January, half-back L. Watson made his debut in the game at home to Maidenhead, having been signed by the club after he impressed them with his performance in an inter-county match between teams representing Kent and Sussex.[21] W. Thomas also made his debut and scored one of the goals.[3] A week later, New Brompton defeated Sheppey 3–1 at home to maintain their record of having won every league game.[3] The Athletic News reported that Sheppey had their goalkeeper to thank for keeping the margin of the defeat down. The writer noted that Russell, New Brompton's goalkeeper, was "almost a spectator".[22]

New Brompton's run of victories continued with wins away to Maidenhead and Uxbridge, both without conceding a goal.[3] The team scored two goals in the latter game, the fewest they had yet achieved in a Southern League match, and an Uxbridge newspaper reporter wrote that he had heard that the New Brompton players "admitted that it was the toughest fight they have had in the League tournament".[18] New Brompton's only league defeat of the season came on 9 March when they lost 3–1 at home to Bromley. Athletic News columnist "Grasshopper" attributed the defeat to "the deplorable state of the ground".[23] Dickenson was absent from the team for the only time during the season.[3] Two weeks later the teams met again at Bromley's ground and New Brompton won 3–2 in what the East Kent Gazette described as a "keen struggle".[24]

The team's final two games of the regular league season took place on consecutive days. On 12 April, they beat Old St Stephen's 6–0 away from home; Rule scored three of the goals, the team's third Southern League hat-trick of the season.[3] The following day New Brompton played Chesham at home and won 9–0; Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper reported that the team "simply made rings round their opposition".[25] Rule scored five goals to take his total for the league season to 18.[3][26] New Brompton finished the season with 11 wins in 12 games; their total of 57 goals was more than twice that achieved by any other team in the division. Rule alone scored more goals than the entire team of fourth-placed Uxbridge.[27]

Having received a bye in the first qualifying round, New Brompton entered the 1894–95 FA Cup at the second qualifying round stage and were paired with Chatham of the Southern League Division One. The match drew approximately 8,000 fans, the largest recorded attendance to date at the Athletic Ground.[3][31] Dickenson scored a hat-trick in a 3–0 win for the home team; as New Brompton had been eliminated at the earliest stage in the previous season's FA Cup, this was the club's first victory in the competition.[32] In the third qualifying round, New Brompton faced another Southern League Division One team, Millwall Athletic. Although New Brompton had beaten Millwall in a friendly earlier in the year, they lost the cup game 2–0 and were eliminated from the competition.[33]

Harry Buckland played in all 15 of the team's Southern League and FA Cup matches.

During the season, 18 players made at least one competitive appearance for New Brompton. Harry Buckland and Alf Meager made the most, playing in all 15 games. Dickenson, Hutcheson, Dan Pellatt and A. Ashdown each missed one game. Webb and R. Read made the fewest appearances; each played his only match for New Brompton's first team during the season.[34] Rule's 22 goals made him the team's top scorer; Hutcheson had the second highest total, with 13.[3]

Leading goalscorer Rule did not play for New Brompton again after the 1894–95 season; Dickenson also left, although he would briefly return in 1903.[35] In their first season in Division One, the team finished 6th out of 10 clubs.[27] The club, which changed its name to Gillingham in 1912, remained in this division until 1920, when the Southern League Division One was incorporated in its entirety into the Football League to form its new Third Division.[36]