Twelve former Exeter Rugby Club players and officials are to be remembered with a new commemorative plaque at Sandy Park – home of the Exeter Chiefs Premiership Rugby team.

A special memorial service will take place at the stadium on Tuesday 11 November at 10.30am.

Missing First World War casualties

For years, Exeter Rugby Club has displayed a plaque commemorating members who lost their lives in the Second World War.

Research by local historian and club supporter Roy Hough has unearthed a further 12 men associated with the Devon club who never returned from the battlefields of the First World War.

Exeter Rugby Club chairman and chief executive, Tony Rowe OBE, said: ‘For some time we have displayed a plaque remembering those former players that died during the Second World War. However, we’ve since been made aware that there were also a number of old players and club officials who were killed during the First World War.

‘The fact these people were not remembered anywhere at the club needed to be addressed, so I immediately commissioned a new plaque – on behalf of the club membership – to be produced and hung alongside that of those who died during the Second World War.

Names remembered

Among those listed on the memorial are the following.

36-year-old lieutenant William Goff (MC), of the 7th Battalion Royal Welsh Fusiliers, who was killed on 22 April 1918.

Private Geoffrey Culverwell, of 1st/4th Battalion the Devonshire Regiment, who died on 10 June 1916 and is commemorated on the Basra Memorial in Iraq.

Major John Veitch (MC) of 1st Battalion, the Devonshire Regiment, who was killed on 21 May 1918 and is buried at Thiennes British Cemetery in France.

Second-lieutenant CE Tudor-Jones of the East Lancashire Regiment and the Royal Flying Corps. A former reservist with the 7th Battalion Devon Regiment, he died in December 1915.

Lieutenant SE Hucklebridge of 21st Battalion, West Yorkshire Regiment, who died on 19 March 1919 and is buried at La Louvière town cemetery in France.