BROWN BLAZER OF W.A. MACTAGGART (SH 20-25) – SEDBERGH 1ST XV
Thank you to Stuart Mactaggart (SH 79-84) who sent in a photo of the 1st XV Brown Blazer belonging to his grandfather, W.A.Mactaggart (SH 20-25), who played on the 1st XV side of 1923/24. This could mean that the blazer is the oldest of its kind still around today. Although the School archives are currently in lockdown, Acting Archivist Dr. Steph Carter confirmed that the School archives have a 1919 blazer belonging to George Pedley’s (donated by David and John Pedley), as well as a blazer pocket belonging to John Sedgwick (Day boy, 1910-1913) (donated in 2003 by Bill Sedgwick). Unfortunately, it isn’t clear in the 2013 catalogue what type of blazers these are. However, Steph discovered that Pedley was in the 1st XI (1919) rather than 1st XV, and there was no information regarding John Sedgwick playing on the 1st XV, so it can be presumed that neither of these blazers are brown blazers. Therefore Mactaggart’s 1923/4 appears to be the earliest brown blazer that we know about!
Stuart Mactaggart later continued the family tradition by also playing on the 1st XV and similarly receiving his own Brown Blazer in the 1983/1984 team, some sixty years after his grandfather.
The Brown Blazer of H R Birtwistle (L 35-39) from the 1939 unbeaten side was also recently shared on Twitter and can be seen above.
