The British Ladies' Football Club was a

women's association football Women's association football, more commonly known simply as women's football or women's soccer, is a team sport of association football when played by women only. It is played at the professional level in multiple countries and 176 national t ...

team formed in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It ...

in 1895. The team, one of the first women's football clubs, had as its patron Lady Florence Dixie, an aristocrat from

Dumfries Dumfries ( ; sco, Dumfries; from gd, Dùn Phris ) is a market town and former royal burgh within the Dumfries and Galloway council area of Scotland. It is located near the mouth of the River Nith into the Solway Firth about by road from t ...

, and its first captain was Nettie Honeyball (real name likely Mary Hutson). The club's first public match took place at

Crouch End Crouch End is an area of North London, approximately from the City of London in the western half of the borough of Haringey. It is within the Hornsey postal district (N8). It has been described by the BBC as one of "a new breed of urban vill ...

, London on 23 March 1895, between teams representing 'The North' and 'The South'. The North won 7–1 in front of an estimated 11,000 spectators. The club and its associated teams under different names played matches regularly until April 1897. It was briefly revived in 1902–03.

Precursors

Until the 19th century, women's participation in football was limited to folk rituals linked with marriage customs. In Inverness, for example, single women would annually play a match with married women, whilst prospective husbands watched from the sidelines.Seddon, P. (2004) ''Football Talk: The Language & Folklore of the World's Greatest Game'
page 156
Robson. Retrieved February 2015 The first recorded women's match was on 7 May 1881, at Edinburgh's Hibernian Park, billed as a Scotland–England international and organised by two theatre entrepreneurs. The final result was 3–0 to Scotland. On 16 May the teams played in Glasgow to a crowd of more than 5,000, a match abandoned after a violent pitch invasion during which the women were "roughly jostled", and chased by a mob as they left the grounds. Further games resulted in similar pitch invasions, which soon ended this early attempt to introduce women's football. (The 1881 teams have no known connection to the 1895 British teams.) It is uncertain, from the coverage of the time, what the pitch invasions were in protest against. However, the press tone, which would dominate coverage of women's football for the next century, was clearly established in 1881: barely disguised contempt regarding player appearance, including costume, and the standard of play,Domeneghetti, R. (2014) ''From the Back Page to the Front Room: Football's journey through the Englismedia'

Broken link id=lmWLBQAAQBAJ&lpg=PT156&dq=british%20ladies%20football%20team&pg=PT155#v=onepage&q=british%20ladies%20football%20team&f=false page 155] Ockley Books. Retrieved February 2015 overlaid with a certainty that football was a rough man's game unsuitable for women.Laycock, S. & Laycock, P. (2014) ''Unexpected Britain'
page 199
Amberley Publishing. Retrieved February 2015 Other women's football clubs were reported to exist in 1889, in England, Scotland and Canada.

Club history

Foundation

A new club was inaugurated by Alfred Hewitt Smith and Nettie Honeyball, the British Ladies' Football Club, founded in late 1894.Tomlinson, A. (2010) ''A Dictionary of Sports Studies'
page 490
Oxford University Press. Retrieved February 2015 Lady Florence Dixie, the youngest daughter of the Archibald Douglas, 8th Marquess of Queensberry, Marquess of Queensbury,Williams. J. (2013) ''A Game for Rough Girls?: A History of Women's Football in Britain'
page 26
Routledge. Retrieved February 2015 acted as chairman and sponsor. In 1894, an advertisement was placed in the '' Daily Graphic'' seeking those interested in forming a football club for womenRippon, A. (2012) ''Amazing & Extraordinary Facts - Football'
page 38
David & Charles. Retrieved February 2015 which attracted around 30 women, who trained twice weekly under the tutelage of Tottenham Hotspur wing-half

Bill Julian John William Julian (10 July 1867 – 14 March 1957) was an English football player and coach. Career Born in Boston, Lincolnshire, he first played for his local side Boston Excelsior, then Boston. He impressed in a home match for Boston Town ...

.Brown, P. (2013) ''The Victorian Football Miscellany'
page 156
Superelastic. Retrieved February 2015

Reception

The club divided into a north and south team and on 23 March 1895, 10,000 spectators watched the inaugural game at

, London. Unlike in the matches of 1881, players no longer had to wear corsets and high-heeled boots, but acquired standard man's boots in suitable sizes. They still had to wear bonnets, with the game being stopped if any woman headed the ball and it dislodged either bonnet or hairpin which had to be replaced before the game could resume. The reaction was generally one of being heckled by the crowd, and press censure,Mangan, J.A. & Nauright, J. (2013) ''Sport in Australasian Society: Past and Present'
page 134
Routledge Retrieved February 2015 bordering on derision. Despite this, the club went on tour, sponsored by Lady Dixie, and in the following two years played some 100 exhibition matches. The tour attracted great publicity from the press, though not entirely restricted to the sport as, at the time, women playing football was intricately linked to the 'Rights question'. The British Ladies' played their second match at Preston Park on 6 April 1895. The following game at Bury was attended by 5,000. The team played exhibition matches in New Brompton,

Walsall Walsall (, or ; locally ) is a market town and administrative centre in the West Midlands County, England. Historically part of Staffordshire, it is located north-west of Birmingham, east of Wolverhampton and from Lichfield. Walsall is th ...

and

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

, where the North beat South 4–3 at

St James' Park St James' Park is a football stadium in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It is the home of Premier League club Newcastle United F.C. With a seating capacity of 52,305 seats, it is the eighth largest football stadium in England. St James' Pa ...

with more than 8,000 spectators attending the match. Tour continued in South Shield and

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. The River Skerne flows through the town; it is a tributary of the River Tees. The Tees itself flows south of the town. In the 19th century, Darlington underw ...

. Only 400 spectators attended the match at

Jesmond Jesmond is a suburb of Newcastle upon Tyne, situated to the east of the Town Moor. Jesmond is considered to be one of the most affluent suburbs of Newcastle upon Tyne, with higher average house prices than most other areas of the city. H ...

.BRITISH LADIES: PRIMER EQUIPO DE FÚTBOL FEMENINO
on Punto Cero, 17 Oct 2018 Midfielder Daisy Allen (who was believed to be only 11 years old, being the youngest player of the team by far) was one of the most notable players of the British Ladies'. ''The Bury Times'' described her as "a small four feet goblin", while ''The Bristol Times'' wrote (she was) "a brave young girl that leaded her teamates with great courage, showing that she ruled the rudiments of the game, unlike the rest of the team". As well as its usual name, and ''North'' and ''South'', other team names that were used by the club were the ''Lady Footballers'', ''Original Lady Footballers'', and after a dispute with Nettie Honeyball, an offshoot team was fielded under the titles ''Original British Ladies'' or ''Mrs Graham's XI''. Helen Matthew ("Mrs Graham") led this team in matches from November 1895 to June 1896. The strain of playing so often took its toll, and by September 1896 the ladies could only field a few players. They were also broke, and arriving in

Exeter Exeter () is a city in Devon, South West England. It is situated on the River Exe, approximately northeast of Plymouth and southwest of Bristol. In Roman Britain, Exeter was established as the base of Legio II Augusta under the personal comm ...

found they had insufficient funds to either leave or pay their hotel bill. Appeals to the mayor of Exeter fell on deaf ears and he refused to pay. The ladies had to be rescued by friends, and the activities of the club came to an end. Women's football once again fell into obscurity until the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, when

Lloyd George David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during ...

required women to work in factories whilst the men were at the front. On Christmas Day, 1916, the first recorded match between factory organised women's teams, occurred in

Ulverston Ulverston is a market town and a civil parish in the South Lakeland district of Cumbria, England. In the 2001 census the parish had a population of 11,524, increasing at the 2011 census to 11,678. Historically in Lancashire, it lies a f ...

, Cumbria.

Political agenda

In a year when the cultural, social and public concern over what was decent and what was unnatural were already focused, football for women raised important issues within Victorian society, including dress reform, the feminine ideal, women's sexuality, and the rigid British class structure in a way that no other sport could.Lee, J. (2013) ''The Lady Footballers: Struggling to Play in Victorian Britain'

Routledge. Retrieved May 2017 Lady Dixie, a keen advocate of women's rights,Hong, F. & Mangan, J.A. (2004) ''Soccer, Women, Sexual Liberation: Kicking Off a New Era'
page 283
Taylor & Francis Retrieved February 2015 believed that football was excellent for women's physiques, and predicted a day when it would be as popular with girls as with boys. Moreover, she was a supporter of the rational dress movement, which sought to liberate women from the corsets and petticoats of Victorian society. She, therefore, saw football as a weapon of subversion and a means of ''pushing the boundaries'', since the members of the club played openly in knickers and blouses.Sanders, R. (2010) ''Beastly Fury: The Strange Birth Of British Football'
page 201
Random House. Retrieved February 2015 Nettie Honeyball was well aware of the political ramifications, telling an interviewer that: ::''There is nothing of the farcical nature about the British Ladies' Football Club. I founded the association late last year, with the fixed resolve of proving to the world that women are not the 'ornamental and useless' creatures men have pictured. I must confess my convictions on all matters, where the sexes are so widely divided, are all on the side of emancipation, and I look forward to the time when ladies may sit in Parliament and have a voice in the direction of affairs, especially those which concern them most.''

Notes

References

{{Authority control Feminism and history Defunct women's football clubs in England Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom Politics and sports Association football clubs established in 1895 Women's organisations based in the United Kingdom 1895 establishments in the United Kingdom