William John Hartill (18 July 1905 – 12 August 1980), also known as Ted Hartill, was a professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

, who spent the majority of his career at

Wolverhampton Wanderers Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club (), commonly known as Wolves, is a professional football club based in Wolverhampton, England, which compete in the . The club has played at Molineux Stadium since moving from Dudley Road in 1889. The club's ...

. He stands as the club's third-highest goalscorer in their history with 170 goals. Nicknamed 'Artillery' after a stint serving as a bombardier in the Royal Horse Artillery after leaving school, Hartill joined then-Second Division

Wolves The wolf (''Canis lupus''; plural, : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large Canis, canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of Canis lupus, subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been reco ...

as a semi-professional in August 1928, making his league debut on 24 November 1928 at

Bradford City Bradford City Association Football Club is an English professional football club in Bradford, West Yorkshire. The team competes in League Two, the fourth tier of the English football league system and are currently managed by Mark Hughes. Th ...

. The following year, his first full season as a professional, he scored 33 goals in 36 games to finish as the club's top goalscorer. He repeated this feat in the next three successive seasons (five times in total), helping the club regain their top flight status as Second Division champions in 1931–32. He remained at Molineux until summer 1935, when he was sold to Everton. His overall tally of 170 goals made him the club's all-time leading goalscorer at the time, a record which stood until April 1980 when broken by John Richards. He twice scored 5 goals in a single match, a record never bettered by a Wolves player, and scored a then club record 16 hat-tricks (later beaten by

Steve Bull Stephen George Bull (born 28 March 1965 in Tipton, Dudley) is an English former professional footballer who is best remembered for his 13-year spell at Wolverhampton Wanderers. He played there from 1986 until his retirement from playing in 19 ...

). After a brief stay at Everton, he moved across Stanley Park to rivals

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...

in January 1936, but again his spell with the club was to be short-lived. He managed just 4 games for the Reds during January–February 1936, before moving to Bristol Rovers as part of the deal that saw Phil Taylor move in the opposite direction. He retired from the game in 1940, after the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, due to a leg injury suffered two years earlier. He died in August 1980 at the age of 75.

References

External links

LFChistory.net player profile

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hartill, Billy 1905 births 1980 deaths Footballers from Wolverhampton English men's footballers Wolverhampton Wanderers F.C. players Everton F.C. players Liverpool F.C. players Bristol Rovers F.C. players Men's association football forwards English Football League players Royal Horse Artillery soldiers 20th-century British Army personnel