The Wednesbury Charity Cup was an early
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
competition held from 1880 - eight years before the foundation of the
Football League
The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...
- for teams from the
West Midlands region
The West Midlands is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of International Territorial Level for statistical purposes. It covers the western half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. The region consists ...
of England.
The competition was conceived and initiated by
Isaak Griffiths, a businessman and magistrate from Wednesbury.
Money raised from the competition went to local causes.
Trophy
Winners were awarded a
solid silver trophy,
on which the name of each year's winning team was engraved.
The cup was made by Walker and Hall of Birmingham and
hallmarked in 1879, and is topped by a figure of
Charity It cost £100, paid for by public subscription.
The trophy weighs nearly and is tall.
In 2016, a member of the public offered the trophy, in poor condition, to Bowjangles, a jewellery shop in
Wednesbury, for scrap.
Bowjanges owner Aaron Sheldon recognised its provenance and arranged for the trophy to be restored by Crescent Silver in Birmingham's
Jewellery Quarter
The Jewellery Quarter is an area of central Birmingham, UK, in the north-western area of Birmingham City Centre, with a population of around 19,000 people in a area.
The Jewellery Quarter is Europe's largest concentration of businesses invol ...
, a process which took five months.
The newly-restored trophy was sold at auction by Cuttlestones Auctioneers and Valuers of
Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton () is a city, metropolitan borough and administrative centre in the West Midlands, England. The population size has increased by 5.7%, from around 249,500 in 2011 to 263,700 in 2021. People from the city are called "Wulfrunian ...
, on 2 December 2016,
for £7,250.
The first name engraved on the trophy is "Stafford Road, Wolverhampton 1880" and the last "Cradley Town 1991".
Winners
References
{{reflist
Defunct football cup competitions in England
Wednesbury
English football trophies and awards
Awards established in 1880