Prince's Skating Club was an

ice rink An ice rink (or ice skating rink) is a frozen body of water and/or an artificial sheet of ice created using hardened chemicals where people can ice skate or play winter sports. Ice rinks are also used for exhibitions, contests and ice shows. The ...

in the

Knightsbridge Knightsbridge is a residential and retail district in central London, south of Hyde Park. It is identified in the London Plan as one of two international retail centres in London, alongside the West End. Toponymy Knightsbridge is an ancien ...

area of

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It saw a number of firsts for

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice h ...

in Britain and Europe. The rink was opened on Montpelier Square on 7 November 1896 by the Prince's Sporting Club. It operated on a membership-only basis and was aimed at the elite of British figure skaters who wished to practise on uncrowded ice. .n.(June 2004)
The Establishment of Artificial Ice-rinks
''News off the Edge'', news bulletin of the Ice Skating Association of Queensland. 39. Archived 17 June 2005. Prince's was the second large rectangular rink in Britain after Stockport, its ice measuring . This made it an ideal venue for the developing sport of ice hockey. The rink closed in summer 1917. The building was later used by

Daimler Hire Daimler Hire Limited provided a luxury chauffeur-driven Daimler limousine-hire-service from Knightsbridge in London. Incorporated in 1919 to take over the operations of Daimler's hire department, Daimler Hire was a subsidiary of Daimler Company. ...

, and ultimately demolished in the mid-1970s.

Ice hockey

The

Princes Ice Hockey Club Princes Ice Hockey Club were one of the most influential early European ice hockey teams and is sometimes considered the first ice hockey club in Britain. Founded in late 1896, the team was based at Prince's Skating Club in Hammersmith. They ini ...

was founded at the rink at the end of 1896. It began playing challenge matches in early 1897, initially against the three existing teams in England: Niagara, Brighton and the Royal Engineers. In March 1900, the rink hosted the first Ice Hockey Varsity Match, won 7–6 by Oxford, although

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

insisted on playing with bandy sticks and a

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensiv ...

ball. The next year, another Varsity Match was held, this time using a puck and

hockey skate Ice skates are metal blades attached underfoot and used to propel the bearer across a sheet of ice while ice skating. The first ice skates were made from leg bones of horse, ox or deer, and were attached to feet with leather straps. These skates ...

s. In 1902, London Canadians was founded as a second ice hockey team at the rink. They and Princes participated in Europe's first ice hockey league, which they contested against

Argyll Argyll (; archaically Argyle, in modern Gaelic, ), sometimes called Argyllshire, is a historic county and registration county of western Scotland. Argyll is of ancient origin, and corresponds to most of the part of the ancient kingdom of ...

and the Amateur Skating Club, both based at Hengler's Ice Rink, and

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III of England, Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world' ...

. The league started in November 1903 and was completed in February 1904 after eight games. Canadians won the tournament, with Princes taking second place. The league was not repeated, as Hengler's closed. Instead, Princes began undertaking annual European tours (as did London Canadians' successors,

Oxford Canadians The Oxford Canadians were an English amateur ice hockey team, originally formed from Rhodes Scholars who were attending Oxford University. They were the first ice hockey team representing Canada to wear a red maple leaf on their uniform. They enj ...

), while teams such as

Sporting Club Lyon Sporting may refer to: *Sport, recreational games and play * Sporting (neighborhood), in Alexandria, Egypt Sports clubs *AC Sporting, a football club from Beirut, Lebanon *Alexandria Sporting Club, a sports club from Alexandria, Egypt *Real Sporti ...

, Brussels Club des Patineurs and C. P. P. Paris came to play the London-based teams. The 1908 match with Paris was the first under Ligue Internationale de Hockey sur Glace (international) rules in Britain; it was also notable as

Thomas Sopwith Sir Thomas Octave Murdoch Sopwith, CBE, Hon FRAeS (18 January 1888 – 27 January 1989) was an English aviation pioneer, businessman and yachtsman. Early life Sopwith was born in Kensington, London, on 18 January 1888. He was the e ...

played in goal. In March 1910, the first

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

ice hockey match was held at the rink, but the sport was suspended at the start of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Despite this, the British Ice Hockey Association was founded at the rink in 1914.

Figure skating

In October 1908, the figure skating events of the Olympics were held at the rink – the first ice sport ever included in the Olympics and the only occasion Olympic ice events have been held in Britain.Theodore Andrea Cook (1909)
The Fourth Olympiad, being the Official Report: The Olympic Games of 1908
The British Olympic Association. p. 39, p. 284. Accessed September 2013.

Exhibitions

The rink was also used for art exhibitions. The

International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers was a union of professional artists that existed from 1898 to 1925, "To promote the study, practice, and knowledge of sculpture, painting, etching, lithographing, engraving, and kindred ...

held its annual exhibition there in 1898 and 1899.The International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Gravers: Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951

Glasgow University , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

, . Accessed September 2013. The Women's Exhibition hosted by the

Women's Social and Political Union The Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) was a women-only political movement and leading militant organisation campaigning for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom from 1903 to 1918. Known from 1906 as the suffragettes, its membership an ...

and funded by Clara Mordan was held at the Prince's Ice Rink in May 1909. heila Stowell, ''A Stage of their own: Feminist playwrights of the suffrage era'' (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992), p. 53/ref> Its organisers included Amy Katherine Browning and

Sylvia Pankhurst Estelle Sylvia Pankhurst (5 May 1882 – 27 September 1960) was a campaigning English feminist and socialist. Committed to organising working-class women in London's East End, and unwilling in 1914 to enter into a wartime political truce with t ...

.Joanna Dunham, 'Browning , Amy Katherine (1881–1978)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 19 November 2017
/ref>

Ice hockey

Figure skating

Exhibitions

References

Further reading