In a quiet corner of Streatham Park Cemetery, 15 miles south of Wembley and a long way from Bolton, you can find the final resting place of David Bone Nightingale Jack.
Only you won’t find it. Not easily anyway. Because David Jack is buried with his wife Kathleen, who also died in 1958 at the age of 60, in an unmarked grave. A plain patch of grass that offers not the slightest clue about the man whose remains are buried there.
The man who scored the first ever goal at Wembley in the legendary ‘White Horse’ FA Cup final between Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United 100 years ago next month.
The man who became football’s first £10,000 player when he joined Arsenal from Bolton for a world record fee in 1928. The man who captained England on four occasions.
A blue plaque will be unveiled at Jack’s birthplace at 119 Chorley Old Road in Bolton — which is now a convenience store — on April 29, the day after the centenary of the White Horse Final.
David Bone Nightingale Jack was the first player to score at Wembley – in the 1923 FA Cup final
The final between Bolton Wanderers and West Ham had an attendance of over 200,000 fans – with some fans even watching from the roof (top left, in front of the tower)
King George V (right) takes off his hat and waves to the crowd at a packed-out Wembley
But it was only when plans were made to celebrate Jack’s life that the mystifying and rather sad circumstances surrounding his death came to light. The fact he lies in an unmarked grave has only been confirmed in recent days.
‘I was very surprised that nobody bothered to put a gravestone there,’ Bob Jack, his 88-year-old nephew, told Sportsmail.
‘It came as a shock to me,’ adds Gordon Niven, a family friend of 50 years who campaigned for the plaque and would now like to see a fitting memorial for Jack in the cemetery as well.
‘I just couldn’t fathom how that could come about. I don’t think we’ll ever get the reason why, but it has to be corrected.’
Jack assumed his place in history two minutes into the 1923 FA Cup final, an event so chaotic it beggars belief by modern standards. More than 200,000 spectators —well in excess of the official attendance of 126,047 — brought carnage to Wembley for the first game at the new Empire Stadium.
The venue cost an unprecedented £750,000 and the FA were glad to play the role of guinea pig by using their Cup final as a test event. When the decision was made to shut the gates, tens of thousands of fans forced their way in and massed around the pitch.
King George V, who was there to present the trophy, was advised to return to Buckingham Palace because there was little or no chance of the match taking place. He declined and was rewarded when, almost impossibly, it started 45 minutes behind schedule after police patiently cleared supporters back to the touchline —famously led by PC George Scorey and his ‘white’ horse Billie, actually a grey.
It was a miracle nobody was killed but there were still reports of 900 injured, many due to fainting in crushes. The crowds parted to let the players on to the pitch, although there was no chance of them getting back into the dressing rooms at half-time.
Billie the famous white horse keeps the crowd in line as fans arrive in droves to watch the final
Supporters pictured invading the pitch at Wembley on April 28, 1923 during Bolton’s 2-0 win
Some fans at the front of the crowd collapsed as tens of thousands of fans forced their way into the 125,000 capacity stadium
Bolton goalkeeper Dick Pym recalled: ‘When we came out, all we could see was the top of the crossbars.’
Referee David Asson told captains Joe Smith and George Kay: ‘Let’s start the game, and hope we can finish!’
Spectators were still crammed together behind both goals and along the touchlines when the match got under way, a situation that is said to have contributed to both Bolton’s goals.
West Ham defender Jack Tresadern got swallowed up by the crowd after taking a throw-in, and Jack was able to beat keeper Ted Hutton with a shot so fierce that it knocked out one fan standing behind the net. When winger Ted Vizard crossed for Jack Smith to complete the 2-0 win, there was a strong suspicion fans had kept the ball in play.
‘The best pass I had all day came from a spectator,’ Vizard later confessed. ‘I had to lean on them to take a corner. If they gave me a push, I could take one stride and kick the ball.’
Bolton players wait on the pitch at Wembley as the carnage causes a 45-minute delay
Captains George Kay and John Smith shake hands before kick-off after the crowds are calmed
The astonishing size of the crowd can be seen from the aerial view, with Billie the white horse also visible, to the left of the far penalty box (circled)
As we approach the centenary of the White Horse Final, it’s fitting that Bolton are going back to Wembley in the Papa Johns Trophy on Sunday to play League One rivals Plymouth Argyle.
David Jack played for both clubs, having started his career at Plymouth where his father Bob was manager for a total of 29 years, leading the club into the Football League. Bob’s ashes were scattered on the pitch at Home Park. David grew up in Plymouth and Southend where there is a blue plaque at the former family home.
A gifted inside forward, he joined his dad’s old club Bolton from Plymouth for a fee of £3,500. His brothers, Rollo and Donald, also signed for Wanderers.
Jack scored 161 goals in 324 games at Bolton — which puts him third on the club’s all-time list with a better strike-rate than Nat Lofthouse in first — and won the FA Cup again in 1926 when he scored the only goal against Manchester City.
The story goes that his move to Arsenal was negotiated over G&Ts in a north London hotel. ‘The manager Herbert Chapman got there early and asked the waiter to make sure the officials from Bolton got double gins, and there was only tonic in the Arsenal glasses,’ chuckles nephew Bob.
As the action finally gets underwat under the twin towers, West Ham go on the attack
There are rows and rows of supporters as far as the eye can see as Bolton take the final 2-0
The world record transfer fee of £10,647 and 10 shillings was worth it. Jack’s 124 goals in 208 games helped Arsenal win the title three times in four years and put him 10th in the club’s all-time list. He also won the FA Cup again in 1930, becoming the first player to win it with two clubs.
He moved into management after a playing career that brought nine England caps. Having served in the Navy during the First World War, he then worked for the Air Ministry and also ran a pub.
David and Kathleen had moved into his mother’s flat in Streatham with one of their three children before he died through illness, several months after his wife also passed away. The unmarked grave seems incongruous with Jack’s unique place in football, a fate only discovered by club historians Jeff Williamson and Simon Marland last week thanks to the work of a local history group.
‘David Jack was the first player to score a goal at Wembley, which adds to the fact that we were the first club to score a league goal in 1888,’ said Marland, Bolton’s long-serving club secretary who retired at the end of last season. ‘These are things that can never be taken away from us.’
The Bolton Little Theatre is staging a re-run of And Did Those Feet to mark the 100th anniversary of the game.
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It tells the lives of ordinary Boltonians who travelled south to witness history, including mothers honouring their sons killed in World War One.
Wembley was built as an antidote to the difficulties of the early 1920s with Great Britain losing its place to America as a main global power in the aftermath of the Great War.
The event immediately became a massive story featured in news and sports sections, because of the frightening scenes but also the outpouring of emotion that greeted Bolton’s win.
For a nation who had survived on grim austerity for years, the party atmosphere was a revelation. Overnight it placed football as the national game, a position it has never relinquished.
Bolton’s winning players had lunch the next day at the House of Commons. When they finally returned home by train on Monday evening, they disembarked to a band playing See, the Conquering Hero Comes! and thousands of fans lining the streets for an impromptu parade on a double-decker bus. The Daily Mail covered the elation but also the safety concerns at Wembley. On page nine underneath the headline ‘Cup crush inquiry at once’, it was revealed that the Government had backed an immediate investigation.
Jack led his side to FA Cup glory again in 1926, scoring the winning goal for Bolton in their 1-0 triumph over Manchester City at Wembley. Pictured drinking from the illustrious trophy above
A blue plaque will be unveiled at Jack’s birthplace at 119 Chorley Old Road in Bolton
Sir Travers Clarke, deputy chairman of the Empire Exhibition, commented on the huge numbers who had descended on Wembley: ‘The tap of traffic had been turned full on, and nobody could turn it off.’
Even so, the scale of the occasion established Wembley’s reputation as a sporting mecca.
On the football itself, Mail match reporter John Crockett enthused: ‘I have seen a good many cup finals but never one like this. It was amazing. That it was carried out must stand as a tribute to the calm, tolerant police of London.’
Back in his stables, Billie became the most famous four-legged creature in the world. A brilliant cartoon in the Mail depicted the horse saluting the referee giving permission for the game to kick off.
Many of that Bolton team are immortals. Pym was known as the ‘Devonshire Fisherman’ and returned to the trawler after retiring from football.
As a club, Bolton have had ups and downs over the past century; from FA Cup glory with Lofthouse in 1958 to nearly going out of business in the last decade.
The White Horse Final is indelibly linked with the club’s history. In the week of the 50th anniversary, Bolton won the Third Division title at Burnden Park. To mark 100 years, they could go one better — and win another trophy at Wembley.