Coleraine’s contribution is vast, on and off field
Brendan Gallagher continues his series looking at rugby’s great schools
Coleraine Academical Institute, which morphed into Coleraine GS in 2015, have an extraordinary if rather odd record in the Ulster Schools Cup. Traditionally they are excluded from the “big three” who dominate Ulster Schools Rugby – Methodist College Belfast, Royal Belfast Academical Institute and Campbell College – occupying fourth place with nine titles which is a worthy enough effort.
What those bare statistics do not convey is that Coleraine have also been losing finalists on 24 occasions. Outside of the last two decades which have not been vintage years, Coleraine have always been a considerable factor in the competition.
Coleraine were a mighty power in the land in the 1880s as rugby really established a stronghold and took three titles in quick succession in 1884, 1886 and 1887 before they suffered the frustration of losing six successive finals between 1888-1893 with Methodist College Belfast being their main tormentors with four wins while RBAI emerged victorious in the other two.
That depressing run ended in 1894 with a 3-0 win over Methody. There was another title against the same opponents in 1897 but before WWl there was another run of defeats in the final, three on the trot between 1908-1910.
After WWl their 1920 victory over Campbell College was notable for the appearance of Victor Beamish, the first of the four brothers who played for Coleraine and achieved great things subsequently with the RAF.
Victor enjoyed a considerable rugby career after he left school with Quins and Leicester, and was a regular Irish trialist, but it was his stellar career as a pilot in the RAf that took precedence. That was interrupted in 1933 when he contracted TB and was forced to leave. After a year spent lumberjacking in the fresh air of British Columbia he re-applied and returned to active service.
In WW2 he commanded 64 squadron and was later the commanding officer at RAF Kenley. During hostilities he claimed at least 12 kills as a fighter pilot and ‘shared’ a similar number, and was awarded the DSO and bar and the DFC, earning the reputation en route as one of the best and most revered squadron leaders.
Beamish ran a tight ship at the airbase with no boisterous behaviour allowed but, on their occasional breaks in action, he would frequently take all his pilots for lively runs ashore in London and pick up the tab himself. He was shot down and killed over the Channel near Calais on March 28, 1942.
George Beamish, an extremely powerful forward, was the next of the brothers into action for Coleraine and although he missed out on Schools Cup honours he was capped by Ireland age 19, one year out of school.
Beamish was playing for the Coleraine club at the time but his RAF career took him to England where, like Victor, he appeared for Quins, Leicester and London Irish depending on his RAF postings. An almost ever present in the Ireland team between 1925 and 1933, he won 25 caps, skippering them to their first Home Unions title for 20 years in 1932.
He also earned five Lions caps on the tour of Australia and New Zealand in 1930 and it was on that tour that he led a delegation that expressed their displeasure to the Lions management of the the fact that while the blue of Scotland, white of England and red of Wales were represented in their playing strip there was no green for Ireland. A green flash was added to the socks, which from 1938 became a green turnover and that has remained a feature of the strip ever since.
Professionally he was another high flyer finishing as Air Marshall Sir George Beamish with his key moment probably coming when he organised the retreat of British forces from Crete to Egypt after the British high command decided not to stay and defend the island. His last appointments were as Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief at Transport Command in 1954 and Air Officer Commanding-inChief at Technical Training Command in 1955.
Then came Charles Beamish, capped on 12 occasions by Ireland at prop and another to tread the well worn path with Quins and Leiceseter after leaving Coleraine. He also represented the Lions on their unofficial tour to Argentina in 1936 while the final brother of the talented Coleraine quartet was Cecil.
Air Vice-Marshal Cecil Beamish went on to become a London Irish stalwart and a frequent Barbarian representative before the war badly interrupted his sporting career. Afterwards he concentrated on golf, winning the RAF championship on seven occasions and finishing as the third placed amateur in the 1951 Open at Portrush when he finished 33rd overall.
Just prior to WW2, Coleraine enjoyed one of their more notable titles with a fine 16-5 win in the final over Methody but it was hard to match the big three after the war although they were generally the best of the rest. The 60s and 70s in particular were hard going but that’s not to say Coleraine weren’t still making an impact on occasions. In 1965 – following on from trailblazers RBAI who contested three finals at the Rosslyn Park Sevens, winning one – Coleraine claimed a notable title at their first attempt in a brilliantly executed raid across the water. .
They had to do it the hard way by playing two qualifying games on the first day, an inconvenience the more established English and Welsh schools and seeded teams were spared back then. In 1965, Llanelli GS and Millfield, who had contested a thrilling Oxford Sevens final a few weeks earlier, were the favoured teams but it quickly became obvious that a very fit and efficient Coleraine were the class act of the year, with their watertight defence particularly impressive, conceding just 11 points in the entire tournament.
In quick succession they defeated Surbiton, Eltham, Worksop, St Edward’s Liverpool, Rydal, Stonyhurst and Dulwich before accounting for Ipswich – who had also been asked to play in the qualifying rounds – 10-5 in the final. That same year group formed the basis of a strong XV the following year when Coleraine reached the final of the Ulster Schools Cup before losing 3-0 to a strong Campbell College.
Coleraine had to wait until 1992 for their ninth and thus far last Ulster Schools triumph and what a win it was; their 35-21 thumping of favourites Methody, skippered by lock Jeremy Davidson, hailed as one of the greatest ever Ulster Cup performances.
Played in front of a 12,000 crowd at Ravenhill on St Patrick’s Day, future Ireland centre Jonny Bell – at full-back that day – and fly-half Darry Callaghan took centre stage.
Bell went onto a considerable career with Ulster, Northampton and Ireland but Callaghan never replicated that genius at senior level. Indeed he didn’t even get capped by the Irish Schools that season which remains an enduring mystery.
And that was their final success although there was an inglorious and painful appearance in the 1998 final against RBAI when they got thuped 57-3. There have been a few notable players since, not least Ulster and Ireland wing Andrew Trible, but they wait impatiently for a return of the glory years.