The heroic Olympians felled by the Great War

IF EVER there was a man who could lead a company of soldiers charged with throwing bombs at enemy lines it was 2nd Lt Alfred Flaxman.

He had, after all, made his name at the 1908 London Olympics, during which he competed in the discus, javelin and high jump.

It was Flaxman’s fearsome strength that caught the eye of his commanding officers when he joined the South Staffordshire Regiment in June 1915.

Flaxman was chosen to lead the company of bombers on account of the prowess he had demonstrated during training, when he threw a bomb well over 75 yards.

Flaxman was killed on the first day of the battle of the Somme, in an ill-fated diversionary attack at Gommecourt. During the first wave of British assaults Flaxman was caught in barbed wire as he tried to push forward and was killed by German machinegun fire.

The 36-year-old from Wombwell, South Yorkshire, was one of dozens of British Olympians killed during the First World War. They had proved themselves to be, in the motto of the Olympics, “the fastest, highest, strongest” of their generation – the Mo Farahs, Jessica Ennis-Hills and Adam Peatys of their day – but their athletic achievements were no defence when war broke out between the great European powers.

One by one they were cut down, their Olympic ideals no defence against Alfred Flaxman, far left, was known for his strength and could throw a bomb more than 75 yards. He died on the first day of the Battle of the Somme, above Brigadier General Paul Aloysius Kenna, above, competed in the 1912 games before being shot at Gallipoli; Frederick Kelly, right, won rowing gold in London in 1908 but was killed in action in France the machineguns, mines and bombs of modern mechanised warfare.

Now their lives and achievements are finally being recognised in a book telling the story of the Olympians who died during the Great War.

Britain lost the largest number of Olympians in the conflict: 50 men who had competed in 1908 and 1912.

But it was not the only country to lose the flower of its athletic youth. France lost 29 Olympians, along with 22 from Germany and 10 from Hungary.

Austria, Russia and Canada each lost five Olympians, with three Australians killed, two from Belgium and the US and one each from South Africa, Haiti, Serbia, New Zealand, Finland and Italy.

Flaxman, a gifted artist and musician, had taken up the hammer throw and pole vault after moving to London to study at the Royal Academy of Music. He also became a distinguished boxer and gymnast.

Selected for the 1908 Games, Flaxman is said to have “competed hard” in the discus, Greek discus, freestyle javelin and standing high jump, but missed out on any medals.

Flaxman was described by his commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel F A M Webster, as “a simple gentleman, the best of sportsmen and a very gallant soldier” who could “bend a horseshoe” and “rip a half pack of playing cards in half ”.

On hearing news of his death, Flaxman’s brother, Samuel, who was serving as a Captain with the North Midland Field Ambulance RAMC, went in search of his remains. They were never found.

He is commemorated on the Thiepval memorial but has, until now, been largely forgotten.

The book, by Nigel McCrery, also tells the story of Brigadier General Paul Aloysius Kenna, who had a distinguished military career before representing Britain at the 1912 Stockholm Games.

Kenna was awarded the VC for his part in the Battle of Khartoum in 1898, when he rode to the aid of a fallen comrade in the face of 3,000 enemy troops. An outstanding horseman he won around 300 flat and steeplechase races and was selected for the British Olympic equestrian team for the show jumping and three-day events in Stockholm.

Two years later he was back on active service, fighting in Egypt and then Gallipoli, where he was picked out by a Turkish sniper. The bullet went through his arm and into his stomach and he died of his wounds the following day.

McCrery, a former policeman who created the BBC crime dramas

and also recounts the story of Frederick Kelly, who won a rowing gold at the 1908 Games and was commissioned into the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve at the outbreak of war, serving alongside his great friend, the poet Rupert Brooke.

When Brooke died in April 1915 of sepsis from an infected mosquito bite, Kelly acted as one of his pall bearers and wrote the orchestral piece

in his memory, still played at the Proms to this day.

Kelly was twice wounded during the Gallipoli campaign and was awarded the DSC for conspicuous bravery in January 1916. But he would not see out the year. On November 13 he was killed while attacking a German machine gun post at Beaucourt-sur-l’Ancre, near the Somme.

The which Kelly had written for Brooke was played at his own memorial service in Wigmore Hall, central London.