Frank Edwards

Frank Edwards (29 September 1893 – January 1964), also known as The Footballer of Loos, was a British Army soldier in the First World War who served as a rifleman in the 1st Battalion, London Irish Rifles, during the Battle of Loos. He is distinguished for leading the London Irish across no man's land to storm enemy trenches kicking a football ahead of the troops. The successful capture of enemy positions that followed earned the London Irish Rifles their second battle honour, Loos, 1915. The football is still preserved in the regimental museum of the London Irish and to this day the memory of Edwards is commemorated on Loos Sunday.

Biography Edwards was born into a working-class family in Chelsea, London. He married, but his wife and child both died in 1913. On the outbreak of the war in August 1914 he was working as a stationer's assistant, but promptly enlisted in the 1st Battalion, London Irish Rifles, who were based at the Duke of York's Barracks on the King's Road, Chelsea. A keen footballer, Edwards soon became captain of his battalion's football team, and led them to victory in the Brigade Final, only days before they were sent to France in March 1915. and by September, were stationed close to the village of Loos. ) where he was promoted to Sergeant.

In October 2012, Edwards was commemorated on the pub sign of "The Rifleman" pub in Twickenham.

The Football of Loos Edwards' football was found after the battle, lodged in the German barbed wire, and was on display at the regimental museum in London up until the 1970s, when it was put into storage in the sergeant's mess and forgotten. Enquiries about the ball in 2011 led to its rediscovery in a very poor condition, and at risk of disintegrating completely. It was sent to the Leather Conservation Centre in Northampton for repairs and restoration, and has since been on display at the London Irish Rifles Association museum.

In October 2014, it appeared on the television programme Antiques Roadshow where it was valued at up to £15,000. In May 2015, the Royal Mail issued a set of First World War commemorative stamps, one of which featured The Football of Loos.