Royal And Ancient Captain To Repeat Term, First Since
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In another sign of the (first world) times, the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews will have Clive Edginton continue as captain for another year. This makes him the first to do so since John Murray Belshes in 1835-36.
I know you all know about Murray Belshes, but first, for Immediate Publication.
THE ROYAL AND ANCIENT GOLF CLUB ANNOUNCES CLIVE EDGINTON WILL CONTINUE AS CAPTAIN FOR 2020/21
6 May 2020, St Andrews, Scotland: The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews has announced that Clive Edginton will continue as Captain for 2020/21.
Mr Edginton took office last September as Captain for 2019/20 but due to the disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic the Past Captains of the Club have nominated Mr Edginton to continue as Captain for another year from September 2020.
This is only the second occasion since the Club was founded in 1754 that a Captain has served two successive terms. The first was Major John Murray Belshes, who held the position in 1835 and 1836.
Mr Edginton said, “It is an honour to be Captain of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club and I feel very privileged to be asked to continue in the role. This is a difficult time for all of us in the midst of this pandemic but I am happy that I can continue to serve the Club as we look positively to the future.”
Born in Walton-on-Thames, Mr Edginton was educated at Malvern College and Oxford University, graduating in 1973 with a degree in law and a Blue for golf. After a successful business career in the City of London, latterly as Chief Executive and then Chairman of Tindall Riley, a specialist insurance management company, he retired in 2014. He has since been a non-executive director and is now a consultant to the Medical Defence Union.
Mr Edginton became a member of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club in 1997. He served on the Rules of Golf Committee from 2000 to 2004 and was its Deputy Chairman from 2002 to 2004. He was Chairman of the Amateur Status Committee from 2007 to 2011 during which time The R&A and the USGA produced the first unified Amateur Status Code. He was elected to the General Committee of the Club in 2014 and became Chairman of the General Committee and of the R&A’s principal companies from September 2015 until September 2018.
Mr Edginton’s home club is St George’s Hill in Weybridge, Surrey where he became a member at the age of eight. He has served St George’s Hill as Committee Member, Captain, Director and Trustee. He has been Club Champion on four occasions and is a nine-time winner of the club’s scratch Gold Medal. At various times he has also been Captain of the South Eastern Junior Golfing Society, the Oxford and Cambridge Golfing Society, the Moles Golfing Society and the Old Malvernian Golfing Society, for whom he played more than 100 matches in the Halford Hewitt.
Aged 68, Mr Edginton currently plays to a handicap of eight. He is married to Debbie, who is a member of both St George’s Hill and The St Rule Club.
Now about Belshes.
Check out Scott Macpherson’s item for Links on the royal (golf) title and its history. Captain B, an 1800’s man who looked like, well, every other 1800s elite type, put the stamp on a very important application back in those roaring 1830s.
With the union of the Scottish and English crowns in 1603, golf moved south; but when the House of Stuart fell 100 years later, so did golf’s royal link. It wasn’t restored until Lord Kinnaird, captain of the Perth Golfing Society from 1832 to 1834, addressed King William IV during a trip to London. Kinnaird asked His Majesty if he would become patron of the Society, and if the club might call itself The Royal Perth Golfing Society. When the King agreed to both requests, the royal rush was on.
Perth!
William IV granted the royal title to only one other golf club, but it was a big one—the Society of St. Andrews Golfers. Major John Murray Belshes put forward the application in 1834, and His Majesty was happy to have the club restyle itself The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews. But it took some gentle persuasion before he would agree to become its patron, acquiescing once it was pointed out that one of his many titles was Duke of St. Andrews.
There you go, he’s the man who got Royal in the title of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews. Definitely worth a second year.
Wait, so who tacked on the “and Ancient?”
Hey, I have something to do tomorrow! Macpherson here I come!**
**He offers this:”
“They added the ‘ancient’ when devising the new club name was to do with the fact the club was 70 years older than the Royal Perth Golfing Society, who had a year earlier in 1833 been granted the royal title. The wanted to differentiate themselves and not just be a royal club, but make it very clear they were the senior club. John M Belches led the charge for the royal title for the St Andrews club by writing to the King etc, despite (as many of them were) also being a member of the, now Royal, Perth club. It was oneupsmanship on a grand scale. So the club went from the St Andrews Society to the R&A GC of St Andrews. There was no ‘The Royal Golf Club of St Andrews'.”
