RGS Newcastle Fives Challenge Cup (Senior), presented by Headmaster S.C. Logan, June 1891 (1891-1906)
Fives
Fives is an ‘extinct’ RGS sport, short-lived but popular at the turn of the 20th century.
Fives is a handball sport, also known historically as ‘hand-tennis’, which is played in a three-walled court. It was whilst the school was located at our Rye Hill site that Fives became a feature of sporting life for students.
“The game of Fives is one of the oldest pastimes known; it preceded Racquets, Tennis, and similar games, being many years old before some one with soft hands, used a bat, and called the old game by a new name.”
The Novocastrian, Vol. III No. 2, Feb 1888, p.13 [ref: RGS/NOV/14]
RGS Newcastle Fives Challenge Cup (Junior), presented by the Assistant Masters, 1891 (1891-1905)
The February 1888 issue of The Novocastrian magazine announced the introduction of the sport:
A Fives-Court is to be erected, or rather 4 Fives-Courts, on that playground where so many heroes have come to grief...
The Novocastrian, Vol. III No. 2, Feb 1888, p.13 [ref: RGS/NOV/14]
The courts were in place by 1891, and by that year its popularity must have been significant, as an annual Fives competition was launched. Two Fives Challenge Cups were awarded : a Junior Cup donated by the Assistant Masters, and a Senior Cup by the Headmaster, SC Logan (1883-1912). These beautifully engraved silver trophies are some of the oldest in our collections and are now on display in our Sports Centre.
Fives completely disappeared from RGS following our move to Eskdale Terrace in 1906. No courts were constructed on the new playing field and enthusiasm among most students for the sport must have waned.
The last glimpse of an attempted resurrection was in 1915, during the Debating Society’s spring ‘potpourri’ debate:
The old and grievous question: “When are we going to get a Fives Court?” came up again...
The Novocastrian, Vol. XXIX, No. 3, Jul 1915, p.8 [ref: RGS/NOV/146]
It wasn’t to be, and Fives courts were never built on our Jesmond site, only fragments of evidence of the sport remain in our historic collections.