Who Were The First Corinthians in Brazil?

In 1910, Corinthian FC toured Brazil for the first time, famously inspiring the founding of Sport Club Corinthians Paulista. But who were the players on that historic tour? James Shaw delves into the annals to find out…

Of the many inspirational moments in the history of this club, by far our most famous is the formation of Sport Club Corinthians Paulista, our brothers in football.

Funnily enough, we owe Fluminense of Rio de Janeiro a big thank you. Much has been said about former Corinthian Charles Miller bringing football to Brazil, but another Brit had an important say. Brazilian-born Oscar Cox, who lived most of his childhood in Switzerland helped bring the beautiful game to Rio, forming Fluminense in 1902. Cox invited Corinthian to tour Rio in 1910 and play three matches against Fluminense, a Rio State XI and a Brazilian XI. Miller found out and invited the tourists to visit São Paulo and play a further three teams there, including Miller’s Sao Paulo Athletic Club (SPAC).

Corinthian would thrash Fluminense 10-1, Rio State 8-1 (with A.T. Coleby scoring six), and register a 5-2 win over the Brazilian XI.

The games in Sao Paulo were tougher. The first was a 2-0 win over Palmeiras (not the current club). This was followed by a 5-0 win over Paulistano, a club founded by Italian immigrants. The final game against SPAC ended 8-2, with Miller scoring one of the two goals for the Paulistas.

Corinthian took 15 players on tour, some of the finest amateur footballers. Many attended the top public schools including five each from Malvern College and Charterhouse School, while 11 went on to attend Oxford University and the remaining four were at Cambridge University.

Such was the brilliance of the Corinthian players during their games in São Paulo that a group of local railway workers, including Miguel Bataglia, were inspired to form a football club. Legend has it that Miller suggested they name it in honour of the Englishmen. Thus, was born Sports Club Corinthians Paulista.

These are the gentlemen who dazzled Sao Paulo 115 years ago…

Charles William Miller (1 appearance/ 0 goals for Corinthian)
A prominent member of Southampton FC and the Hampshire FA, Miller was invited to step in for one game for Corinthian against Hampshire in 1892. The game finished 1-0 with a goal by J.G. Veitch and not much else was thought of it. Miller travelled to Brazil in 1894 and joined the São Paulo Railway Company. He would create SPAC, who won three Paulista league titles in the early 1900s and suggested the name for Corinthians. So even with just one game to his name he is one of the most important players in the history of Corinthian.

THE CORINTHIANS

Reginald Rogers (6/0)
The goalkeeper only played for Corinthian during this tour. He became a schoolteacher in Eastbourne, playing locally, and also for Casuals. Sadly, he died at the Somme in 1916 and was listed as an unknown soldier, but they exhumed his body in 1930 and found a pocket compass with his name on it before he was reburied.

William Udal Timmis (200/5)
The fifth-highest appearance maker for Corinthian who played in all but the first game of this tour, Timmis was the honorary secretary of Corinthian from 1906 to 1919, while also playing for Casuals. At that time, he advocated for amateur international football which caused the split between the FA and the AFA that led to Corinthian being banned from playing professional clubs in England. Timmis was a clerk in the Lord’s Chancellors' office and then the Royal Courts of Justice until 1921, when he suddenly passed away aged 46. He was a Second Lieutenant with the Grenadier Guards during WWI.

Charles Carew Page (54/0)
Page replaced Timmis at right back in the first game of this tour before moving to left back for the last four games. A renowned cricketer, he was part of Marylebone CC’s famous tour of New Zealand in 1906/07 captained by another Corinthian, P.R. May. Page was a Captain in the Army Ordnance Department during the war and, despite surviving, he died in 1921 after falling downstairs in his home.

Robert Lyttleton Lee Braddell (14/0)
Braddell played four games during the tour, switching positions three times. Born in British Malaysia, Braddell served during WWI with the Royal Garrison Artillery. He then became a barrister, practising in Singapore, but returned to England to become a bursar at St Paul’s school.

Frank Noel Tuff (24/0)
Tuff went on three Corinthian tours, to Brazil, Spain and USA & Canada. He featured in four games on the 1910 tour, playing in four different positions, and was another who also represented Casuals. He studied law and was articled at his brother’s firm in Rochester, Kent. Sadly, he died during WWI at the age of 25 from injuries suffered during a catapult demonstration in Gallipoli in 1915. He was shipped to Malta, where there was a military hospital, but died after the wound got infected.

John Charles Dodsworth Tetley (22/0)
Having played for Casuals, Tetley also made several appearances for England Amateurs. In addition to the 1910 tour, he was also selected for the abandoned 1914 tour, returning immediately to fight in France when he heard that war had broken out upon his arrival in South America. Tetley worked for Corinthian legend Charles Wreford-Brown as a solicitor for the Wreford-Brown & Co. firm. He served with the 3rd Battalion of the Grenadier Guards and died during WWI in the third battle of Ypres in 1917.

Morgan Morgan-Owen (170/24)
Morgan-Owen played in all but one of the tour games in 1910 and also represented Casuals, where he was club president from 1922 to 1939, having held a meeting in 1919 to revive the activities of the club after the war. He later became the first president of Corinthian-Casuals from 1939 to 1950. He played 12 times for Wales and also turned out for Nottingham Forest and Glossop North End when they were in the Football League. Morgan-Owen was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Essex Regiment and Rifle Brigade and he was awarded a Distinguished Service Order, mentioned in dispatches twice and wounded twice. His brother Hugh also played for Corinthian.

Ivan Edward Snell (92/14)
Snell played five times on this tour, scoring four goals against Paulistano. Credited with mending the rift between the AFA and the FA in 1914, allowing Corinthian to play professional clubs once more, he was also a member of the abandoned 1914 South American tour. Snell carried on playing for Corinthian after the war, and became a Met Police magistrate in 1925 until his retirement in 1948. He won a CBE for his work in the police force, and was awarded the Military Cross during the war in 1916, whe nhe was a Major with the Black Watch, mentioned in dispatches three times and wounded once.

Cuthbert Everard Brisley (84/64)
Brisley was considered the best striker of this generation and played five times during the tour. For Casuals, he scored hat-trick in the very first AFA Senior Cup final in 1908, beating Old Carthusians 3-1 in the final. He was a barrister, called to the bar at Inner Temple in 1912. Unfortunately, it was a short-lived career as Brisley died during the war. He was a Major in the RAF and with a few months to go in 1918, he died in a flying accident at Market Drayton at the age of 32.

Arthur Tindall Coleby (22/30)
No, you’re not misreading those statistics, Coleby really scored a staggering 30 goals in 22 matches for Corinthian, including six against the Rio State XI on the 1910 tour. Not much is known of his life away from the football field, but he was a schoolmaster at King’s College, in Bangkok, Thailand in 1912, and also taught in Eastbourne. He died in Bexhill, Sussex in 1950.

Lancelot Andrews Vidal (37/9)
Vidal scored four of his nine goals on this tour in one game, against Fluminense, but only played in three more games after. He was an avid botanist and a keen rugby player for Harlequins. He died in France in 1915 as part of the 2nd Battalion Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry. He was only 28.

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​Samuel Hulme Day (108/117)
Possibly the most famous player on this tour, Day was the fifth-highest goalscorer in the history of Corinthian and has the joint third-highest goals scored in a single game, with 9 against All New York in a 19-0 win in 1906. He represented England three times, scoring twice, and also represented England Amateurs six times. On the cricket field, he played 171 first-class test matches for Kent and scored a century in his first match whilst still a schoolboy. His brothers Arthur and Sydney both played for Corinthian as well as playing cricket for Kent. Day was Honorary Secretary of Corinthian from 1904 to 1906.

Howell Griffith Howell-Jones (46/7)
Howell-Jones only played once during the tour in the 8-1 win over the Rio State XI. He also played over 50 times for Casuals, including that AFA Senior Cup final in 1908, in which Brisley bagged a hat-trick. He also played for Eastbourne while he was teaching there and had previously played for Wrexham and Bristol Rovers among others. He fought in the war with the Royal Welsh Fusiliers.

Arthur Henry Goold Kerry (17/2)
Kerry played for Oxford City and also represented Tottenham Hotspur in the league against Chelsea in April 1910, scoring the goal that helped relegate Chelsea. During the war, he fought with the Royal Engineers from 1914 to 1919 and was awarded a military MBE for his services.
He was one of the many Corinthians to be adept at multiple sports including cricket, swimming and athletics.

Vivian Gordon Thew (52/1)
Thew played in five of the games on the 1910 tour, missing only the game against the Brazilian XI in Rio. He served in the Royal Garrison Artillery during the war and was acting bombardier when he won the Military Cross. By 1933, he moved to Sri Lanka, but not much else is known of Thew.

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