The 'Southwark News' ran a big news story today on our Club remembering our War Dead at the weekend

Bill Kirby, a lifelong Hamlet fan who served in the Second World War, featured on the cover & in a full page article in the news section of the 'Southwark News', that was pulbished today:

The heroes of Dulwich Hamlet
Oldest fan pays tribute to club's war dead

A World War II veteran, who is the oldest supporter of Dulwich Hamlet Football Club, paid tribute last week to the sportsmen who lost their lives in battles since the First World War.
Bill Kirby, 93, who was involved in firing at enemy aircrafts during the Blitz before landing in normandy as part of the Royal Service Corps on D Day, laid a wreath in the boardroom of the club at Champion Hill, remembering the 22 Dulwich footballers who never made it back from the First World War.
Walter Lawrence, who served with the Royal Bucks Hussars as part of the Household Cavalry, was the first Hamlet casualty of the war. The West Dulwich Private is the only Hamlet World War One soldier who was buried in south London in Norwood Cemetery. He was killed on December 2 1914, aged 22.
Another four players were also killed in World War II.
Bill, from Herne Hill, who turns 94 next month, has been following the club since 1932, and distinctly remembers three players whome he used to watch in the pre-war days.
The most famous Hamlet footballers were killed within a week of each other-Reg Anderson, who was 25, and Bill Parr were both England amateur international players.
Reg Anderson, who was in the RAF, died close to Norway in February 1942, when the aircraft he was in was shot down. He was regarded as one of the best players the club had produced. The keen athlete scored a hat trick for England against Wales in the FA Amateur Cup finals in 1937.
And Bill Parr, who was a right winger (or outside right as it was known at the time), was also in the RAF. It is not known how he lost his life. He only had one season at Dulwich Hamlet before the war.
In 1941 Dulwich had 48 players serving in the foreces, with a large number of them serving in the RAF.
Even though the majority of players made it back from World War II, many returned with devastating wounds.
One player, Billy Milward, who rose from a Private to become a Brigadier, lost a leg and was awarded a Croix de Guerre French medal bestowed to members of the allied countries.
Following the remembrance service in the boardroom of the historic club, Bill Kirby said:
"It gives me a great deal of pride to honour the men who died. It's quite difficult to talk of those circumstances. A lot of chaps I went to school with didn'tcome back. A lot of our supporters got killed as well. It's important for young people to remember what a difficult time it was, and the sacrifices that we made. I came back, but wuite a lot didn't."