Edward "Eddie" (and William) McBain
In the last few years of the 1880s St. Mirren seems to have been almost a team of McBains. According to records four were taking the field, although not all at the same time - Andy, Alex, although they might have been the same, Eddie and William. And the last two were brothers, Eddie, the younger and a half-back, William, a forward, in fact in season 1889-90 the Saints' top goal-scorer with seventeen goals in sixteen starts.
William, born in 1867, seems to have turned out for club for just two seasons, from aged twenty-two. He is then said to have played professionally on both sides of the border. Where is unclear. Eddie, on the other hand, born two years later, joined the club in 1887 at eighteen, and played for the first team from 1888 to 1898, a one-club man.
The McBain brothers were the two eldest sons of a Ship's Rivetter from Dumbarton and local, Paisley-born mother. In fact, whilst William would become a Brass Finisher, Eddie would follow his father to trade. And it would be to that work he would return after football career that would include five Renfrewshire Cups, seeing his club into the Scottish League on its formation, its remaining in its First Division, despite a couple of re-elections early on and for him personally playing for and captaining Renfrewshire, two Scottish League appearances and a single cap in victory over Wales in 1894.
Eddie retired from playing in 1898, at not even thirty with the possibility it was health related. Just over a decade later at the age of only forty -one in 1911 he was dead. His passing was at the house he still shared with his widower father and several of his siblings but not William. He had married. Eddie never had. And death was due to heart failure but from of a combination of asthma, bronchitis and pneumonia. He is buried in Hawkshead Cemetery, by Paisley with his parents and a younger brother, Adam.
Birth Locator:
1869 - 7, Old Smithhills, Paisley
Residence Locations:
1871-81 - 7, Old Smithhills, Paisley
1891-1901 - 10, Lawn St., Paisley
Death Locator:
Grave Locator:
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