Samuel "Sam" Thomson
Samuel Thomson started his working life as a miner, but of ironstone. By then he was at nineteen living in Auchinleck in Ayrshire, one of six children of his widowed mother. But he had been born up the valley below Glenbuck in Muirkirk, his locally-born father also having mined the ironstone but dying in 1879 aged fifty-six.
But away from work Sam was by then also in the Boswell team from nearby Lugar, having joined in 1880, a forward, winning with it the Ayrshire Cup the following year, playing for Ayrshire and losing in the same final in 1882.
And that loss was perhaps the start of change, of dismantling. Whilst in 1882-3 the club reached the 5th round of the Scottish Cup only to lose on a replay to eventual finalist Vale of Leven, at the end of the season four of the team moved on within Scotland. All, as a result, would win caps but not quite yet as Thomson remained to be awarded two the following year and draw immediate interest.
But in his case that attention would come from Down South and lead to a move to Preston North End, a club with which he would remain for six seasons, winning in the last two the League/Cup double in 1889 and retaining the Cup the following year. He was by then twenty-eight, perhaps already suffering from ankle problems yet then lured away for what he probably saw as a last pay-day. He went to Wolves but only lasted a season before a return to Lancashire briefly turning out for first Everton and then Accrington, presumably living back in Preston, before at just thirty hanging up his boots and entering the pub--trade.
And it was through the building of his Hotel Continental that he may have met his future wife, Ellen Croft, the daughter of the builder. They were married in 1897 in Preston, he interestingly giving his own address as Rosebank, Lugar, recorded himself as a Publican and his father as a Mining Manager.
He and Ellen were to have three children, one born in Cumnock, so between Lugar and Muirkirk, and two in Alston, just outwith Preston. However she was to die young aged just fifty-five in 1922 to be buried in Preston Old Cemetery.
Sam was by then sixty and on retirement went to live with his daughter and her family in Fulwood, north of Preston, although by the time of his death he was staying in another suburb of the town, East Ribbleton. That passing would be in 1943, he, aged eighty-one and having outlived his wife by more than two decades, laid to rest beside her, there to be joined in time by their daughter, Isabella, and her husband.
Birth Locator:
1862 - Wellwood Row, Muirkirk, Ayrshire
Residence Locations:
1871 - N/A
1881 - 473, New Road, Auchinleck Ayrshire
1891 - N/A
1897 - Rosebank, Lugar, Ayrshire
1901-22 - Continental Inn, Bowling Green, Riverside, Preston
1939 - Baynesdon in Fullwood, Preston, Lancashire
1943 - Watling Street Road, East Ribbleton, Preston, Lancashire
Death Locator:
1943 - Watling Street Road, East Ribbleton, Preston, Lancashire
Grave Locator:
Preston Old Cemetery, Preston, Lancashire
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