The Olympics has everyone excited, and we were very enthusiastic to share this story that was recently brought to our attention.
The Museum is often approached to undertake research to verify tid bits of history and while many times the story being fact checked turns out to not be true, with the Olympic spirit raging through our offices we were asked to confirm if a local Orange Firefighter was indeed the first NSW Firefighter to attend the Olympics AND take home a gold medal!
The story is indeed true and so we had to share it!
Firefighter Charles McMurtrie was a member of the local Orange Fire Brigade (pictured here in his uniform).
Locally, he was a prolific rugby union player who was a member of the Orange Fire Brigade’s Rugby Union Team. His size made him an asset as a lock forward and he was well accustomed at using his weight in scrums and rucks, as well as in the lineout.
His prowess on the field extended beyond the NSW regional town though and after being selected for his performance in the country v. metropolitan match he joined the Australian national team to tour the UK.
This 1908-9 tour coincided with the Olympics being held in London in 1908. The Aussie team, coined the “Wallabies”, were asked to represent Australia in the Rugby Union event. This meant McMurtrie and the entire team were now Olympians.
Just three nations were entered into the rugby union competition; the host nation (Great Britian), Australia and France; with the later being the defending champions from the previous games. The French team ultimately withdrew from the competition leaving just the two teams to fight for gold. The British team was represented by the Cornwall Club (not a selection of players from across the country like the Aussie team) and the Wallabies reigned supreme with a final score of 32-3.
Unfortunately, interest in the contest as an Olympic event was minimal which may have contributed to the sport not being included again until 1920. Long term the sport didn’t last in the Olympic format and after 1924 rugby union was not seen at an Olympics again until the Rugby 7’s format was introduced in 2016.
After the Olympics and the British tour ended in 1909, McMurtrie returned to Australia where he switched codes and joined the Balmain Rugby League Club. He would go on to be selected to represent Australia (the Kangaroos) in this code as well making him a duel international, thus both a Wallaby and a Kangaroo.
He then enlisted to serve during World War One and saw action in Egypt, France and England before he was medically discharged and returned home.
He had a career as a successful miner until his death in 1951.
To confirm if McMurtrie was NSW’s first firefighter to attend the Olympics our team conducted a brief review of all Olympians to precede him. Across the first three Olympic Games (1896, 1900 & 1904) Australia had just six athletes attend the games. This number grew significantly at the 1908 games thanks to the attendance of the rugby union team however, including the athletes at the 1908 games, this still only took Australia’s athlete attendance number to 36.
While we are very confident that McMurtrie was in fact the first NSW Firefighter to attend the Olympics representing Australia and bring home gold there is always the possibility that additional information about other athletes may come to light at some point in the future. If this does occur our team will conduct further research.
For now though, we celebrate Orange Fire Brigade Firefighter Charles McMurtrie as the first fireie from NSW to attend the Olympics!
-Story by the Museum of Fire Heritage Team
That is one awesome story the town of Orange is very passionate to me as I won the baby show back in 1963 please keep up the great work and researching.