If you have heard of the Inkerman Battle in the Crimean War and of the barracks at Woking named after it, then it won’t surprise you to know that Edward Inkerman Jordan Bell was the son of a Major in the Royal Fusiliers. Educated in Ireland, he worked as a post-office clerk in Farnborough, where he played his early football for Archie Turner’s old club, South Farnborough. He continued playing as an amateur for Portsmouth and then Crystal Palace.

He made an unusual start to his spell with Southampton, featuring in a Hampshire Benevolent Cup match under the assumed name of “J. Edwards” – for business reasons, it was said. Having initially declined professional terms, he changed his mind after the game. A regular in the Reserves in 1907-08, he played but a handful of Southern League games before returning to Farnborough, to become a Government Contractors Inspector.

His achievements, during the First World War, with the 17th Middlesex, aka the Footballers’ Battalion (see photo below), considerably outshone his few seasons in the Southern League – to the extent that he features prominently in When The Whistle Blows, the story of the battalion’s soldiers and footballers.

Captain Edward Bell served as adjutant to Major Frank Buckley, an England international who would continue to use his military title during his 32 seasons as a manager in the Football League. When the Major was wounded at the Battle of Delville Wood in July 1916, Bell assumed command of the battalion, in such a manner that he was awarded a Military Cross for “conspicuous gallantry”. In March 1918, while attached to the 99th Infantry Brigade, Captain Bell was killed by an enemy shell near Albert. A few months later, he was gazetted a Bar to his Military Cross, for

“conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty.”

The son born to his widow in October 1918 would be given that memorable sequence of names – Edward Inkerman Jordan – and would serve as an officer during the Second World War.