Caring Hands Went To Harry’s Aid

Articles about former Wolves players, managers, directors, physios, secretaries and scouts adorn the pages of this website. But this is a first – a piece about a member of the match-day emergency services team.

We wouldn’t have deemed it sufficiently newsworthy for inclusion had it not been for the huge response we recently received when posting the photo (right) on Facebook.

Our motivation was to put in the public domain a picture we thought would delight the gentleman on the left – assuming he was still around to enjoy it, of course.

It was taken at the North Bank End of Molineux on March 13, 1971, during Wolves’ 2-0 First Division win over West Ham and shows Harry Redknapp being carried off with a knee injury.

We are informed by the Hammers’ former official photographer, Alan Shubrook, who ‘snapped’ it, that the tracksuited figure on the winger’s left side is physio Rob Jenkins.

But we also looked at the gentleman in the hat and more formal uniform and wondered whether any Wolves supporters might remember, recognise and identify him. We need not have fretted!

After we posted it on Facebook in the ‘Wolverhampton in old photographs’ group, we were deluged with comments and attracted well over 250 likes.

In no time at all, the name ‘Fred Baugh’ was offered by Wolves supporter Nick Williams as the identity of the mystery man. And Maxine Sutton agreed.

Shortly afterwards came confirmation from both Fred’s nephew and grand-daughter, the latter of whom spoke of his great pride in receiving this belated exposure from a time when he volunteered with the St John’s Ambulance.

It transpires that Fred is now in the second half of his 80s and unable to attend matches but remains a keen follower of them on TV and over what he still calls ‘the wireless’.

He has stayed in Wolverhampton and is resident in the Stafford Road area of the city, where he was said to be thrilled at the publication of the photograph more than 50 years on from when it was taken with London eyes in mind.

The Facebook post sparked further information about the game itself; namely (from Andy Lockett) the fact that Jimmy Greaves went on as substitute for Redknapp and, as Robert Green reminded us, that Bobby Gould scored both goals in Wolves’ victory.

‘E for B and Bobby Gould,” offered Brian O’Connor, reminding us how Molineux fans adapted a TV advert of the time that extolled the virtues of eating eggs for breakfast.

Gould later moved to Upton Park, via Albion and Bristol City, while Redknapp’s long football career, as a player and then manager, has been followed by a variety of TV roles including his success in the Australian jungle in I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here.

As for the photo at the top of this feature, it is one of the hundreds printed in Alan Shubrook’s handsome West Ham book – a pictorial record from his time on the touchline from 1965 to 1973.