133 years ago, in November 1892, The King’s Hospital played the very first hockey match in Ireland. In the same month, a match between The King’s Hospital and The High School was the first-ever schools’ hockey match in the country. Prior to the introduction of hockey rules, both schools had been active in the Irish Hurley Union, founded in 1879.
The key figure in the early history of hockey was the school’s headmaster, The Revd T. B. Gibson (1878–1896). He served as President of the Irish Hockey Union from its formation until 1905. When Gibson left the headmastership, hockey ceased to be a major sport in the school. Under a Welshman, The Revd T. P. Richards, the school turned its attention to rugby, and hockey was no longer played.
It wasn’t until 1937 that the school once more fielded hockey teams. The revival was led by past pupil and teacher Mr Paddy O’Driscoll, whose brothers were in the school at the time. In the second season after the reintroduction of hockey, the school won the Junior Cup, and the following year saw victory in the Senior Cup. Many further titles were won thereafter.
In 2018, when the school’s second Astroturf hockey pitch was inaugurated, the school honoured the two founding fathers of hockey at KH by naming the new pitch the O’Driscoll Pitch and the original pitch the Gibson Pitch.
The school welcomed descendants of Dean Thomas Gibson, who viewed the new signage for the pitch and presented artefacts to the school for preservation and exhibition. His great-grandchildren John Moore, Peter Moore, Andrew Moore, and James Moore, and his great-great-grandson Steven Hanna, were there to honour their ancestor. Steven’s mother, Patricia, taught Physical Education here in the early 1970s. She had coached the Mercer’s School team that won the Intermediate Cup in 1969, setting firm foundations for the school’s Senior Cup title in 1975.
