John Hunter Player Profile

Biography

The year 1910 saw the death of King Edward VII and the coronation of his son George V. It saw a General Election campaign embroiled in expenses, hung parliaments and possible coalitions and the death of Mark Twain not ‘greatly exaggerated’ this time and on April 20th it saw the return of Halley’s Comet during it’s seventy-five year orbit. On the very same day that the comet became visible to the naked eye, John ‘Sailor’ Hunter wrote himself into Dundee FC folklore when he scored the winning goal in the Scottish Cup Final to bring the trophy to Dens for the first and to date only time in The Dark Blue’s history and 106 years later he wass inducted into the club’s Hall of Fame with a Heritage Award.

John Bryson Hunter was born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire on April 6th 1878 and after a youth career with Paisley Junior side Westmarch, he signed for the town’s original Scottish League members Abercorn aged 18 in 1897.

At the turn of the century John tried his luck down south and went to Liverpool where he was part of their first ever side to win the English League Championship in 1901 but a year later moved back to Scotland to join Hearts for £300 where he was a Scottish Cup runner-up when they lost the 1903 replayed final 2-0 to Rangers.

In 1904 he joined Woolwich Arsenal in a £165 transfer, playing 22 times for them in 1904/05 before joining Portsmouth of the Southern League and in 1907 he was back in Scotland when he signed for Scottish League runners-up Dundee in pre-season.

Nicknamed ‘Sailor’ because of his rolling gait, John was a strong centre-forward who became a prolific scorer in his three years at Dens Park. He was an instant hit with the Dark Blue support when he scored on his debut away at Falkirk on August 17th 1907 and he became the first Dundee player to score back to back hat-tricks when he got a treble against Clyde in a 6-1 home win in October and did it again a week later when The Dee beat Queen’s Park 5-0 at Dens.

By the end of the season ‘Sailor’ was top scorer with 18 goals and in his second season repeated that feat with an impressive 32 goals in 35 games as Dundee very nearly won the Scottish League Championship. By April Dundee were top of the league, having held that position since the turn of the year but by the end of the season missed out on the title to defending Champions Celtic despite Hunter’s 29 league goals which beat the Scottish League record by 5 strikes.

The undoubted turning point came in March when Hunter was called up to play for Scotland in a Home International match with Wales in Wrexham and while John was winning his only international cap in a 3-2 defeat, Dundee also went down in his absence 2-1 to lowly Morton at Dens. That failure proved fatal as Celtic took six points from their last four games in a five day spell to deny Dundee their first major honour by a single point.

That honour however was just 12 months away and ‘Sailor’ Hunter was to be at the heart of it. By April 1910 Dundee had reached the Scottish Cup Final for the first time ever after a marathon eight game campaign and were favourites to defeat Clyde at the 75,000 Ibrox Stadium; being used instead of Hampden which suffered serious damage after riots in the 1909 Old Firm Final.

In the first round Dundee defeated non-league Beith after a replay and in the second round defeated Falkirk 3-0 at home with Hunter scoring Dundee’s third. In the next round a Sandy Hall hat-trick helped Dundee progress to the semis 3-1 at Motherwell where they would meet Hibernian in a repeat of their 1903 quarter-final meeting.

In what proved to be an epic tie, Dundee went through to the final after the second replay; the two matches at Dens Park and Easter Road ending goalless and with Celtic Park the neutral venue for the third match, Dundee won 1-0 thanks to a typical headed counter from Hunter.

Dundee’s Final opponents Clyde had defeated Rangers and Celtic on the ‘Road to Ibrox’ and by half-time were 2-0 ahead against the Dark Blues in front of 60,000 fans on April 6th. As the minutes ticked away The Dee showed little sign of making a comeback and the Dundee fans started streaming for the exits as the Clyde ribbons were being tied to the trophy.

With just four minutes left however a long ball sent down the middle was diligently chased by Hunter and as the Clyde keeper attempted to clear, the ball rebounded off the 5ft 10in striker and into the net. Caution was then thrown to the wind and with just 30 seconds remaining the Dark Blues’ efforts were rewarded when George Langlands crashed a Bellamy corner high into the net.

The replay took place a week later on Saturday 16th April but a no scoring draw meant that the sides had to do it all again midweek on Wednesday the 20th. Just like the first match Clyde shocked Dundee early on when Chalmers gave them the lead in only three minutes but 12 minutes later Dundee drew level when Englishman Jimmy Bellamy headed home from a corner.

Then came the moment when John Hunter would immortalise himself into Dundee’s history with a goal that would live long in the memory. Hunter took advantage of a blunder by the Clyde defence to run in on goal and after beating former Dens Park centre-half McAteer, he sent the ball high past McTurk from a narrow angle to give Dundee the lead for the first time in the tie.

Clyde laid siege to Dundee’s goal but The Dee managed to hold on and win the oldest football trophy in the world 2-1. “At last the hitherto elusive Scottish Cup has been brought to Dundee”, exclaimed The Courier the morning after Dundee’s victory as ‘Jute City’ celebrated like it had never celebrated before.

A 20,000 crowd awaited the returning heroes at Dundee West train station at eleven o’clock at night and the names of the cup winning sides would be long remembered especially that of John ‘Sailor’ Hunter whose winning goal ensured that the Cup would come east to Dens Park.

Hunter only played twice more for The Dee in the first two games of the 1910/11 season but after ironically moving to Clyde in September, he failed to make an appearance for the Shawfield club as he was forced to retire through injury six months later.

Almost a year to the day from the cup winning triumph, Hunter became Motherwell’s first ever manager and would lead them to the Scottish League Championship in 1931/32 during a 35 year managerial reign. ‘Sailor’ found it hard to leave Fir Park and would stay on as club secretary, a position he held when Motherwell met Dundee in the 1952 Scottish Cup Final. He refused to go to the Final so as to not be a distraction against his former club and when the players won 4-0 to lift the Cup, they dedicated the win to the popular former boss.

John would stay on as secretary until his retirement in 1959 at the age of 80 when the club when the club granted him a weekly pension and he sadly passed away in Motherwell on January 12th 1966.

In a year which saw Winston Churchill elected as a Liberal MP for Dundee in the December General Election, Portugal become a republic, Japan annexe Korea, the first commercial flight take place, Dr. Crippon arrested and the RMS Olympic launched, at Dens Park it will always be remembered as the year that John ‘Sailor’ Hunter scored the winning goal for Dundee to win the Scottish Cup and their first major honour after a 17 year wait and the club has recognised that achievement with Hunter’s induction into the club’s Hall of Fame with the 2016 Heritage Award.