WHEN Mary Beavis passed away during the night of December 1 the world of rugby lost one of its great characters.

Mary's rugby story began one evening not long after the war when a group of young men met at the White Hart Hotel in St Whites Road with the aim of restarting rugby in Cinderford. They were all keen to play but none was willing to do the club's donkey work. So an exasperated young Mary Davies, the landlady's daughter, took on the role of secretary for the newly re-formed Cinderford club and thus became the only female rugby club Hon Sec in the country. That role of Hon Sec was one she fulfilled with distinction for the next 50 years. 

Mary and her late husband Bob lived and breathed rugby and they with a few others were instrumental in reestablishing  the Cinderford club after the conflict. They played a pivotal role in securing the Dockham Road ground when the land came up for sale in the early 1950s organising a loan overnight in order to buy the freehold of the ground from under the noses of the town council who were intent on having the land for housing.

The husband and wife team were the main driving force in the Cinderford club for the next half-century overseeing the ground improvements and the re-emergence of the club as a force in South West and later National League rugby. For many years the club's finances and those of many other sports clubs in the forest benefited from the proceeds of the 'tote' draw that ran every week until the early 1970s and which was administered by Mary at The White Hart. The White Hart Hotel remained the club's headquarters until the early 1970s and many old players still remember those times. Mary's mother, who was by then Mrs Jones, her husband Glynn and Mary's piano playing brother Pat with affection.

Mary was ever an ardent campaigner for the Cinderford club and her voice and trenchant views on rugby and its administration were heard with trepidation in rugby circles throughout Gloucestershire and in the corridors of power at Twickenham right up until her retirement and later, when occasion demanded, right up until the last.

She was a determined and articulate committee member and deployed every tactic and strategem in order to win her way. She even, like the iron lady herself, could shed a tear if she thought that it would give her an advantage in argument.

Mary and Bob, Bob and Mary, for one was rarely mentioned without reference to the other, seemed to know virtually everyone who was anyone in the world of english rugby during the second half of the twentieth century. However, because she was so well known, it was a paradox that she received the 'unsung hero' award at the RFU's annual dinner one evening during the 1980s. Ever one to deprecate her own efforts she was, nevertheless, delighted with the accolade.

Despite her lifelong devotion to rugby in general and Cinderford RFC in particular this admirable woman also found time to indulge her other sporting passion on the golf course at the Ross on Wye club.

She represented the GLCGA as a county selector and had the honour to be President of the GLCGA  for the years 2002-04.

Although lately she was not so physically active as she once had been she nevertheless appeared to keep good health and was as mentally sharp as ever right to the last. Her death comes as great shock to her friends at the Cinderford club.

– Rob Worgan, Chairman Cinderford RFC.