01/10/2026
Local hero, Walter Tull, was born in 1888 in Folkestone to Daniel Tull, from Barbados, and Alice Elizabeth Palmer, from Kent. Walter's education began at North Board School, in Folkestone (now known as Mundella Primary School). When Walter’s parents died he and his brother Edward were sent to an orphanage in London.
Walter began his football career with the Clapton Football Club before signing for Tottenham Hotspur, making his debut in September 1909 in a match against Sunderland. “Football and the Colour Prejudice” was a headline that appeared after abuse he received from opposing fans. His excellent talent was spotted, and he was signed by Northampton Town, where he remained until war broke out.
When the First World War broke out in 1914, Walter was the first player for Northampton Town to enlist in the British Army, serving in two Football Battalions of the Duke of Cambridge’s Own (Middlesex) Regiment. Tull was commissioned as a second lieutenant on 30 May 1917; he became one of the first mixed-heritage infantry officers in a regular British Army regiment (the 1914 Manual of Military Law excluded soldiers who were not "natural born or naturalised British subjects of pure European descent" from becoming commissioned officers in the Special Reserve).
Walter was praised by Major General Sydney Lawford for his "gallantry and coolness" during a night raid into enemy territory on the Italian front. The raid of 26 men from the 23rd Battalion led by Walter crossed a fast flowing river into enemy lines and returned home unharmed.
Walter’s battalion returned to the frontline in Northern France on March 1918. During the First Battle of Bapaume, Walter was killed in action. His body was never recovered. Private Tom Billingham, a former goalkeeper for Leicester Fosse, tried without success to return him to the British position while under fire. He is believed to be buried somewhere in the Somme.
Walter is remembered locally with his name on the Folkestone War Memorial, the town war memorial outside Maison Dieu House in Dover and on the parish memorial in the village of River.
