Harriet Wheelock / Friday 23 July 2010 The Dublin Hospitals Rugby Cup In January 1881 a group of physicians and surgeons met in Dublin to discuss Dr Cassidi's idea for a rugby league to be played between teams fielded by the Dublin Hospitals. Amongst those who supported the idea, and contributed towards the trophy, was William Thornley Stoker, the brother of Bram Stoker author of Dracula. The Hospitals Cup has been played every year since 1881 (with the exception of 1916-1917 and 1945-1946) making it the longest running rugby competition in Ireland.[1] Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital was involved from the beginning and was particularly dominant in the early years of the competition, winning the cup 16 times in the first 30 years. Amongst the hospital papers is a fantastic collection of team photographs showing all but one of the twenty two Sir Patrick Dun's Rugby teams who have won the cup. As well as the photographs the collection also contains a rugby cap from the 1900-1901 team. Amongst the hospital teams, especially when rugby was an amateur sport, were several players who would later go on to represent Ireland, one example from Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital is Bethel Solomons (1885-1965), third from right in the back row of the photograph above. Solomons studied medicine at Trinity and so would have attended Sir Patrick Dun's, as the universities teaching hospital. He played on the Hospital's cup winning team in the 1903-1904 and 1904-1905 seasons. After graduating from Trinity in 1907 Solomons won ten caps for Ireland in the next three years, but his rugby career gave way to the demand of medicine. Solomons specialised in gynaecology and in 1926 he was elected Master of the Rotunda, where he was a progressive and innovative doctor and master. His connection with the hospital was celebrated by James Joyce in Finnegan's Wake 'in my bethel of Solyman's I accouched my rotundaties'. Solomons was elected President of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland in 1946, a position he held for three years.[2] [1] Leinster Rugby: Dublin Hospitals Rugby Final Preview, 17 December 2008, http://www.leinsterrugby.ie/domestic/3067.php [2] 'Bethel Albert Herbert Solomons' by William Murphy, Dictionary of Irish Biography 2010. Images: Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital Rugby Football Team 1901, PDH/6/4/11 Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital Rugby Football Team 1904, PDH/6/4/13 Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital Rugby Cap, 1901, PDH/7/7