Robert Shute survived World War One only to die after hitting his head on Manly Oval playing rugby in 1922.

John ‘Shute’ (no relation) was involved in the tackle that led to Robert’s death. Yet while greatly-affected by the incident right up to his own death some 66 years later, Jack Shute left a great legacy for the Shute family, for Eastwood DRUFC, for rugby, writes MATT CLEARY of the Northern Beaches Sports Tribune.

The old man sat at the bus stop in his dressing gown, long white pyjamas and fluffy slippers. There was a cowboy hat on his head. And he was telling himself the story he’d been telling – living – for 66 years, the one about the day that Robert Shute died.

“I met up with Robert before the match, he said he felt a bit crook. Then I tackled him and he crumpled and he died. He’d survived the Western Front. He died on Manly Oval. His mother wrote me a letter to say it wasn’t my fault. It wasn’t my fault.”

When the man’s family found him and took him back to the nursing home, he repeated the story again. And again. And again. The one about Robert Shute, who’d been a Gunner in the 8th Field Artillery Brigade, who’d survived war in France and hospitalisation in Italy, only to pass away after hitting his head on Manly Oval, June 5, 1922.

Two days after his family picked the old man up, he passed away himself, aged 87. He was still telling the story. The old man was John ‘Jack’ Shute and he was no relation of Robert Shute’s, though the men were friendly having played rugby against one another.

Jack Shute grew up on a property outside Mudgee before moving with his family to Parramatta, then part of Sydney’s rural outskirts. He played rugby for Western Suburbs and was good enough to be selected, aged 19, on the Waratahs tour of New Zealand.

Later, matches against those New Zealand All Blacks – one of which the Waratahs won – were awarded Test status, and those Waratahs recognised as Australia’s team. Jack Shute would thus earn three Test caps.

Jack Shute was a stocky, quick little winger with good-sized quads, a chip-and-chase, and a fearless tackling style. A journalist described him as “the find of last season”.

In 1919 he was playing junior football; but last year came into the NSW side in place of Farquhar, and was the only one who effectually put the ‘Indian sign’ on the famous ‘All Black’ wing – Percy Storey. Diminutive, ginger and plucky, afraid to tackle nothing and a straight runner.”

Robert Shute was a 190cm front-rower who played for Sydney University. On Saturday June 3, 1922, Jack’s Wests played Robert’s Uni. On the following Monday, a public holiday to celebrate the King’s birthday, they played each other again in a Probables vs Possibles trial to decide a team to face the visiting New Zealand Maori.

As Paul Treanor writes on Eastwood’s website: “Towards the end of the first half Robert Shute was carrying the ball up when he was tackled by Jack Shute. Robert fell heavily ‘in a bunch’ hitting his head on the ground. He lay there for a while, tried to get up but fell back to the ground unconscious. An ambulance was called and Robert was taken to St Aubyn’s Private Hospital.

“The game continued without the players knowing the extent of Robert’s injury. The game was won by the Probables 27-18 with Jack Shute scoring two tries and retaining his place in the NSW team. Robert never regained consciousness, and died at 6am Tuesday from a cerebral haemorrhage. A subsequent Coroner’s Inquest would record Robert Shute’s death as accidental.”

Robert Shute’s death greatly affected the Sydney rugby community. That a fit young man who’d survived war only to perish on a playing field, made no sense. The Sydney competition’s trophy was named the Shute Memorial Trophy, and later the Shute Shield.

“It was obviously traumatic for everyone,” says Jack Shute’s grandson Nathan Shute. “He was a young bloke who’d served on the front lines of the Great War; dodged bullets, shrapnel. He comes back and loses his life doing something he loved. It had a real impact.

“It was particularly traumatic for grandad, obviously, because it stuck with him his whole life. He had a touch of dementia and when we found him at the bus stop he said he just wanted to go home, wherever he believed that was. It killed him that he couldn’t look after himself. He’d always been a guy who had run his own show.”
Jack Shute had been prominent on Australia’s beef board and regularly travelled the world. He was awarded on OBE by the Queen. Though his demise was sad, Nathan Shute – who referees each weekend and ran the line last Saturday in the Manly v Two Blues game at Manly Oval – has lovely memories of his grandfather.

“He took me to my first Test match at the SCG, we ate Vegemite sandwiches in the MA Noble Stand,” says Nathan. “We saw Mick Martin score in the corner. There was Mark Ella, Michael Hawker, Mick O’Connor.

“He watched every single game that I played. He wasn’t one for coaching but he loved the chip and chase, it was his favourite play. And he’d always say: you’ve gotta go low to bring down the big blokes.”

“Big Jack” Shute was the first president and life member of Eastwood Rugby Club. He was the founding member of Eastwood along with Jim Millner whose father Thomas ‘TG’ Millner has Eastwood’s home ground named after him.

“Grandad loved the connections, the values and traditions of the game,” says Nathan. “After the incident he dedicated himself to leading a clean and healthy life. He wasn’t overly religious but he went to church on Sundays. From that day, he wanted to give back.”

Jack Shute had two sons, Doug and Robert. Every Saturday for as long as Nathan can remember the family would sit in the top left-hand corner of TG Milner and watch Eastwood.

And always, ever present, there was “Big Jack” Shute, wearing a suit and his trademark cowboy hat, and chewing on a toothpick. And telling his grandsons about the chip and chase. And thinking of his friend Robert.