Royston Town FC

While Ipswich this evening are away to the Ravens of Bromley, Cole Skuse's Bury Town play host to Royston's Crows. So let's do this Hertfordshire team the honour and dig a bit deeper and #GetTheBadgeIn!

The name goes way back. The hooded crow on the badge is, technically, the Corvus cornix (sounds like you should kill it to destroy the last piece of Voldemort...). It is in fact a breed of crow with a grey body, black wings and head. It was once a common visitor to Hertfordshire, so much so that it became known locally as the Royston Crow. During the English Civil War, Cromwell’s Roundheads clashed with local Cavalier sympathisers in the town and, after a brawl, sneered at the locals as “crows”. The name stuck. Even the town’s 150-year-old newspaper is still called The Royston Crow.

The badge pairs that bird with a black-and-white chequered background – a direct lift from Royston’s coat of arms. That pattern comes from the Stuart dynasty and marks the town’s connection to King James I, who first stayed here in 1603 and later built a royal hunting lodge by demolishing two inns on the High Street. He liked the place so much he banned anyone else from taking game within 16 miles. The chequerboard is a nod to that regal past; the crow, a nod to the people.

Royston itself grew where two ancient routes meet – the prehistoric Icknield Way and Roman-built Ermine Street – marked by a medieval stone cross. The “Roisea Stone” is still there today in the town centre, thought to be the base of that cross. The town straddled the Hertfordshire–Cambridgeshire border until 1896 and sits today right on the Greenwich Meridian.

As for the club, they can trace their roots back to 1875, making them Hertfordshire’s third oldest behind Hitchin and Bishop’s Stortford. Their first honour came in 1911/12 with the Creake Charity Shield. The modern era has seen steady climbs: Herts County Premier champions in the 70s, South Midlands Division One winners in 1978, Isthmian League stints in the 80s, and a renaissance under Paul Attfield and later Steve Castle, who guided them through the South Midlands and into the Southern League. By 2017, they’d won promotion to Step 3 – the highest level in their history – bagging 120 league goals along the way.

They play at Garden Walk, where the badge – crow poised in front of the Stuart chequerboard – greets you at the gate.

From royal hunting parties to Civil War name-calling, from ancient trackways to Southern Premier football, Royston’s story is written in black, white, and crow. 🐦‍⬛

This year they celebrate 150 years since their formation!