All Black Number 176. Played 26 games including 5 tests, 1913-1914.
Albert "Doolan" Joseph Downing (12 July 1886 – 8 August 1915) was a New Zealand international rugby union player, capped 26 times at lock between 1913 and 1914. He was born in Napier, and began his playing career for Napier Marist in 1909, from which he was selected for Hawke's Bay and for the North Island. He moved at the end of 1912 to Auckland and there joined Auckland Marist, where he was the club's first All Black, playing his debut match against a touring Australian team in 1913. He was selected for the highly successful tour of North America in 1913, playing in 14 of the 16 matches and scoring 6 tries.
Downing's rugby career, playing at lock, started with the Napier Old Boys Rugby Club and then Napier Marist Rugby Club;he represented Hawke's Bay from 1909 to 1912. In 1911, he was selected for a North Island Country team, playing all games of a five match tour.The tour was part of a scheme by the New Zealand Rugby Union to discover talent, which brought Downing to the selectors' attention. The North Island team played four games, against Auckland, Taranaki Union, Wanganui and Wellington, between 29 July and 9 August, and played a final match against the South Island on 12 August. Reports from the tour show Downing was very involved in the games, scoring a try against Wanganui for a 13–0 victory, and nearly scoring in a close game against Auckland, which resulted in an 8–8 draw. The North versus South match, which the North won 18–6, was described in the press as lacking in quality: it was an "uninteresting match", and "play was crude and poor and lacked vigour". Downing stood out: "The only member of either team who could be said to have played up to inter-island form was Downing – a fine forward in the North Island team."
The following year, Downing's name was put forward by Hawke's Bay to play for the North Island in the annual Inter-Island match and he made selection.The North beat the South 12–8 in a closely contested, entertaining game in front of a full capacity crowd. The Northern forwards in general played a good game; it was suggested that Downing's passing back from the lineout to the halfback was something that other forwards might consider imitating. A tour with the North Island Country team followed, in which Downing played all four games.The last, against South Island Country in Wellington on 4 August, had to be stopped at half time due to the condition of the match ground, and the North won 14–3. His Hawke's Bay and North Island Country teammate Norman McKenzie described him as "an outstanding line-out forward with a wonderful pair of hands".
During the All Black tour of Australia, in the game against Metropolitan Union in Sydney on 5 August 1914, the news was posted on the scoreboard that the British Empire – and therefore New Zealand and Australia – had declared war. On the ship home, the players collectively decided to volunteer for military service. Three of them were killed, including Downing at Gallipoli, Bobby Black at the Somme and Jim McNeece in hospital at Rouen of wounds received at Messines.
Downing enlisted with the Fifth Reinforcements (Wellington Battalion) on 2 February 1915. While doing basic training, he also played two games of rugby for the Trentham Military Forces Team, against Wellington on 1 May and Auckland on 5 June.In the first of these, Downing was reckoned to be the standout forward of the Trentham team, and "played splendidly".
On 13 June, he departed bound for Suez in Egypt, arriving 24 July. His unit took part, beginning on 6 August, in the Battle of Chunuk Bair, in support of the landing at Suvla Bay, which was intended to break the deadlock in the Gallipoli Campaign. The initial assault was successful and early on the morning of 8 August, Downing was with A Company occupying the Turkish trench on the crest of Chunuk Bair. The Turks counter-attacked at dawn, forcing back the British battalions and the Wellingtons. The crest was lost and the battle continued for 12 hours on the seaward slopes. By nightfall, Downing, who had earlier distinguished himself in a bayonet charge, was killed, reportedly "blown to pieces". Downing was the first All Black killed in the war, just a day before Henry Dewar, the second All Black to fall, was killed in action with the Wellington Mounted Rifles at Anzac Cove.
Sergeant Doolan Downing is commemorated on panel 17 of the New Zealand Memorial to the Missing on Chunuk Bair, along with his commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel William George Malone, who died aged 56, and more than 300 other men of his battalion.
[New Zealand Remembrance Army (anon)/facebook. Retrieved 17/12/2021]
