Football team rallies to raise £1,000 for Sheffield's historic Mi Amigo memorial, following mindless vandalism

A recent spate of vandalism at the Endcliffe Park site inspired Sheffield University Mens Football Club, who trained regularly in the park before the current lockdown, to step up and fundraise.

The team has now vowed to run or cycle a combined 1,944 miles – in honour of the year of the Mi Amigo disaster – in one week, to help take care of the memorial site.

“We’re all using our daily exercise time to rack up as many miles as we can this week,” said team member, Toby Newton-Dunn,

“We regularly use the park for club runs and fitness sessions when times are normal, and see the selfless work that Tony Foulds puts into upkeeping the memorial.

“When we heard that the site was vandalised recently, and a number of items of memorabilia stolen, we were heartbroken for Tony, and decided we wanted to do something to help.”

On February 22, 1944, a US aircraft was returning from a mission when its engines failed.

The pilot, who was losing altitude, was left with a choice; land in Endcliffe Park where children were playing, or crash in the woods next to the park and save the children.

Lt John Kriegshauser chose the latter and he and his nine crew all died in the crash.

A permanent memorial to the heroes was built in Endcliffe Park in 1969, spearheaded by Tony Foulds – one of the children playing in the park that fateful day, whose life was saved by the pilot’s quick-thinking.

Tony remains the memorial’s biggest champion to this day, and was the one who discovered that items had been stolen from the memorial on April 21 – including his own name card on the wreath he laid down on February 22 to mark the anniversary.

Thankfully, in the days since, many of the items have been recovered.

Toby, aged 21, said: “We’re so pleased for Tony that many of the items were found by local residents, dumped in bins and gardens, and that they’ve been returned, but we still wanted to do something to show our appreciation, and to contribute to the upkeep of the memorial going forwards, and the planting of new flowers.

“Of course, this has the added benefit of inspiring us to keep moving and fit in lockdown, so we’re ready to get back to football as soon as we’re able to.

“Any donations and support would be greatly appreciated by everyone at the club.”

Visit HERE to make a donation.