Former Hereford United Chairman Peter Hill has sadly passed away. He was aged 80.
Hill owned a number of businesses in Hereford and was a former owner of Saxtys in Widemarsh Street, he was also a former director of Radio Wyvern.
He was also Hereford United Chairman from 1977-1998. Prior to that he was on the board of directors at Edgar Street.
When Hill took over at Edgar Street the club was struggling. After a back to back relegation the glory days of 1972-1976 were over. Hereford were in the old Division Four (Now League Two) and on a downward spiral.
In 1980 the club was nearly re-elected back out of the Football League, but survived by three votes. Two years later Hereford United were hours away from being liquidated until a deal was struck with the local council to ensure survival.
The era of being in the 2nd tier of English football and at the same level as Chelsea, Wolves and Nottingham Forest were now long gone and attendances at Edgar Street were regularly under 2,000. Hill and his board of directors would regularly fund the club themselves to keep it alive.
Balancing the books was a constant battle. In 1983 the club again was bottom of the Football League but this time luckily the rules had changed and Hereford comfortably survived another re-election vote.
Under Hill’s leadership the club started to bounce back.
A 5th place finish was achieved in 1985 under manager John Newman and the team took top flight Arsenal to a replay in the FA Cup 3rd round.
The following season the club nearly reached Wembley for the first time, but went out 3-2 on aggregate to higher graded Bristol City in the area final of the Freight Rover Trophy.
Newman departed in 1987 and former Nottingham Forest player Ian Bowyer took charge. Bowyer led the club to victory in the Welsh Cup final with a 2-1 win over Wrexham in 1990. With Bowyer’s prowess in the transfer market and a young squad which would only get better, it looked like a bright future for him and the club.
That sadly didn’t happen. Bowyer and Hereford United parted company a few weeks after the Welsh Cup win due to a dispute of the transfer of his son Gary to Nottingham Forest.
Colin Addison and John Sillett were both reappointed as managers in consecutive seasons, but they were unable to enjoy their previous success of the 1970’s.
Hereford United were struggling financially again and new manager the under appreciated Greg Downs had one of the lowest budgets in the division, but he managed to keep the club in the Football League.
In 1994 the club received a windfall of around £250,000 when Newcastle United signed Darren Peacock from QPR that spring.
Hill had shrewdly inserted a 10% sell on when the central defender was sold to QPR in 1990 and the club invested it in the playing budget.
Hill admitted afterwards he should have given Downs more time with his new look squad when Downs was dismissed in September 1994. Hill had taken a bit more of a backseat role at the club and had appointed a Managing Director called Robin Fry to handle the day to day operations at Edgar Street.
Hereford United took Premier League Tottenham Hotspur to a 3rd Round FA Cup replay and also reached the play offs in 1996. This was under the former Aston Villa manager Graham Turner who had been appointed as the man in charge the previous summer.
Hereford were tragically relegated the year after to the GM Vauxhall Conference after a 1-1 draw with Brighton on the last game of the season.
With player contracts rolling over and the loss of the majority of the Football League funding. The demotion to non league football left the clubs financial position in an awful state and a few months later players and staff were going without wages. Supporters were holding fundraising events to help pay the bills and bucket collections were an occurrence at home matches.
Hereford managed to stay afloat until the end of the season but after 20+ years as Chairman Hill had enough and wanted out, the hassle of running the club and the financial commitment to keep Hereford United running had taken its toll on him. Hill had regularly stated he wanted to let somebody else run the football club and take it on from him, but despite plenty of talk from others, there were no takers.
Hill left Hereford United in safe hands and sold the club to manager Graham Turner who himself felt a personal responsibility for the relegation out of the Football League. Turner would run and manage the club aided by a loyal team of staff, volunteers and players.
The club teetered on the edge of going bust on numerous times, but a FA Cup run in 2001 which included a live match shown on BBC1 swelled the coffers and with a new group of hungry young players signed, the club turned the corner on and off the pitch.
By the time Turner and Company Secretary Joan Fennessy departed in 2010 Hereford United were back in the Football League and had money in the bank.
Your Herefordshire director Matt Healey paid tribute to him “I interviewed Peter at the end of 2018 to talk about his time at Hereford United, it was the first interview he had done for a long time about the football club, he was a wonderful man with plenty of humour, he had some great stories to tell about his time at Edgar Street and he was delighted with the popular feedback the interview got when I saw him in town a few weeks later. I would have loved to have known him in his heyday. Despite suffering with ill health when we met up, he had a glint in his eye when we talked about the nights at Saxtys which he owned in the 80s and 90s. He will be sadly missed”
Our thoughts and prayers go out to Peter’s family and friends.
Photos supplied by MH Archive
