Paris Olympics 2024 are underway with the opening ceremony tonight and medal fever starting to ramp up, which makes it an excellent time to look at some 1924 Paris Olympic medals in our own collections.

Our Centre for Research Collections hold Eric Liddell’s 1924 Paris Olympic Medals: Gold Medal for 400m; Bronze Medal for 200m; and the Paris Olympic 2024 Medal for participation. All three were presented to the University by Mrs Patricia Russell, daughter of Eric Liddelll, on Wednesday 20 May 1992.

Eric Liddell’s Olympic Medals, 1924, University of Edinburgh, CC BY

But who is Eric Henry Liddell? Born 16 January 1902, Liddell was a Scottish sprinter, Olympic medallist, and University of Edinburgh alumni. Liddell’s Olympic training and racing, and the religious convictions that influenced him, are depicted in the Oscar-winning 1981 film Chariots of Fire, in which he is portrayed by fellow Scot and University of Edinburgh alumnus Ian Charleson.

While at the University of Edinburgh, Liddell became well known for being the fastest runner in Scotland. Newspapers carried stories of his feats at track events, and many articles stated that he was a potential Olympic winner.

The Student, Vol.XXI, 1924-25, University of Edinburgh, CC BY 

As a devout Christian, Liddell altered his events for the 1924 Summer Olympics, withdrawing from the 100-metre race (his best event), because the heats were going to be held on a Sunday. This decision was made well before the Games and he spent the intervening months training for the 400-metre race, though his best pre-Olympics time for the distance was modest by international standards. On the morning of the Olympic 400-metre final, 11 July 1924, Liddell was handed a folded square of paper by one of the team masseurs. Reading it later he found the message: “In the old book it says: ‘He that honours me I will honour.’ Wishing you the best of success always.” Recognising the reference to 1 Samuel 2:30, Liddell was profoundly moved that someone other than his coach believed in him and the stance he had taken.

The pipe band of the 51st Highland Brigade played outside the stadium for the hour before he ran. Inspired by the Biblical message, and deprived of a view of the other runners because he drew the outside lane, Liddell raced the whole of the first 200 metres to be well clear of the favoured Americans. He was challenged all the way down the home straight but held on to take the win. He broke the Olympic and world records with a time of 47.6 seconds. It was controversially ratified as a world record, despite being 0.2 seconds slower than the record for the greater distance of 440 yards.

The Story of Edinburgh University Athletics Club, 1966, University of Edinburgh, CC BY

A few days earlier Liddell had competed in the 200-metre finals, for which he received the bronze medal behind Americans Jackson Scholz and Charles Paddock, beating British rival and teammate Harold Abrahams, who finished in sixth place.

This blog post was written using content from the Eric Liddell Wikipedia article, under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 4.0.

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