Cyril Steele

Recruited from Melbourne Grammar, Henry "Cyril" Steele appeared briefly for Melbourne as a teenager before crossing to University four years later for the Students' final VFL campaign in 1914. His footballing tenure was cut short by the outbreak of the Great War, where his personal history became one of the league's most profound wartime tragedies. Steele enlisted in the artillery but was compassionately recalled from active service on the Western Front after all three of his brothers were killed in action, a directive issued to ensure the survival of the family name. He later established himself as a successful businessman before his life ended prematurely in a boating accident on Port Phillip Bay in 1939.