London Cornish was formed as Cornish Exiles in 1962 by a group of like minded men from God's Country, who met up in Fleet Street's Cock Tavern. The club changed its name to London Cornish shortly thereafter and played occasional fixtures in a variety of locations until moving to the current ground, the Richardson Evans Memorial Playing Fields in 1972. These grounds have been rented to us every season since then by the Wimbledon & Putney Common Conservators. A Conservators rule forbids any matches kicking off later than 1415 on a Saturday, our 1s pitch as good a surface as any in the league. Our clubhouse is the Telegraph Inn on Putney Heath, our post match meals renowned throughout the leagues!

The advent of the League system saw London Cornish begin life in the Middlesex divisions and there we stayed until 1997/98 when we transferred to Surrey 3, which we promptly won! 4 promotions in 7 seasons mean that in 09/10 we will contest London 2 S/W, while similar success across our other teams means our 2s now play in Canterbury Shield Div 4, our 3s in the Surrey Alliance and our 4s in the Surrey Combination leagues. Our current Director of Rugby and Head Coach, Redruth born Dickon Moon, took on the role at the start of 2003/4.

We are an open club and our players are drawn from across the County and around the globe, but we remain true to our Celtic roots and are proud that plenty of Cornishmen play in all of our sides at the club. Our 4 sides also boast players from Britain and Ireland, Australia, New Zealand (with whom we have a very close affinity) and elsewhere around the globe.

The club crest is half the One-and-All Cornwall logo and half the red cross and sword on a white background of London and we proudly wear the black and gold colours of the Cornwall County XV. Permission for this was kindly granted by the patron of the Cornwall RFU who is H.R.H. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

Every season since 1983 we have travelled to Cornwall to play for the Arthur Hunt Memorial Cup. While this used to be against the Cornwall Junior Cup Winners, in recent seasons we have made this a challenge match to a club at the same level as us. The plan will be from next season (10/11) to challenge the winners of the Cornwall Senior Cup, given to the club by the widow of the late Arthur Hunt, who fulfilled most of the committee roles at the club during his time. We are the current holders of the Trophy, and will defend the Cup at Camborne in August 2009. Entry to all our home matches remains free, and at league matches we also provide free programmes so supporters (and sponsors!) are hugely encouraged!