Footballing horizons broadened significantly in the early years of the 20th century. The advent of rail, boat, and air travel made Europe – and indeed lands much further afield – more accessible to English clubs seeking increased prestige and revenue.

Chelsea were not about to miss out. At the conclusion of our very first season in existence, 1905/06, we travelled to Copenhagen, Prague, Budapest, and Vienna, playing a total of ten exhibition games – and winning them all!

In 1929, we left European shores for the first time, contesting fixtures in Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay during a gruelling six-week tour. Over the next decade, the Pensioners stayed closer to home, participating in post-season friendlies in northern, central, and eastern Europe. Among them, in May 1936, were a pair of games in Poland. We were the first English club to ever play in the country, whose path was about to take a devastating turn for the worse.

Sports daily The Star heralded Chelsea’s trip to this new land, coining the nickname ‘Chelski’, which wouls of course resurface early in the following century. The travelling party comprised of 15 Chelsea players, directors Joe Mears and Colonel Crisp, secretary-manager Leslie Knighton, and trainer Jack Whitley. They left London Liverpool Street station on Friday 8 May, destined for Amsterdam via a steamer from Harwich.

Chelsea won their first game in Amsterdam, and over the next ten days tasted success in games played in Stockholm and Gothenburg. The next stop was Poland.

Covering the 750 miles from Gothenburg to Warsaw over land and sea was a serious expedition, requiring three separate, lengthy train journeys. The travelling party changed first in Malmo, and then took a sleeper to Berlin. From there, the pilgrimage across the border, to the east of Poland, took a hefty ten hours. They arrived in the capital at 7.55pm local time on Thursday 21 May, having set off from Gothenburg some 27 hours earlier.

Still, luxury awaited in the shape of the prestigious Hotel Polonia Palace, located in the heart of Warsaw. Known for hosting statesmen and dignitaries from all over the world, it still operates today, having miraculously survived being bombed in World War Two, or plundered by the Red Army when they liberated the city from Nazi control. The Polonia Palace was the only hotel still standing in Warsaw in 1945.

The Chelsea party received a warm welcome upon their arrival in Warsaw. After a much-needed recovery day on the Friday, it was time to get down to business. Chelsea would be taking on a Poland XI, which was practically the same side that had recently beaten Belgium.

The fixture was arranged as a trial match for Poland for that summer’s Olympic Games in Berlin, which would quickly become overshadowed by much darker events.

A crowd of over 20,000 packed into the Polish Army Stadium, the home of Legia Warsaw. According to the Sunday Express, it was ‘easily a record attendance for a football match in Warsaw’. The matchday programme, a copy of which is located in our museum, is pictured top, and below, full size.

It was not lost on Chelsea’s secretary-manager Knighton that the England national team had surprisingly just lost to Belgium, themselves beaten by Poland. He said Chelsea were pleased to have the opportunity to play the Polish team that defeated England’s conquerors, and we would go all out to show the locals what a team from England was capable of.

There is no official record of Chelsea’s side, but on the eve of the game, the London Evening News predicted our starting XI: Woodley; O’Hare, Barber; Mitchell, Craig, Miller; Spence, Burgess, Mills, Gibson and Barraclough. Allum, Argue, Cheyne, and Chitty were the other members of the playing squad on the tour.

Chelsea won 2-0 courtesy of goals from George Gibson and Dick Spence, although it might have been more. ‘Chelsea forwards several times shot wide with the net at their mercy,’ reported the Sunday Express. ‘Woodley was brilliant in goal.’

Spence was a Chelsea great who played for us before and after the Second World War. The two England caps he won, both in 1936, are also on display in our museum.

There was little time to celebrate the impressive victory. Chelsea had a match in Krakow the next day and needed to board a train shortly after the game had finished. They dined in the restaurant car before pulling into Poland’s second largest city shortly before midnight.

Wisla Krakow were celebrating their 30th anniversary and had invited the London team to celebrate the occasion. Another huge crowd, far exceeding the stadium capacity and including Poland’s General Inspector of the Armed Forces, Edward Rydz-Smigly, watched the local side win 1-0.

The only goal was scored by Antoni Lyko, one of the great Polish players in the interwar period, and later an activist of the Polish Underground State. He was murdered at the Auschwitz concentration camp in July 1941, one of six million Polish people estimated to have died during World War Two.

The game against Wisla was Chelsea’s last on that post-season tour. They returned home to London via Berlin and the Hook of Holland, arriving at Liverpool Street exactly three weeks after they set off.

When Enzo Maresca’s Blues take to the field on Thursday, having undertaken a rather less arduous journey to reach Poland, they will be following in the footsteps of the class of 1936, and trying to emulate their result in Warsaw.

You can find out more about our history and see amazing artefacts in the flesh at the Chelsea FC Museum at Stamford Bridge!