Sydney Morse was born on 1 June 1854 in Birmingham. He was the son of Rev Francis Morse, Master of Arts, and his wife Clarissa Catharine Morse. Francis was the son of Thomas Morse, of Flixton, near Lowestoft, and was born in 1819, and educated at Shrewsbury Grammar and Street Johns College, Cambridge.
Sydney, like his older brother Edward, attended Marlborough College.
Francis, at the time of Sydney"s birth, was the incumbent of the parish of Street John"s Church, Ladywood Birmingham. Sydney had ten siblings among whom were Catharine Elizabeth (b 1850), Clara (b 1851), Edward Street John Morse (b 1852), Harold (b 1860), Harriet Emily (b 1864), Winifred Mary, (b 1868) and Margaret Ellinor, (b 1870). Morse played rugby at Marlborough College and went on to play for the school"s old boys club in London, the Marlborough Nomads.
In total, he played three matches for his national side, the final two being registered as a Marlborough Nomads player.
He played his final match for England on 8 March 1875 at Edinburgh against Scotland. Sydney became a very successful solicitor, setting up the firm of Sydney Morse & Company, based in the City of London.
His firm was associated with many institutions themselves involved in new technologies, including forty or more tramway and electric lighting companies, through to gramophone manufacturers. Sydney married Juliet in 1878 with whom he had a number of children, including Leopold George Esmond Morse.
Sydney also became known as a collector of art, including the portrait of Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Bt by William Holman Hunt.
Amongst other works collected by Sydney Morse were important pieces by Blake, Whistler and a number of Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood pieces. Holman Hunt also did a drawing of Sydney Morse himself, c.1897-1898. Many years after his death Sydney Morse & Company continued to operate, becoming in the mid-twentieth century part of Waltons & Morse Limited Liability Partnership, who continued into the twentieth-first century as one of the City of London"s leading specialists in shipping and insurance law.
However, he also played for the Law Club, a club open only to members of the legal profession, and it was whilst registered as a Law Club player that he won his first cap on 3 March 1873 at Hamilton Crescent, Glasgow in the Scotland vs England match. He was described as "a dashing runner and good drop with either foot." Sydney"s older brother, Edward Street John Morse, played in the first meeting of Oxford and Cambridge match on 10 February 1872, representing Cambridge University, a game won by Oxford by a goal (from a try by Isherwood) to nil.
