Although club sides had been existence in the county as early as the 1890s the Berkshire RFU did not form until 1931. A Berkshire representative side played the county's first competitive game in 1932 against
Sussex but had to wait until January 1947 for the
RFU to admit them to the
County Championship, making their debut in the 1948 competition, where they reached the quarter-finals. In 1948 the Berkshire Society of Rugby Football Referees was formed by referees that lived locally, having previously belonged to the London Society, who had up until then also overseen games involving Berkshire clubs. With the introduction of rugby union leagues in 1987, despite their closeness to London the majority of Berkshire clubs were placed in the south-west regional leagues, and up until the end of the century were grouped with
Dorset and Wiltshire sides in a 3 tier Berks, Dorset & Wilts league. In 1994 Dennis Easby (D H Easby) became the first ever member of the Berkshire RFU to be elected as the president of the national RFU. Formerly of
Redingensians, where he had been club captain, Easby held the top job for the 1994-95 season. He died in 2017. For the 2000-01 season, the RFU restructured the leagues and Berks clubs in the south-west regional leagues were instead grouped with clubs from
Buckinghamshire and
Oxfordshire. == Senior county team ==