“Too daring for the grey-beards?”: The Mental Health of Harold Gimblett

Harold Gimblett in 1936 (Image: Wikipedia)

The incredible first-class debut of Harold Gimblett, the 20-year-old son of a farmer, for Somerset in 1935 catapulted him to fame from the very start of his career. His 63-minute century against Essex was one of the most spectacular debuts by any player and suggested that a promising career was beginning. When Gimblett was forced to retire 19 years later owing to a severe mental health condition which required his admission to hospital, he had largely fulfilled that promise. Over those years, he was to prove more than useful. He became — and remains, almost seventy years after his retirement — Somerset’s leading run-scorer in first-class cricket. He was an entertainer much loved by the county’s supporters and played many great innings. And yet underneath the success, there was tension and bitterness, to which there were two contributing factors. The first was the nature of cricket in the years around the Second World War: a Somerset Committee which handled all professionals with a brutal lack of sympathy, empathy or understanding, and a sport riven by deliberate class distinction in which the amateurs were on top, and professionals were treated as menial hired hands (a distinction which was often harsher at counties like Somerset which had a greater proportion of amateurs in the team). But the second factor was Gimblett’s own lifelong struggle with mental health.

Most of what we know about this comes from Gimblett’s own account, provided in a series of tape recordings intended for the ears of David Foot, with whom he planned to collaborate on an autobiography. The project never got off the ground before Gimblett’s suicide in 1978, but Foot turned the searingly, painfully honest recordings into a 1982 biography Harold Gimblett: Tormented Genius of Cricket. There had never quite been anything like it before, owing to the fact that Gimblett did not intend his words to be published when he spoke them (but he gave permission, as did his widow after his death, for Foot to use them) and so they did not have the usual filter applied by sporting stars in writing their autobiographies. There is no parallel account of the life of a cricketer in the period around the Second World War. And yet his words find an echo in the experiences of modern players whose mental health suffers under the unrelenting pressure of professional and international sport. This can be seen most clearly in his memories of his Test debut for England in the first match of a series against India in 1936, in which he dreaded having to play. But an unbeaten, match-winning 67 in the second innings (the highest score of the game) provided him with another fairly-tale debut and meant that he retained his place. This proved something of a turning point for him.

At the time, the England selectors were looking around for new players to refresh the team and replace some veterans after a string of poor results. For the second Test, Gimblett’s opening partner was the debutant Arthur Fagg, who like him was only 21 years old. In a high-scoring game, Gimblett made just nine runs out of England’s 571 for eight declared. He also missed a catch when India batted and was dropped from the team for the third Test. While somewhat relieved to escape from the pressure, he was affected for the rest of the summer by what he perceived as his failure, which continued to weigh on his mind and impacted on his form. After his Somerset debut the previous summer, he had similarly struggled for consistency in the aftermath, but never questioned his own methods. Nor had he particularly clashed with the Somerset authorities. But something seemed to change (if we can believe his own account) now that he was an international cricketer. The Somerset Committee attempted to force him to temper his aggression, but he was not willing to compromise, even when he form had fallen away. For the rest of the season, he struggled with the hook shot, which he had always played successfully, and sought out Herbert Sutcliffe, an acknowledged expert at the shot, for technical advice. An unsympathetic Somerset Committee simply told him to stop playing the shot, which he refused to do. He also clashed with his captain after one game in which he hit a full toss for six in the last over of a day’s play; he was told that he would be dropped if he ever took such a risk again.

The result of all this was another loss of form. In his first five matches of the season, Gimblett had scored 623 runs with three centuries, at an average of 103.83. By the time of his selection for England, he had scored 1,041 runs in 12 matches at 57.83. In the remainder of the season, he managed just 605 runs at 18.91. His final record for 1936 was 1,608 first-class runs at an average of 32.81; respectable but far short of what seemed possible at the start. His temperament in big matches and his slip fielding were also questioned by Wisden, which, as it had done after his debut, counselled a more careful approach. But how much had the scrutiny of the opening weeks of the season, and the pressure — and what would probably today be termed as anxiety — before his England debut affected him? The effects lasted into the following two seasons, when Gimblett struggled to live up to the potential identified in the press. Others overtook him in the race for England places, and he seemed unsure of the best way to bat. He was heavily criticised in 1937 for his overly aggressive batting and was briefly dropped down the order. Yet he was outwardly unconcerned and stubbornly maintained his approach; sometimes he seemed overconfident and played in deliberately unorthodox fashion. Again, this is perhaps less an indication of arrogance and more a sign that all was not well. He still managed 1,500 runs that summer, at an average just over thirty, but fell away in 1938, and his average dropped to 27. Moreover, he was often unfit, battling “aches and pains”.

Gimblett at his wedding to Ria Burgess in 1938 (Image: Harold Gimblett: Tormented Genius of Cricket (1982) by David Foot)

Gimblett finally began to recover his batting skill in 1939, and made a distinct advance. Perhaps this was early a result of his previous experiences, or perhaps it arose from a change in his personal life. In December 1938, he had married Marguerita (Rita) Burgess, whom he had known for some years. They eventually had a son, Lawrence. Whatever the cause, Gimblett made an excellent start to the 1939, similar to that of 1936, and scored 905 runs in his first seven games. Such form resulted in a recall to the England team for the first Test against the West Indies team that toured during the season. Perhaps unfortunately, it was once more played at Lord’s, a ground that often made him uncomfortable owing to what he perceived as extreme snobbery and social prejudice. In the first innings, he was bowled by John Cameron for 22 when he lost sight of a flighted delivery; in the second, he hit his first two deliveries, bowled by Leslie Hylton, for four and six, as England chased a target against the clock. But in looking to score quickly, he was bowled by Manny Martindale. Unlike during his previous Test appearances, his fielding was singled out for praise in Wisden; he took one spectacular catch to dismiss Ken Weekes, for which he was congratulated by the new batter, Learie Constantine. But he had not done quite enough and was dropped for the final time, having played only three Tests for England. Although it is hard to be certain, some of his team-mates suspected in later years that, whenever there was a chance that he might come back into England selection, such as before a touring team was chosen, he deliberately batted poorly so that he would not be picked. Nevertheless, in 1939 he managed to maintain his form and finished the season with 1,922 runs at 40.89.

The outbreak of war in 1939 brought a pause in Gimblett’s career, and he found the next few years difficult. He volunteered for the Air Force, but for reasons that are not quite clear was instead allocated to the Fire Service where his duties involved dealing with the aftermath of bombing raids. Foot notes that some of Gimblett’s team-mates thought that guilt from not seeing active service affected him after the war. But he was equally affected by his experiences as a fireman, especially when some of his colleagues were killed in an air raid, and he possibly suffered depression from having to deal with the destruction. Foot had received information that “his dormitory locker was full of pills.”

When county cricket resumed, Gimblett did better than ever. Somerset were surprisingly good in 1946 and finished fourth in the County Championship; Gimblett was a key player, averaging almost fifty. More circumspect than he had been, he still was capable of powerful shots but was less reckless. He scored his first double-century when he hit 231 against Middlesex in 320 minutes (32 fours, 1 six). If there was a slightly drop-off in 1947, the team leaned almost entirely on his runs in 1948. Against Sussex that summer, he scored 310 (465 minutes, 37 fours, 2 sixes), the highest innings by a Somerset player, surpassing the 52-year-old record set by the amateur Lionel Palairet, who scored 292 in 1896. However, the Somerset Committee refused to recognise the achievement. Gimblett said: “Arthur Wellard went to see the secretary, Brigadier Lancaster. ‘Harold’s just made 300. Will you allow a collection around the ground for him?’ The answer was prompt: “He’s paid to score 300. There will be no collection.’ I think that was when I first decided my career with Somerset was going to end. I was deeply hurt.” He and his team-mates suspected that the Somerset hierarchy were displeased that a professional had beaten the record of a famous and revered amateur from the past. But that was not his only spectacular achievement in 1948: against Glamorgan, he scored 70 which included six sixes in 13 balls from Len Muncer.

Somerset in 1946, illustrated on a benefit leaflet for F. S. Lee (Image: Harold Gimblett: Tormented Genius of Cricket (1982) by David Foot)

This immediate post-war period was perhaps Gimblett’s peak as a cricketer. He was adored by the Somerset crowds and enjoyed their adulation. But this brought its own internal pressures. While he struggled with the scrutiny and expectations of playing for England, and although he did not like journalists or the press in general, he enjoyed hogging the headlines for Somerset and was sometimes jealous of team-mates who usurped the attention. He hated to fail, and team-mates described how he would throw his bat around the dressing room if he was dismissed cheaply; they knew to keep away. Nor did they criticise him, because he did not respond well; in fairness, he did not especially enjoy praise either. Yet it left him with a reputation as something of a prima donna, not least because his reactions could be unpredictable. Foot tells several stories: how he once refused a drink from a Somerset member after he scored a large century, and had to be persuaded to accept; how he angrily shouted at Lancashire members who were critical of an umpiring decision that went against their team: “Why don’t you go back to the bloody mills and do an honest day’s work”; how when he was dismissed early in an innings played at Lord’s, and an MCC member complained “I’m sorry you are out, Gimblett; I’ve come a long way to watch you bat”, he stopped and replied: “You ought to have bloody well stayed at home.”

Nor was he a particularly good team-mate. Although he got on well with the other professionals, he was not especially interested in their success. He did not usually watch them bat, and only rarely offered technical advice despite being knowledgable about such matters. And he did not always consider the interests of his team while he was batting; he sometimes played how he wanted to play rather than as the situation demanded and sometimes was prone to play deliberately poorly if he knew selectors were watching. One amateur team-mate, according to Foot, suggested that if he was hit by a short ball (although he was generally very skilled against bouncers and fast bowling), he sometimes surrendered his wicket shortly after. Nevertheless, when the mood took him, he was a good team man, getting his head down and seeing off the new ball, or battling through difficult situations when Somerset were in trouble. Yet he never wanted responsibility and captaincy held no appeal for him.

Perhaps more importantly, Gimblett rarely got along with the amateurs in the team and could be difficult for the captain to deal with, particularly at a time when Somerset had a succession of short-lived captains who struggled to establish themselves. In fact, he had a problem with authority, refusing the demands of the Somerset Committee to drop the hook shot; he lacked deference even towards figures as distinguished as Pelham Warner. As the writer (and former Somerset player) R. C. Robertson-Glasgow put it: “Someone remarked that perhaps he is too daring for the grey-beards. My own view is that he is also too daring for the majority of the black-beards, brown beards and the all-beards, who sit in judgement on batsmen; in short, too daring for those who have never known what it is to dare in cricket.” The editor of a local newspaper who went to school with Gimblett called him an “infuriating enigma”. John Daniell, a hugely influential figure at Somerset for much of Gimblett’s time there, was baffled by the opener. He was often heard muttering: “That bloody Gimblett”. The latter in turn never forgave Daniell for rejecting him as a Somerset player before he made his famous debut (when he was chosen, just as an unsuccessful two-week trial was coming to an end, largely because no-one else was available).

Off the field, Gimblett had a reputation as a hypochondriac; he complained of aches and pains and suffered from migraines. He frequently visited doctors and was known, particularly after his mental health struggles became serious, for always having bottles of painkillers in his kit. He often kept to himself and was very introverted. Yet his rebelliousness was admired by his fellow professionals, who often conformed to get ahead.

Gimblett set another record in 1949, when he reached 2,000 first-class runs in the season for the first time; his 2,063 runs was the highest in a season for Somerset (beating Frank Lee’s 2,019 runs in 1938). During another solid season in 1950, Gimblett made runs for Somerset against the touring West Indies team. As a result, when Len Hutton withdrew from the England Test side, Gimblett was chosen to replace him. However, Gimblett developed a painful carbuncle on his neck and therefore was unable (or perhaps unwilling) to play; there were suggestions that the carbuncle might have arisen through the stress of his selection.

During the 1950–51 season, a “Commonwealth XI” toured India and what was then known as Ceylon; this took place at the same time that an England team toured Australia. Gimblett was chosen in the Commonwealth team and did reasonably well on the field. But he did not enjoy the tour: “It was a bad time for me — I had no energy, no spark, no conversation. I became very withdrawn. At first I wondered whether I’d picked up a bug. But it was purely mental.” He also struggled with Indian food and climate; he lost weight and came home looking very thin. Foot concluded that “Gimblett was temperamentally unsuited to touring”. But even this might be harsh; the experience he describes sounds very similar to the accounts of more recent England players, like Jonathan Trott and Marcus Trescothick, who hated the life of a touring cricketer, which exacerbated their symptoms of anxiety.

Gimblett batting at Bristol against Gloucestershire in 1953 (Image: Harold Gimblett: Tormented Genius of Cricket (1982) by David Foot)

The after-effects of the tour lingered into the 1951 season and Gimblett took a complete break in July, after doctors told him that he was “run down”. When he returned in August, he scored three centuries. The instability of the Somerset team cannot have helped; both the captain and Gimblett’s opening partner changed with bewildering frequency in this period. During his benefit season of 1952, he scored 2,000 runs again. At the end of the season, he took his family on a six-month trip to Rhodesia after being invited there in order to coach and play a little cricket. He was tempted to stay but chose to honour his Somerset contract and, according to Foot, “the pending political mood [in Rhodesia] bothered him.” Although he scored heavily again in 1953, there were suggestions that he had stopped enjoying the game and rumours of his imminent retirement, or his need for psychiatric treatment, circulated. Although he continued to bat well, Foot suggested that he was “inclined to look an old man” even though he was only 38. Gimblett himself said: “I couldn’t take much more. I was taking sleeping pills to make me sleep and others to wake me up. By the end of 1953, the world was closing in on me. I couldn’t offer any reason why and I don’t think the medical profession knew, either. There were months of the past season that I couldn’t remember at all.”

After struggling over Christmas 1953, Gimblett was admitted to the mental hospital Tone Vale (near Taunton) and had electro-convulsant therapy twice a week. He was a patient for sixteen weeks before rejoining Somerset for the 1954 season. He struggled through pre-season and played the first game although he wanted to come off mid-innings. When he was out for 29, he returned to the dressing room and had what Foot called “a bitter little monologue”, while Gimblett said that “I wanted to get it all out of the system in one go.” There were suggestions that he was reported to the Secretary; in the next game, he scored a duck against Yorkshire and when he returned to the dressing room, said that he couldn’t take any more. He left the ground mid-game; he batted in the second innings but was told by the captain to take some time off. He never played for Somerset again; he was soon a patient at Tone Vale once more. When he returned to the county ground later in the season to sit in the scorers’ box, he was ordered to leave.

The rejection, and lack of sympathy from Somerset throughout his career, left Gimblett bitter. Although he served on the Somerset Committee in the 1960s, and was heavily involved in fund-raising, he never quite forgave the county. These feelings were doubtless exacerbated by his mental health struggles, which continued for the rest of his life. He never knew the cause because he never received a diagnosis. But his problems were by no means limited to his cricketing experiences.

At the time of his enforced retirement, Gimblett had amassed an excellent record. He had scored 23,007 first-class runs at 36.17 (and took 41 wickets at 51.80); of those, 21,142 were for Somerset and even today, almost seventy years after his retirement, he remains Somerset’s leading run-scorer in first-class cricket, just ahead of Marcus Trescothick. In among those runs, he scored fifty first-class centuries; all but one came for Somerset, but he is second to Trescothick in the list of leading century scorers for the county. His innings of 310 remains the fifth highest score for Somerset; it was surpassed by Viv Richards in 1985 (and the record-holder is currently Justin Langer with 341). In his three Test matches, he scored 129 runs at 32.25.

After leaving Somerset, Gimblett briefly played professionally for Ebbw Vale Cricket Club, having struggled to find other employment. He also began to work at a steel works in South Wales as a safety inspector. He struggled with his mental health and the job in the steel works — and the unions — and at one point drove back to Somerset alone for a day, not returning home until the night. In his second season at Ebbw Vale, he left the steel works and took a job working on a farm but his schedule left him too tired to play for the club mid-week and his contract was terminated by mutual agreement. He later took a job at R. J. O. Meyer’s Millfield School as the head coach, with half an eye on returning to play for Somerset. Meyer was supportive but the Committee did not want Gimblett to return. In any case, he worked for twenty years at Millfield, performing various roles (including running the sports shop) and playing plenty of informal cricket. When Meyer retired, Gimblett’s relationship with the school became fractious and he began to hate his job. At one point, recognising that he was struggling, he applied to another school before changing his mind. He once more was treated in a mental hospital with electro-convulsant therapy. He retired on medical advice, not least as he was struggling with various physical ailments (some of which required surgery in later years).

In his final years became more and more reclusive, and by the end of his life actively disliked cricket. Even his wife, to whom he remained close, told Foot that she never entirely understood him. In his turn, Gimblett felt that he had been unkind to her early in their relationship, and regretted it. In March 1978, Gimblett took an overdose and was discovered next morning by his wife. Foot summarised this unhappy ending: “The tragedy is that he was able to share too little of the joy and sheer pleasure he brought to the game of cricket.” But this seems too simple of a conclusion for a complicated man who clearly had endured serious mental health problems which would have been beyond the comprehension of his contemporaries, little understood by the medical establishment of the time and even when Foot was writing in 1982 remained a source of shame and stigmatisation. Perhaps in the modern world — and even in modern cricket — Gimblett might have received better treatment (in both the medical and professional sense).

We cannot do justice to such a complex issue — nor, in fairness, to a complex life — here. But perhaps we can consider his standing as a cricketer. A sympathetic obituary in Wisden, although it did not mention his cause of death, summarised his career very effectively: “People sometimes talk as if after [his debut] he was a disappointment. In fact his one set-back, apart from being overlooked by the selectors, was when in 1938, probably listening to the advice of grave critics, he attempted more cautious methods and his average dropped to 27. But can one call disappointing a man who between 1936 and his retirement in 1953 never failed to get his 1,000 runs, who in his career scored over 23,000, more than any other Somerset player, and fifty centuries, the highest 310 against Sussex at Eastbourne in 1948, and whose average for his career was over 36?”

Unrequited Love: English Cricket and the British Monarchy

The future King Edward VII, the middle of the three seated men, playing cricket for the Bullingdon Club, Oxford, in 1859 (Image: Cricket, 12 May 1910)

Depending on your view of British royalty, the forthcoming coronation of Charles III of Britain might evoke very different feelings. However it does provide a chance to look at some of the times that the British royal family have had an impact — usually inadvertently — on cricket. Because however much the MCC might have wished it otherwise, cricketing royals have been few and far between. Perhaps the most notable was Queen Victoria’s grandson Prince Christian Victor (1867–1900), the only royal to play first-class cricket (one game for I Zingari in 1887). Prince Phillip, the Duke of Edinburgh (1921–2021), was also a keen cricketer, serving as the MCC President and playing in charity matches when he was younger. The only monarch to have shown any interest was George VI (1895–1952), who had a Wisden obituary which claimed that he had a life-long love of the sport: “When Prince Albert, he performed the hat-trick on the private ground on the slopes below Windsor Castle, where the sons and grandsons of Edward VII used to play regularly. A left-handed batsman and bowler, the King bowled King Edward VII, King George V and the present Duke of Windsor in three consecutive balls, thus proving himself the best Royal cricketer since Frederick, Prince of Wales, in 1751, took a keen interest in the game. The ball is now mounted in the mess-room of the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth.” This slight desperation on the part of Wisden to demonstrate cricket’s relevance to royalty perfectly demonstrates how the English game has historically tried to prove its loyalty in the face of royal indifference.

Such desperate reverence on cricket’s part was not always in evidence. When Queen Victoria died in January 1901, there was only one publication which was purely dedicated to the sport, Cricket: A Weekly Record of the Game. During the off-season, this was published monthly and in its issue of 31 January, it carried a brief and understated tribute to the late queen, albeit somewhat jarringly in its “Pavilion Gossip” section. It said:

“Cricketers were always among the most loyal of Queen Victoria’s subjects, as they will be among the most loyal subjects of King Edward VII. Many of them, living in far distant lands, cannot yet have heard of the great Queen’s death, but we are certain that they will all, without exception, receive the sad news with a sorrow as deep and sincere as that which was felt by the vast body of cricketers living within reach of the telegraph.

It was never to be expected, even by the most enthusiastic, that Her Majesty should take a deep interest in the game of cricket but the fact that on several occasions she witnessed matches in which his sons participated may be taken as proving that she viewed the game favourably …”

Despite the final wistful pang of hope that Victoria had been a secret cricket fan, there is quite a contrast between the matter-of-fact nature of that article and the Wisden obituary from 1953. However, even Cricket wanted to show that the connection between their sport and the royal family was deep and historical. It claimed that George II (1683–1760) “was the first Royal lover of cricket, and every British sovereign since that time has taken a delight in the past time. Frederick Louis, Prince of Wales, was the greatest patron with which the Royal Family has yet furnished us. To him, cricket seemed little less than life and breath, and the manner in which he received his death-blow whilst joining in the game, is it not written in the chronicles of cricket? His present Majesty [Edward VII], as is well-known, takes an interest in the game, and has at various times paid several visits to Lord’s, the Oval, and Prince’s. He has, too, occasionally participated in the game.”

The same issue also featured, rather incongruously, the scorecard of a match between the Royal Household at Osborne and the Officers and Men of the Royal Yacht played in 1866, which was watched by the Queen and the royal family. As a tribute to the late monarch, it was a strange choice. Incidentally, when Victoria died, cricket clubs passed on their condolences. For example, Heaton Cricket Club in Bradford passed a vote offering sympathy to the Royal Family and postponed their annual ball. The Yorkshire Committee passed a similar vote of condolence, as doubtless did many other Committees. Their modern counterparts, when Elizabeth II died last year, took to Twitter rather than the committee room to pass on sympathies.

Funeral procession of Queen Victoria (Image via Wikipedia)

The period around Victoria’s death, and the coronation of her son as Edward VII, proved of great interest to cricketers; similar to today, they were perhaps struck by the historical nature of events given the length of her reign. But unlike their modern counterparts, they made quite an effort to see things for themselves given that there was no other way to watch. Ranjitsinhji, who told everyone that he was a prince (but he wasn’t), attended the funeral procession of Queen Victoria on 2 February 1901, accompanied by his long-time “fiancé” Edith Borissow — almost certainly the mother of his illegitimate son — and her sister. Ranjitsinhji’s biographer Roland Wild wrote in 1934, probably based on Edith’s recollections, that they were unable to find a respectable hotel because so many people came for the funeral, and “until 3am they toured London in a hansom cab”. Eventually they found a “third-rate hotel, the mere aspect of which horrified his guests”. As it was the last resort, Ranji persuaded the sisters to spend the night in the only available room but they would not sleep as they were “frightened at the unfamiliar experience”. Wild finished the tale: “When, early in the morning, [the sisters] opened their door, they tripped over a recumbent and disheveled figure — the faithful though ill-tempered idol of English cricket. Ranji, one of the most fastidious men in England, had kept all-night vigil stretched on the floor in the corridor.”

The coronation of Edward VII (1841–1910) in 1902 took place in the middle of a tour of England by the Australian cricket team. It was originally scheduled for 24 June, but was postponed owing to Edward’s ill-health: what transpired to be appendicitis. As the Australians had planned to attend the coronation, a match was arranged in Bradford to fill the unexpected gap, against an “England XI” — which in practice meant a team comprising anyone whom Bradford Cricket Club could convince the play. However, the club struggled to raise a team (perhaps understandably); there were rumours that the old Lancashire and England bowler Arthur Mold would play, but he didn’t. Furthermore, one of the players who was chosen, the Leicestershire all-rounder J. H. King, was unavailable for the first day’s play and a substitute fielded in his place. Consequently, three local club players made up the numbers in the team and found themselves facing some of the most famous cricketers in the world.

Herbert John Knutton (Image: Yorkshire Evening Post, 8 June 1912)

One of these club cricketers, plucked from obscurity, was Herbert John Knutton. Born in Coventry in 1867, Knutton grew up in Banbury, where his father was from. An all-round sportsman in his youth, he originally played cricket largely as a batter but gradually established himself as a good fast bowler too. He first played as a professional in Appleby, Westmoreland; in one game, his team had been dismissed for 52 and their opponents, Settle, had reached 52 for two but Knutton took the last eight wickets without conceding a run to secure a tie. He moved to the Little Lever Cricket Club in Bradford and did well enough to impress county scouts. He was given a trial with Warwickshire, playing one first-class match in 1894 without taking a wicket. In 1897, he signed for Bradford Cricket Club, taking over a hundred wickets and batting well in his first season, the start of a long and successful career; by 1907 he had taken over 1,000 wickets for the club. He settled in Bradford and established a cricketing outfitters’ shop there.

Even as late as 1912, when he was 45, Knutton was still taking enormous numbers of wickets, concentrating on bowling directly at the stumps. But wider recognition eluded him; he played four Lancashire League games between 1892 and 1903 but never signed for a club. Part of the problem might have been suspicions over his bowling action (at a time when such matters were particularly sensitive). A letter to the Yorkshire Evening Post in 1937 by someone who was supposedly a former team-mate of Knutton’s, said that W. G. Grace had cast doubt on his action when Knutton bowled him for a duck in a match between Bradford and London County. The letter suggested that Knutton was no-balled, which upset him greatly, and he later bowled with a splint in his sleeve to prevent his elbow from bending (which is a very tired old story used amongst others by C. B. Fry).

In any case, Knutton was available to play the Australians, and as it transpired was the only full-time bowler in the “England XI”. In his second over, he bowled Monty Noble, Joe Darling and Clem Hill, three of the best batters in the world, reducing the Australians to 11 for three. They recovered to score 402 in 86.2 overs; Victor Trumper scored 113 and Reggie Duff made 182. But Knutton kept on bowling for most of the day, with few other options available. His final figures were nine for 100 in 35.2 overs; he did little more than bowl steadily. The press commented on his questionable action, particularly what seems to have been a flick of the wrist (something which at the time was viewed with suspicion) as he delivered the ball. Neither the Australians nor the umpires questioned his delivery though (understandably in the circumstances). An article in the Leeds Mercury concluded that his fastest delivery was dubious; the writer added that Knutton had turned down offers to return to play for Warwickshire or to join a Lancashire League club.

The Australians eventually won the hastily arranged game by seven wickets; Knutton added another wicket in the second innings to finish with ten for 117 in the match; he never played another first-class game and these were his only wickets at that level. He died in 1946 at the age of 79; perhaps he always thanked the particular royal circumstances which allowed him his moment of fame. After King Edward recovered, the Australians were able to see his rescheduled coronation in August; their match against Hampshire was curtailed by a day as a result.

A painting of the coronation of Edward VII by Edwin Austin Abbey (Image via Wikipedia)

Edward VII seems to have had more interest in cricket than many royals. Following his coronation, Cricket published an article on his association with the game: his patronage of Lord’s and the Oval (which Cricket noted was rented to Surrey by the Duchy of Cornwall, and which would have been worth a lot had it been developed); his laying of a pitch at Sandringham for members of the estate; his playing of cricket at Oxford and for I Zingari. In fact, Edward played twice for I Zingari: in the first game, opening the batting against the Gentlemen of Norfolk in 1866, he was bowled first ball by a straight one from C. Wright. In the same year, he was dismissed for 3 playing against a XXII of the Sandringham Household. He was again bowled. And when he died in 1910, Cricket gave him far more coverage than they had granted his mother: a front page photograph (dating from when he was the Prince of Wales) in his full cricket gear, taken while he was playing for the Bullingdon Club of Oxford in 1859; full scorecards of his two games for I Zingari were also printed, alongside a rather strange poem, unconnected to cricket, by “H. P-T”.

Also in Cricket, R. S. Holmes suggested that the MCC should have played the annual Gentlemen v Player’s match (between the leading amateurs and leading professionals) on the day of George V’s coronation as a special “Coronation Match”. Something similar had taken place when George IV was crowned in 1821, when a “Coronation Match” was arranged to be played four days later between the Gentlemen and Players at Lord’s; the Gentlemen “gave up” on the second day when they were bowled out for 60 in reply to the Players’ 278 for six.

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England’s most potent weapon in 1930: George V meets the teams during a break in play at the Lord’s Test. Australia lost a wicket immediately afterwards

George V (1865–1936) was not particularly interested in cricket. His most famous cricketing intervention was probably during the Lord’s Test of 1930 when he met the teams in the middle of a session when Australia’s opening batters, Bill Woodfull and Bill Ponsford, had posted an unbroken stand of 162 runs in reply to England’s 425. When play resumed after the King left the field, Ponsford was out for 82, without addition to the total, but this brought in Don Bradman who scored 254. Australia reached a total of 729 for six on the third day, and Neville Cardus noted that as the score piled up that morning, “a voice in the press box was heard to ask if the King was coming this morning.” Australia eventually won the game by seven wickets.

By the time of George V’s death, the cricket establishment was firmly in the hands of Pelham Warner. The Cricketer, which he edited, was firmly established by then, and after the king died in January 1936, the Spring Annual of that magazine featured an almost full page photograph of him meeting the South African team at the Lord’s Test match in 1935 above a brief tribute. Warner also included — and probably wrote himself — a passage of toe-curlingly purple prose:

“The nation has sulfered a grievous loss in the death of His Majesty King George the Fifth. His Majesty’s visits to Lord’s to welcome teams from the cricketing countries of the Empire will remain an abiding memory. Picture the scene. A lovely June morning, Lord’s packed to its utmost limits with an eager and enthusiastic throng, and the Royal Standard fluttering in the breeze at the Southern end of the pavilion. The King, accompanied by the President of the M.C.C., walks down the pavilion steps with the huge crowd rising as one man. The two teams are drawn up in line facing each other. The presentations of the captains of the two teams and the other players follow, and then the King returns through the pavilion gate cheered to the echo. So dignified. So impressive. It gave one a thrill and one felt proud indeed to be an Englishman. Men who have known Lord’s for half a century and more will bear witness to the peculiar atmosphere of the oldest and most famous of grounds on a big day-an atmosphere which no other ground has ever quite succeeded in capturing and never was that atmosphere more tense, more compelling, and more keenly sensed than on the occasion of a visit by King George. One felt instinctively that something far greater than a game of cricket was being played. It was as if the unity of the Empire was being forged anew in those moments and that our love for, and our loyalty to, our beloved King was being given a further and a deeper expression.”

W. G. Grace and the future Edward VIII, photographed in 1911 (Image: The Cricketer Spring Annual 1936)

The same issue featured a smaller photograph of the man who had become Edward VIII standing with W. G. Grace in 1911. It was all very different to the subdued reactions to the deaths of Victoria and Edward VII. However, The Cricketer was somewhat quieter in the equivalent annual twelve months later, after the controversy surrounding Edward VIII’s abdication. But Warner was able to show his loyalty early in 1937: in the issue which covered the period of the coronation of George VI, a patriotic photograph appeared on the first page and publication of the following issue was delayed for a few days.

When George VI died in 1952, the Spring Annual of The Cricketer had a photograph on the first page of the late king meeting the players at the Surrey v Old England match at the Oval in 1946. And the issue covering the 1953 Coronation had a picture of Queen Elizabeth meeting Len Hutton, then the England captain, and a feature on royalty in cricket by Gerald Brodribb. But the lack of suitable photographs other than the occasional royal visit to games might be the clearest proof that, no matter what men like Warner might have hoped, or the fervour of Cricket’s claim that cricketers were the “most loyal of Queen Victoria’s subjects”, royalty and cricket have very rarely mixed well. Perhaps the increasingly one-sided nature of the relationship reflects English cricket’s loss of confidence since the reign of Queen Victoria, so that by the time her great-great-granddaughter was crowned in 1953, the establishment was far more desperate to associate itself with the prestige of royalty. The changes experienced by both institutions in the time between that last coronation and the one about to take place, and their relative standing in the world, are issues beyond the scope of a website on cricket history!

And in the end, the most interesting connections between the two are quirks like Alec Stewart scoring a century, in his hundredth Test match, on the hundredth birthday of the Queen Mother in 2000. Or maybe, on a lesser stage, H. J. Knutton’s brief appearance in the news because of the ailing king in 1902.

“An Unchallengeable Authority”: Frank Chester, Cricket’s Greatest Umpire?

Frank Chester (Image: Barclay’s World of Cricket (1986) edited by E. W. Swanton, George Plumptre and John Woodcock)

Frank Chester had been a talented teenage cricketer who looked likely to play eventually for England. But the loss of his right arm in the First World War ended Chester’s playing career and left him in despair. A combination of the need to earn a living to support his family and a desire to remain in cricket meant that he turned to umpiring. Joining the first-class list of umpires in 1922, he found county cricket an unpleasant and uncomfortable world for umpires, and received little support from colleagues whose standards left a lot to be desired. But — according to his recollection — the authorities were impressed enough by his ability as an umpire that they persuaded him to continue in the role. Over the following seasons, he gradually built on his reputation so that by the time of the Second World War, he was generally regarded as the best umpire in the world. Perhaps more importantly, he seems to have been at the forefront — even if it was simply by setting an example — of a drive to improve umpiring. After the Second World War, it was a different story; Chester’s decline, caused partly by ill health, drew a backlash from other cricketing nations against the idea that English umpires were the best in the world.

As is the case for most umpires, Chester’s career in the white coat was largely one of stamina and concentration rather than anything dramatic. He stood in around 30 first-class games each season but, unlike for the players, there are few indications of which were his best or worst matches. His 1956 autobiography — How’s That! — goes into some detail about his first seasons as an umpire, and what life was like, but after that it becomes a conventional review of players, personalities and events from his career: the best batters, the best games, and so on. However, there is an undeniably bitter tone behind Chester’s words, whether from his lost career as a player or the circumstances surrounding his final seasons.

But it is clear that Chester must have been exceptionally good. If he was not particularly happy with his new role, Chester impressed the people who mattered. After just two seasons as an umpire, Chester was asked to officiate in Test matches. His first was England against South Africa at Lord’s in 1924 (featuring Jack Hobbs and Frank Woolley for the home team); he also stood in the fifth Test. He was 29 years old; only two other English umpires had been younger, but they stood in matches in South Africa in the 19th century which were only retrospectively identified as Tests, and even now no younger umpire has officiated a Test in England. His autobiography does not really discuss his feelings about becoming a Test umpire, which was a considerable honour, perhaps owing to the lowly status of the opposition (England dominated the series; only weather prevented England winning all five Tests, and they won the series 3–0). He wrote more about his Ashes debut in the first Test of 1926 — recalling that the two captains could not agree whether conditions were fit for play and asked the umpires to adjudicate — even though it was almost entirely rained off. The Ashes was certainly more prestigious than any other series. Chester described the immense pressure for umpires of Ashes Tests, writing how Arthur Dolphin struggled with the “jitters” during his first Ashes Test in 1934, and found the tension difficult to deal with. While he did not ascribe such worries to himself, it is likely that he was similarly nervous when first standing in Tests. He spent most time in his autobiography remembering a decision he did not need to make: in the final, decisive Test of that 1926 series, Jack Hobbs would have been lbw early in England’s second innings, but the Australians did not appeal; Hobbs went on to a series-winning century and shared a famous partnership with Herbert Sutcliffe.

Between 1924 and 1955, Chester umpired 48 Tests. When he umpired the first Test of the 1948 Ashes, Chester broke the 16-year-old record of Bob Crockett for standing in most Tests, and his 48 Tests were a record which stood until 1993 when H. D. Bird stood in his 49th. Chester stood in at least one Test every season between 1924 and 1955, and often two. For the most important series from the mid-1930s, he sometimes umpired three, for example the Ashes series of 1934, 1938 and 1948 or the South Africa series of 1935.

Chester’s longevity also allowed him to set one record which will almost certainly never be equalled. Between his 1922 debut and his retirement in 1955, he stood in 774 first-class matches. The next highest number is the 701 of Tom Spencer; his old colleague William West is in equal-fourth place on the list, with 657. Incidentally, Chester did not umpire a Gentlemen v Players match at Lord’s until 1937 (and only three other times after that); such matches were usually officiated by MCC umpires who were part of the Lord’s groundstaff.

An indication of how long his career lasted is the identity of the players who bookended it. The first game in which he stood was Essex v Somerset; the players included J. W. H. T. Douglas, “Jack” Russell, Jack MacBryan and Jack White. When his career ended 33 years later, his final match was at Hastings between an England XI and a Commonwealth XI; the players included Colin Cowdrey, Jim Laker, Brian Statham, Frank Worrell and Sonny Ramadhin. His Test debut featured Jack Hobbs, Herbert Sutcliffe and Frank Woolley, and in 1926 he umpired Wilfred Rhodes; his final Test was with Peter May and Doug Insole.

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Chester watching F. S. Trueman bowling in the fourth Test against India in 1952

For Chester to have such a lengthy career at the top is the clearest indication of his ability. Part of Chester’s good reputation might have arisen from the early age at which he began. Most first-class umpires turned to the role after their playing days were over, when their eyesight, hearing and concentration were perhaps less than that of a younger man. Chester had no such worries.

Neville Cardus wrote in The Guardian: “Chester soon established himself as almost an unchallengeable authority not only on the field but off it. Even if players disagreed with a Chester decision they seldom had a reason to back it up with a grievance. Every umpire’s voice is final on the field of play whatever may be thought of it as soon as he gets home; none but the bravest hearts openly argued with Chester.” Cardus believed that “his secret was natural cricket sense which could anticipate a swift sequence of happenings, then an equally quick mind confirmed or rejected impressions arrived at almost instinctively.”

E. W. Swanton, in his obituary of Chester (reproduced in his 1999 book Cricketers of My Time), wrote: “[Chester] described the three chief requisites of an umpire as ‘hearing, eyesight and knowledge of the laws. But that leaves out of account concentration and strength of character, both of which Chester commanded in full measure, and also something intangible which Ronny Aird [the MCC Secretary] perhaps expressed when, on hearing the news [of Chester’s death] yesterday, he said: ‘He was an inspiration to other umpires. He seems to have a flair for the job, and did the right thing by instinct.”

His Times obituary stated: “Chester made very few mistakes, gifted as he was with an unusual keenness of sight at the length of the wicket. Moreover, he gave some correct decisions that have passed into cricket history. Autocratic though he may have been in bearing and speech, his fearless impartiality and scrupulous approach to all problems justly earned him the reputation of perhaps the greatest of all umpires.” And that newspaper’s cricket correspondent related how Donald Bradman had said that he dared to play leg glances to balls on leg stump (but which he believed would have missed the stumps had he not connected) when Chester was at the other end that he would not have dared with lesser umpires. The correspondent added: “There was a time when Chester became recognised as well nigh infallible. It is told, for example, how once at Lord’s he rejected, to everyone’s astonishment, an appeal for a catch at the wicket. The batsman later said that he had not touched the ball and Chester, to put minds at rest, indicated that it had grazed the off stump without dislodging a bail.”

This latter incident involved Gubby Allen, who discussed it in a BBC interview in 1956. Allen recalled Chester gave Herbert Sutcliffe not out despite an audible click and a visible deviation of the ball. When Allen was evidently extremely unhappy, Chester took him down to the stumps where they found a red mark left by the ball when it clipped the off stump. Allen said: “Now that was an amazing decision, because the ball clearly changed its course, and yet he had the eyesight to see that it had missed the bat and he had the confidence to abide by his opinion. It was a very great decision that could only have been given by perhaps the greatest umpire of all time.” Allen mis-remembered the game, suggesting it was Roy Kilner’s 1925 benefit match, when Chester was not an umpire. Swanton, in his 1985 biography of Allen, corrected this to the 1926 Lord’s match.

Bradman wrote in Farewell to Cricket (1950): “Without hesitation I rank Frank Chester as the greatest umpire under whom I played. In my four seasons’ cricket in England he stood for the large percentage of the games and seldom made a mistake. On the other hand, he gave some really wonderful decisions. Not only was his judgement sound, but Chester exercised a measure of control over the game which I think was desirable.” And he described what he thought was the best decision ever made that involved him when Chester gave him out to Reg Sinfield in a 1938 Test: “The ball turned from the off, very faintly touched the inside edge of the bat, then hit my pad, went over the stumps and was caught by [the wicket-keeper] Ames. Whilst all this was happening amidst a jumble of feet, pads and bat, I slightly overbalanced and Ames whipped the bails off for a possible stumping. There was an instant appeal to the square-leg umpire, who gave me not out, whereupon Ames appealed to Chester at the bowler’s end, and very calmly, as though it was obvious to all, Chester simply said, ‘Out, caught,’ and turned his back on the scene.” Bradman also told the BBC in 1956 of another decision by Chester when he gave an Australian batter not out, which the beneficiary later told Bradman was an excellent decision as the ball had brushed his pad but not his bat.

One off decisions like this might just give a flavour of how good an umpire Chester was, but his reputation was based on more than the spectacular decision. He was widely respected for his impartiality and calmness. Bill Woodfull was the captain of Australia during the early 1930s; after the controversial “Bodyline” series of 1932–33 and the fractious 1934 Ashes, he suggested that Chester could travel to Australia for the next English tour. Chester was eager but nothing came of it. He did, however, tour Argentina as the umpire to an English team in 1937–38.

There is a definite sense that from the time Chester began umpiring — and it may not be unconnected — that standards improved. For example, when Jack Hobbs wrote a piece for Wisden on his retirement, he said that over the course of his career, “umpiring has improved all-round, and I should say the two best umpires I have known are Bob Crockett of Australia, and Frank Chester. Umpires nowadays are younger than most of those who officiated when I started, and naturally their eyesight and hearing are better.”

Although it is hard to be certain, Chester’s example seems to have been vital. For example, Frank Keating wrote an article for The Guardian in 1971 (mainly about David Constant) which began: “Modern standards of first-class umpiring were set by Frank Chester, who, between the wars, as Robertson-Glasgow put it, changed umpiring from an occupation to an art.” He insisted that every batter should receive the same fairness from the umpire, no matter their ability or reputation. Chester recalled in his autobiography how some umpires “in my early days” were too eager to give tail-enders out; Chester thought every batter “is entitled to equality of treatment from the umpire no matter what his position in the order.” And again the hint at problems with his fellow umpires: “My protests to offending umpires were not appreciated but I stood firm and eventually such conduct was eliminated.”

Nor was Chester afraid to stand up to amateurs; on several occasions, he refused to allow leg-byes taken by batters who had attempted no shot at the ball — something for which there was at the time no provision in the laws — on the grounds of it being unfair, despite the opposition of Lord Harris (who, according to Chester, said: “You are wrong, Chester, but I admire your courage”). More importantly, the MCC backed Chester, and the law was later changed to reflect his interpretation. Chester summarised his approach: “I gave every match every ounce of my ability, and honesty was my watchword.”

But there was another side to Chester’s umpiring. He cultivated an almost theatrical personality. For example, an article in the Gloucestershire Echo in 1926 said: “Half the crowd watched [Chester] nearly as closely as they watched the game itself, for the young man … is one of the big personalities of any cricket field in which takes his stand as an umpire. His movements, his mannerisms — his ‘antics’ if you like —riveted attention. He twisted this way and that way, he hopped here and there, he even got a laugh now and then by reason of his unusual actions in a capacity which generally attracts very little notice from the crowd.” And Chester began another trend — which has since faded away but outlived his career — for umpires to crouch over the stumps as the ball was delivered. Realistically this would have made no practical difference to the umpire’s view, but it gave an impression of great concentration. Such a show was very much in keeping with Chester’s umpiring.

Cardus wrote: “He became a personality as unmistakable as any in the game. The crouching stance, the gloved right hand, the lean, rather cadaverous and intelligent face, the forward bend of his upper body as he walked — the crowd recognised him at sight. His gestures, as he dispensed the law, were sometimes as expressive as words. To an obviously absurd demand for a leg-before-wicket he would turn his back on the bowler, rendering the perspiring appellant superfluous and momentarily contemptible. Sometimes he would give a batsmen out lbw with, as I thought, unnecessary if diverting vehemence: he would point his finger down the wicket straight at the pads of the apprehensive obstructor, as still detecting him in an offence unspeakably heinous. By rhythmic sweep of the arm he would indicate his delight in a beautiful stroke as he signalled the four.”

Chester watching Verity bowl (Image: Daily Mirror, 7 November 1932)

Most umpires at the time — and with a few exceptions, this has been the case throughout the history of the game — were understated. Chester seems to have thrived on attention and imposing his will on the game. At times, his attitude seems to have bordered on contempt; and not only in his later years when his ill-health made him more impatient. Bradman remembered Chester rebuking Hedley Verity before the Second World War for an lbw appeal against an Australian batter: “Not out Hedley, and that was a very bad appeal.” Not every player thought this was a helpful attitude from an umpire. The contrast to Bob Thoms could not have been more pronounced: the fondly remembered umpire from the late nineteenth century often complimented bowlers and always explained his not-out decisions, particularly when it was a close call. Chester did not subscribe to this view; his primary aim seems to have been to demonstrate his authority.

Even Cardus noted Chester’s “firmness and recurrent suggestions of dictatorship”, although he believed him in reality to be “a man quiet and modest, with an air of loneliness about him”. Vivian Jenkins wrote in Wisden in 1954: “Intensity is the keynote of all he does. It communicates itself even to those outside the boundary — how much more so, then, to the players.”

But this attitude of Chester did not always meet with appreciation, and by the time that Bradman wrote his glowing tribute in 1950, many Australians had begun to hint at dissatisfaction with Chester. At this time, as he admitted himself, Chester’s health was not the best — he was increasingly troubled by stomach ulcers — but he wrote in his own autobiography how the Australians irked him: “The 1948 Australians went too far in their appealing, which often they accompanied by excited leaping and gesticulating. Apart from being distasteful to the home players, as well the cricket-loving public, this sort of behaviour made umpiring a somewhat nerve-racking business at times. More determined than any other international side, the Australians have always imbued their cricket with intensity, but this admirable fighting spirit can be disciplined. It was a sheer joy to stand in the England-Australia Tests before the war.”

Chester suggested that “an exaggerated chorus of appeals can spoil the game, as well as bring upon an umpire the hostility of the crowd which is so out of keeping with the true spirit of cricket.” He criticised the habit of appealing from, for example, cover, who could not have had a clear view. “For as long as I can remember in English cricket, any such appeal from anyone but the bowler or wicket-keeper has been frowned upon.” He publicly condemned Australian appealing in a 1950 speech; even if some thought this was justified, it was not a good look for an umpire to be expressing such opinions aloud. It added to the impression of a man who had not kept up with changes in the game.

In these final years, the unhappiness with Chester among touring teams mounted. The captain of the 1947 South African team wrote to the MCC to clarify the laws after Chester told him that the light was bad when he wanted to bring his fast bowler back on during a Test match; he thought Chester was telling him he could not use a fast bowler or play would be suspended. Chester countered in his autobiography that he had not forbidden the use of pace, and he would not have acted alone without involving the other umpire. This was not the only complaint. Everton Weekes recalled what he believed was an “abysmal” lbw decision against him at Old Trafford in 1950. Keith Miller was so unhappy with Chester’s not-out verdict for a run out during the 1953 Headingley Test that he threw down the ball. Matters became so bad in the latter season that the Australian captain Lindsay Hassett complained to the MCC about Chester’s umpiring in the Headingley Test: for his decisions favouring two English batters and his refusal to take any action when Trevor Bailey shut down the game on the last day by bowling unchecked wide down the leg-side to frustrate the Australian run-chase. Chester was withdrawn from the decisive final Test at the Oval, officially for ill-health. For the same reason, he withdrew from the remaining matches of the 1953 season.

Simon Wilde, in his 2018 England: The Biography, suggests that this was a “significant rebuke for English umpiring, which had to this point been regarded, at least in England, as the best in the world.” But Chester was increasingly at odds with the English authorities as much as with Australian cricketers. One incident emerged after his death. Norman Preston, writing in the 1959 Wisden referred to the growing number of Test bowlers with “questionable bowling actions.” He suggested that the problem had been worsened by the refusal of the authorities to back umpires who were prepared to take action. Preston related how Chester had clearly suspected that C. N. McCarthy, a South African bowler, was throwing during the first Test of the 1951 series between England and South Africa at Trent Bridge. When McCarthy bowled for the first time before lunch on the third day, “Chester, who was at square-leg when McCarthy was operating, watched the bowler intently. It was quite obvious that he was studying his action. After the lunch interval, Chester rarely looked that way again.”

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Frank Chester signalling leg-byes in 1948

Preston went on:

“Some time later I asked [Chester] the reason and he told me that he had gone without his lunch in order to find out whether he would receive official support if he no-balled McCarthy for throwing. He spoke to two leading members of the MCC Committe and could get no satisfaction. They were not prepared to say that MCC would uphold the umpires. In other words Chester was given the impression that, if he adopted the attitude which he knew was right according to the Laws, there was no guarantee that he would remain on the panel of Test match umpires. Naturally, Chester was not prepared to make a financial sacrifice in the interests of cricket and McCarthy continued unchecked in Test matches. And, of course, the corollary came when anyone commented on McCarthy’s action, for the South Africans replied: ‘He satisfied Chester. What else do you want?'”

Reading between the lines of his autobiography, Chester may also have been involved in complaints from umpires about their pay: “Between the wars umpires averaged twenty matches during a season and our fees amounted to about £200, out of which we had to pay rail fairs and hotel expenses. Having to travel all over the country and live away from home for weeks at a time made it impossible to save a penny. At one stage the first-class umpires seriously considered approaching the counties in a body.” The umpires wanted a guaranteed income annually but were hampered by the system that three “adverse reports” from captains could potentially result in their removal from the list.

Money was certainly an issue. Chester admitted that he often struggled to make ends meet during winter months. He had a similar problem during the war when he could not take part in Civil Defence work owing to his disability. To help tide him and his wife over, he earned money from working as a gardener and selling vegetables, as well as umpiring some charity games for a £1 fee. A fund opened between 1948 and 1949 as a testimonial for Chester raised over £3,000, and a further sum came from the MCC on his retirement: £25 for each of his seasons as an umpire. But behind the scenes, the umpires continued to press for better pay. Chester reported how in 1950, the rate was increased so that most umpires would earn around £300 per season, while in 1952 umpires were guaranteed £5 per week, plus rail fares and other expenses. Chester implies that he was very involved in negotiations from the umpires’ side and he continually refers to the umpires as “we”: “we should urge”; “after years of campaigning we made real headway in 1950”.

Stories of Chester’s fallibility increased in the 1950s, yet he continued to insist on imposing his own authority and interpretation of the laws. The result could be that his decisions were at best unorthodox and at worst simply wrong. For example, in a Test against the West Indies in 1950, Doug Insole was bowled by Sonny Ramadhin, but the ball had struck Insole’s pad first. Chester insisted that he should be recorded lbw as he had been given out on appeal before the ball struck the stumps. He stubbornly would not change his decision; the law was changed soon afterwards to prevent such a decision being made again. Also that season he would not rule a batter run out despite being short of his ground as a fielder had obstructed him. Perhaps he was compensating for his fading powers and failing health by becoming more dictatorial, and refusing to consider alternative views. But as a result, his reputation suffered and his own bitterness increased. Always a man of strong opinions, he comes across as arrogant in his autobiography. And in a series of newspaper articles which appeared after his retirement in The People during 1956, the byline rather immodestly named him “Frank Chester … Cricket’s Greatest Umpire”. Yet maybe underneath the bravado, he was simply a disappointed man, twice deprived prematurely of a career in a sport he must have loved.

At the end of the 1955 season, Chester retired, conveniently before the arrival of the 1956 Australian team. Yet he insisted in his autobiography that there had been no behind-the-scenes pressure: “Ulcer trouble and the approach of my sixtieth year were enough to convince me that my competence might be impaired. My best or nothing at all was always my motto … I want to make it clear once and for all that there was nothing diplomatic about my retirement. The only determining factor was my health. If I had not proved that umpiring was a fitter and younger man’s business, who had?” This was backed up by his wife, who said at the time his retirement was announced that he had frequently been in pain while umpiring. Chester added that he had no problem with his critics, and was aware that he must have made mistakes but “the certainty is that they were never wilful nor the result of lost interest.”

Any lapses by Chester in his final years were later excused by the English establishment. Vivian Jenkins stated in the 1954 Wisden: “Recently there have been one or two dissentients among international cricketers of slightly less imposing stature, but Bradman’s opinion is the one likely to last. If there is one small chink in Chester’s armour — and recent duodenal trouble has not improved it — it is his disinclination to suffer fools, and more particularly knaves, gladly.” Swanton wrote in the obituary: “Latterly, before he gave in to persistent ill-health, Chester now and then fell into mortal error, and he neither appreciated, nor was appreciated, by the 1953 Australians, who were irked by his apparently dictatorial manner. But he often umpired when he should have been in bed. Until the last few years he was as nearly infallible as a man could be in his profession, and by his conscientiousness and zeal served as an example to all.”

Chester died suddenly at home on 8 April 1957. He was survived by his wife and son, both of whom lived until 1995 (his wife was 98 when she died). Tributes poured in for Chester from around the world, and any problems at the end of his career were politely brushed over. Everyone focussed on how he was simply the greatest of all umpires. For a historian, it is impossible to rank umpires from the past. All we have to go on is the opinion of their contemporaries, and this was practically unanimous in Chester’s case. Yet his love of the dramatic gesture, his “performance” and the fame that sprung from this does raise questions. How much of his desire to be clearly in control, and to be noticed, arose from his despair at the premature end of his own playing career? The best umpires before him — Bob Thoms, C. K. Pullin, Valentine Titchmarsh, or Bob Crockett — were rarely the centre of the story; and even Jim Phillips, his spiritual prototype as an authoritative umpire who enjoyed the limelight, was far less theatrical. That Chester wanted to noticed, albeit while performing to a very high standard, might say as much about him as his umpiring skills. Yet he also stood up for what he believed in, whether it was treating every cricketer the same way whatever their status or batting position, or demanding better pay for umpires.

The last word should go to E. W. Swanton: “His personality, which communicated itself unfailingly to the crowds, and the story of cricketing promise cut short which led to his becoming an umpire, combined to make the man a sporting institution.”

“A fine re­putation throughout the league”: The Later Career of Ellis Achong

Ellis Achong in 1935 (Image: The Keys, 1 October 1935)

Although mainly remembered for the infamous and possibly apocryphal “chinaman” story, Ellis Achong was a respectable cricketer and probably a better footballer. He played for Trinidad in the latter sport when he was just fifteen, but took longer to emerge as a cricketer. Despite the legend, Achong was an orthodox left-arm spinner (not a wrist-spinner) and although he was successful in local cricket, Victor Pascall kept him out of the Trinidad team for most of the 1920s. When Achong finally got his chance in 1930, he did well enough to make his Test debut against the touring England team, but it was his performance in bowling Trinidad to the Intercolonial Tournament in 1932 which established him as a leading spinner. But when he was chosen for West Indies as part of the team that toured England in 1933, he was not particularly successful. Although he took 71 first-class wickets, he was expensive and his tour was more notable for the number of overs he bowled than the wickets he took. However, the tour changed his life considerably, despite his lack of success — and for reasons unconnected to any supposed wrist-spin delivery.

During the third Test, it was announced that Achong had signed a contract to play as a professional for Rochdale in the Central Lancashire League. At first glance, this looks to have been a strange decision by Rochdale. The two biggest West Indian successes on the 1933 tour were George Headley and Manny Martindale; Headley accepted an offer to play in the Lancashire League (although he had not yet done so when Achong’s signing was announced) and Martindale turned down a similar offer for family reasons. Achong, on the other hand, hardly stood out as a potential star in league cricket. At the time of the announcement, he had taken 52 wickets at 32.39; afterwards, he managed 19 wickets at 46.42. While there were press rumours suggesting that several West Indies players had been approached by clubs, Achong’s name was absent from these stories and his signing came as a surprise.

There may have been sound cricketing reasons though, not least the growing appeal of West Indian cricketers in the leagues. Learie Constantine had been playing for Nelson in the Lancashire League since 1929; Edwin St Hill, a former Test player, was in the final year of his contract with Lowerhouse, another Lancashire League club, and had signed for Slathwaite in the Huddersfield League for 1934; and George Francis had been playing for various clubs in England since 1929 and was at that time with Radcliffe in the Bolton League. Certainly Constantine and St Hill were considerable draws, and crowds noticeably increased at their clubs after they signed — in Constantine’s case, to an incredible extent. Perhaps Rochdale hoped to tap into this appeal. The Manchester Evening News suggested in an article about Achong in 1936 that the club president, Mr Close, had been instrumental in the deal; it must have been important to the committee.

It was also announced that Constantine’s younger brother Elias would be joining Achong at Rochdale as an amateur; Achong and Elias were friends in Trinidad, and the story was reported as if Elias had agreed to go wherever Achong went. But Learie Constantine told the Nelson Leader that he had personally negotiated on his brother’s behalf, and that Elias did not know what he had arranged until the last moment. Learie hoped that Elias would be able to make a good enough impression to secure his own professional deal in the Lancashire League. Was Achong somehow a part of Constantine’s negotiations on behalf of his brother?

Rochdale Cricket Club’s ground at Dane Street in the 1920s (Image: Rochdale Cricket Club)

Another factor is that the Rochdale Committee was very ambitious. In the years since the Second World War, the club professionals had included the English Test bowlers Cecil Parkin (1919 until 1921) and S. F. Barnes (1929 and 1930); since 1931 the professional had been the South African Test all-rounder (and Learie Constantine’s predecessor at Nelson) J. M. Blanckenberg. However, the Central Lancashire League was not seen as quite as prestigious as the Lancashire League, and Rochdale maybe wanted to address that, and match the success of Nelson in signing Constantine. Early in 1933, there were reports that they had offered a contract to Donald Bradman. Although he had been strongly tempted to join Accrington in 1931, Bradman unsurprisingly turned Rochdale down (after a polite delay in which he asked for time to consider).

Achong was hardly in Bradman’s class as a cricketer or as an attraction, but some newspapers — and Achong’s signing was very widely reported — wondered if he was signed to bring some “glamour” to Rochdale’s team, despite his mediocre record. And he was clearly an accurate bowler; the club may have seen someone who could do a job, and for less money than a more famous player.

There was, however, another factor in Achong’s decision; he had already decided to stay in England. At some point during the 1933 tour, presumably when the team played in Leicester in July, Achong had met a eighteen-year-old woman called Sombra Baum. She was the daughter of James Henry Baum, a prominent trade unionist who was born in Scotland but raised in Mountsorrel near Leicester; he had stood as the Labour candidate in the 1929 and 1931 General Elections (for Nottingham East and Kingston upon Hull North West respectively), finishing second both times. Otherwise, Baum worked as a “clicker” in boot and shoe manufacture and was a strong proponent of adult education. All the evidence indicates that Achong began a relationship with Baum during the tour, which must have been a huge factor in his decision to play cricket in England. Therefore, he may have been actively seeking a club for whom he could play professionally, and a combination of Rochdale’s ambition and the probable help of Learie Constantine secured him a deal in the Central Lancashire League.

With his future secured, Achong returned to Trinidad with the rest of the West Indies team. In February 1934, he played his final match in the Intercolonial Tournament (professionals were not allowed to take part) when Trinidad successfully defended their title in the final, played in Trinidad. He took three for 33 and one for 32, as well as recording his highest first-class score with an unbeaten 45 in the first innings. A month later, he set off for England and arrived in Dover on 31 March, accompanied by Elias Constantine, on the H. C. Horn. Within three weeks, he was playing for Rochdale.

On 10 June, Achong married Sombra Baum at St Peter’s Catholic Church in Leicester (The Baum family seem to have been Anglican so it is likely that Achong was the Catholic). He gave his address as Beech House, Manchester Road, Rochdale. He was 30 years old, and the wedding took place one day before his wife’s nineteenth birthday. At the time, she was working as a school teacher. Almost immediately, she gave birth to Yolande, their first child, which would explain the apparent urgency of the marriage. I have been unable to find an exact date, so Yolande may have been born before the wedding; her birth was registered in the second quarter of 1934. It even raises the question if Achong knew that Baum was pregnant when he agreed to join Rochdale.

Unfortunately, there are few readily available records for the Central Lancashire League. I am informed by Harry Watton that Achong made his debut in a friendly match against Radcliffe on 21 April; his first league game was two weeks later. But unlike the Lancashire League, there are no online repositories of scorecards, so it is something of a mystery how often he played in 1934, and even his overall record that year is a little unclear.

Achong (second from right) at a prize-giving in Burnley in October 1934 (Image: Burnley Express, 13 October 1934)

For example, when Achong presented prizes at a Burnley school in October, the report in the Burnley Express seemed a little confused about how many seasons he had been at Rochdale, as it stated he had taken 113 wickets at 10.75 in his “first season” and 122 at 10.36 “last season”. A report in the Jamaica Gleaner (which covered the performances of West Indies players in the leagues) said that he had 121 at 7.25 in 25 matches. At this stage, The Cricketer did not cover the Central Lancashire League, so reliable figures are hard to find. But a review of his career which appeared in the Gleaner in 1938 said that in that debut season, he took 113 wickets at 10.75, the same as the first figure in the Burnley Express, so this looks the most likely number.

Such a return must have pleasantly surprised Rochdale. Even so, they made an attempt to sign Learie Constantine for 1935 (they eventually lured him away from Nelson in 1938), and only re-signed Achong for 1935 when Constantine turned them down. He continued to do well: he took 112 wickets at 11.49 in 1935, followed by 87 at 11.42 in 1936, meaning that in three seasons at Rochdale, Achong had taken 312 wickets at 11.20. Among his achievements, he took a hat-trick in one game, and had seven-wicket returns in others. Occasionally, he had some batting success, scoring a handful of fifties, and in all proved a valuable player.

Achong also seems to have been a popular member of the club, and like many professionals at the time, became involved in the social side of the club. He was invited, in October 1934, to present prizes for the Burnley and District Sunday School Cricket League. In his speech, he talked at length about coaching, giving advice to batters, bowlers and fielders. According to the Manchester Evening News: “Achong has made himself popu­lar on and off the field — his services were made welcome as coach to Rochdale schoolboys for two sea­sons — and he had gained a fine re­putation throughout the league.”

The only interruption to his league career came in the winter of 1934–35 when he returned to Trinidad in order to be available for the Test series between England and the West Indies. In the first Test at Barbados, he bowled only six overs as the West Indies fast bowlers dominated on an extremely difficult wicket. England won by four wickets (and Achong did not bowl in the fourth innings). He then played in Trinidad’s two games against the MCC, both of which were drawn. He had little impact, taking only four wickets altogether, and may have been injured as he did not bowl in the second innings of the second match. Holding his place for the second Test, played in Trinidad, Achong conceded only 51 runs from 28 overs in the match, but took just one wicket. West Indies won the game, but this was Achong’s final first-class match; the selectors dropped him for the final two Tests. His overall record at the highest level was mixed: he had 110 first-class wickets in total at an average of 30.23, but for Trinidad, he had a much better return of 35 wickets at 16.17. His Test record, though, was undoubtedly poor: eight wickets in six Tests at 47.25.

After the 1935 series, Achong returned to England and remained there for a long time. His wife had not accompanied him (presumably as she was looking after their daughter), and the Lancashire Evening Post revealed that upon his return, he went straight to Leicester. Indeed, the passenger lists for his trip back to England give his address as 21 Wynfield Road, Western Park, Leicester (this was not the address at which Sombra lived before their wedding: that was in Briton Street, Leicester); if this was where he lived, it must have made travelling to Rochdale games quite taxing.

Ellis Achong (Image: St Mary’s College Past Students’ Union)

It appears that Rochdale chose not to renew Achong’s contract during the 1936 season, but he told the Manchester Evening News that he would definitely stay in England and had received several offers of contracts, which he was considering. Possibly the decision of Rochdale was at least partly financial, even with Achong’s less effective bowling in 1936: their professional in 1937 was Stanley Crump of Staffordshire, who would almost certainly have been cheaper than Achong. It may also have been connected with future considerations: Learie Constantine had decided that 1937 would be his last season with Nelson and had agreed to join Rochdale for 1938 on an extremely lucrative contract.

Achong eventually signed for Heywood, another club in the Central Lancashire League, whose professional Fred Slater had moved on. Making his debut for the 1937 season, Achong again passed one hundred wickets, taking 104 at 11.95. Remaining with Heywood for 1938, he finished with over a hundred wickets once more — including one nine-wicket return — at an improved average of around nine. In 1939, his final year with Heywood, he took 105 wickets at 11.21 (finishing third in the Central Lancashire League averages behind two Yorkshire left-arm spinners, Horace Fisher and Arthur Booth). He had planned to sign for Enfield for 1940, but the outbreak of war meant that the Central Lancashire League cancelled all professional contracts. The 1939 register lists him living on Bury Road in Rochdale with his wife and mother-in-law, still listed as a professional cricketer. Although it would have been possible to continue to play professional cricket (for example in the Bradford League as Constantine did), Achong returned to Rochdale Cricket Club, appearing as an amateur.

Achong finished the 1940 season with 70 wickets at 10.35. He remained with Rochdale in 1941, taking 62 wickets at 7.29. In 1942, he was appointed as the captain of the first eleven, and took 104 wickets at 7.94 (the only bowler to take a hundred wickets). In the process, he passed one thousand wickets in the Central Lancashire League.

What is not clear is how Achong and his family survived this spell of amateur cricket; presumably he was working somewhere, but there are no traces of where that might have been. A note on the 1939 Register suggests that for a time he was in the Auxiliary Fire Service. But evidently, there may have been financial worries as he returned to professional cricket. For the 1943 season, he moved to the Bolton League, which still employed professionals, signing with Bradshaw; he was judged the “Professional of the Year” in the league. In 1944, he signed for Windhill in the Bradford League, a club for which Constantine had played at the start of the war, taking 57 wickets at 12.45.

One curious echo from that season survives, in a story told by Gerald Howat in his 1988 biography of Len Hutton, who played for Pudsey St Lawrence that year. According to Howat, Hutton was batting on 46 not out when Pudsey needed four to win, with his brother George at the other end. Hutton told his brother to allow him to reach fifty and they would split the collection he would receive. Achong overheard; Howat wrote: “[Achong] resented the assumption of victory and promptly bowled a ball which went for four byes, leaving Leonard stranded on 46 not out.” It is hard to believe that, if this story occurred as Hutton told it, something else did not lie behind the incident. But it does reinforce the impression, such as when he was given a lengthy suspension from Trinidad football for unsporting conduct, that Achong had a hard edge to him.

We also have one shadowy hint of what else Achong was doing at the time: a report in the Trinidad Guardian in June 1944, based on a radio broadcast from London, revealed that he had “recently taken over duties of Warden in charge of the West Indian War Workers’ Hostel at Liverpool”.

Achong photographed around 1945 (Image: Lowerhouse Cricket Club)

For 1945, Achong was signed by Burnley in the Lancashire League which, although other leagues had increased their prestige during the war, remained pre-eminent in England. He spent two seasons there, taking 72 wickets at 10.59 in 1945 and 52 at 12.67 in 1946. His best figures came against Todmorden in 1945, when he took ten for 71 in 15.4 overs to bowl the home side out for 114.

Achong returned to the Central Lancashire League in 1947, signing a contract with Castleton Moor after the club had been unsuccessful in their pursuit of Vinoo Mankad. Nevertheless, Achong was as prolific as ever, taking over one hundred wickets. He remained there for another season but there is no indication of how he performed; The Cricketer covered many leagues by this stage but omitted to mention him. He was being increasingly overshadowed by other overseas stars, including George Tribe, Cec Pepper and Frank Worrell. Around this time, Achong increasingly appeared in various “West Indies” teams which played all around the country, featuring other former Test players such as Constantine, Martindale and Edwin St Hill.

Between 1949 and 1951, Achong played for Walsden. In his first season, he took 106 wickets at 12.53, the eighth time he had taken over one hundred wickets in a season in the Central Lancashire League (a feat he managed at least once at every club for which he played). But now, finally, there was a suggestion that his form began to fade: he took 79 wickets at 12.91 in 1950 and 81 at 17.14 in 1951. In 1950, for his benefit match, two members of the very popular West Indies team which defeated England that summer were released to take part, in order to boost the gate. But Walsden was Achong’s final club in England; whether owing to his age (he was 48) or that loss of form, he decided to retire from professional cricket after the 1951 season.

In February 1952, Achong and his family returned to Trinidad. Although it is hard to be certain, it may have been the first time he had returned since 1935. There are no clear records of him travelling between 1935 and 1952. A feature in the Gleaner in 1948 incorrectly suggested that he had not been home since the 1933 tour, owing to his dislike of sea travel, but the story may have had some kernel of truth in it.

As usual, we cannot be entirely sure what Achong did once he returned to Trinidad. He certainly continued to play cricket, appearing for Orange Grove Cricket Club. But he managed to become involved in one enormous controversy which was not entirely his fault. When the MCC team visited the West Indies in 1953–54 under the captaincy of Len Hutton, there were a series of flashpoints and controversies. Not least of these was over umpiring; many of the English team and press corps questioned the ability (and in some cases, the impartiality) of the home umpires. Some of these reasons were undoubtedly connected to racism, but in the case of Achong there might have been genuine concerns.

Some of the details are filled in by David Woodhouse’s excellent Who Only Cricket Know (2021). Achong was asked to umpire the fourth Test in the series, possibly as the Trinidad authorities believed his international experience and familiarity with the English players from his years in the leagues would enable him to withstand the pressure of such a high-profile game against the background of the incidents which had plagued the series. However, the Trinidad Umpires Association put in a complaint because he was not an accredited umpire. The fact that he was still a current player was also held against him; and he had recently had his own dispute with an umpire. On the way to taking nine for 45 in one game, he had an appeal for a stumping turned down. The reaction of Achong’s team was such that the umpire walked off, although he later returned. It appears that Achong never lost that fire on a sports field.

Another problem was that Achong was also a Trinidad selector for that season, which was at the very least not a good look for an umpire in a Test match. Nevertheless, he stood as umpire in the game between Trinidad and the MCC (his first match as umpire at first-class level) and was then chosen to umpire the Test match.

In the first session of the game, Achong turned down an appeal by England despite what most English accounts of the game suggested was a clear-cut slip catch by Tom Graveney off the bowling of Denis Compton after the batter, J. K. Holt, did not walk. Compton admitted that the language used towards Achong was quite strong; Hutton appealed three times and Graveney lost his temper, throwing the ball to the ground. This was not the only contentious decision in the game, nor was it an isolated incident of poor English behaviour on the field. In the second session, both Achong and the other umpire, Ken Woods, spoke to Hutton about the swearing from the team, and made a formal complaint during the tea interval. Alex Bannister, covering the tour for the Daily Mail, suggested that at the end of the day, Achong and Woods were to be seen discussing what happened with members of the Queen’s Park Oval, and their version appeared in the following day’s Trinidad Guardian; Bannister suggested that the umpires were told “to keep their views and news to themselves” by the authorities.

Achong never umpired another Test or first-class match. By 1960, he was working as a primary school cricket coach, and may have coached the Trinidad team. He also, according to Tony Cozier, became an adviser on the laying of turf wickets. But the rest of his life passed quietly enough.

Achong and his wife had three children in total: two daughters (born in Leicester) and a son (born in Rochdale). The eldest, Yolande, became a social worker in Trinidad; she returned to England in 1959 to take up a role as a Citizen’s Advice Bureau worker in Notting Hill, not long after the race riots. She was the first black person to hold such a role there and later in 1959 married Sterling Betancourt, a famous steelpan musician born in Trinidad and a key figure in the early years of the Notting Hill Carnival.

As for Achong, he was admitted into the Trinidad and Tobago Sports Hall of Fame in 1984, and in his later years basked in the attention which went with the story of how he played a role in the naming of the “chinaman” delivery. He was also a familiar face at the Queen’s Park Oval. He died in August 1986 at the age of 82, survived by his daughters and wife.

“What’s he got against me?”: The Divisive Captaincy of Wally Hammond

Wally Hammond
by Bassano Ltd; half-plate glass negative, 10 September 1936
NPG x21815 © National Portrait Gallery, London

If Wally Hammond is universally regarded as a good batter, there is similar — albeit less complimentary — agreement about his captaincy. His overall record as a Test captain is poor: he led England 20 times, winning four games, losing three and drawing the rest. Worse than his record were the judgements against his leadership. Many journalists and many of those who played under him were scathing in their opinions. Yet a distinction should be made here. Hammond led England in three series before the Second World War and three after it. And it was the 1946–47 Ashes series which forced the conclusion that he was a poor captain. However, perhaps it is unfair to base judgement on a series when Hammond was mentally, physically and emotionally worn out, and he had a much better record (and reputation) as captain before the war. Perhaps his biggest achievement was to have led at all. He was the first professional cricketer to be captain England, although to do so he had to shed his professional status in a way which reflected poorly on Hammond and the system from which he emerged.

Hammond’s appointment as England captain was somewhat manufactured. Precedent, convention and outright discrimination meant that in this period, captaincy always went to amateurs. Although many arguments were trotted out to support such a position, the real reason was simple snobbery — the assumption that amateurs, who were almost always from the middle or upper-middle classes at this time, were superior to working-class professionals. Even at the time, many viewed such an attitude as outdated and there was growing opposition to the whole idea of amateurism. County captains were also generally amateurs, although there had been an abortive attempt to appoint Herbert Sutcliffe as Yorkshire captain (initially the plan was to have him “convert” to amateurism as Hammond did) in 1927 and Ewart Astill led Leicestershire as a professional for one season in 1935.

Therefore, in the ordinary course of affairs, Hammond, who for most of his career played as a professional (he played three games as an amateur immediately after leaving school in 1920 before signing a professional contract) had no chance of being appointed as England captain, even if he was by this time indisputably the best batter in the country. However, Hammond had social as well as cricketing ambitions. In his 1996 biography Wally Hammond: The Reasons Why, David Foot summarised the impression that Hammond gave his team-mates; he was always viewed as an overly ambitious social climber and an outright snob.

From his earliest days in the Gloucestershire team, Hammond had aspired to move up the social ladder and went to some trouble to “cultivate” influential amateurs. He preferred the company of the higher echelons of Bristol society to that of his working-class team-mates. According to Foot — in another of those passages where it is unclear how firmly rooted in historical fact we are — Pelham Warner suggested to him that he should find a job which enabled him to play as an amateur. Whether Warner would have been so open with a professional is perhaps doubtful.

Nevertheless, there were suggestions, as reported in the Daily Mirror in September 1928, that Hammond definitely planned to turn amateur. At the time, he was engaged to Dorothy Lister, whose father Joseph was a wealthy businessman. Perhaps Hammond hoped that Lister would support him financially, and the latter did not deny the truth of the rumours when questioned by the press. Yet following Hammond’s marriage in 1929, he continued to play as a professional. But his father-in-law’s wealth meant that he could afford to drive a car and wear fashionable clothes: in other words, to live an “amateur” lifestyle.

The Great Depression brought about the financial ruin of Lister, and meant that Hammond was unable to maintain such a lifestyle on the wages of a professional cricketer. In fact, he and Dorothy began to struggle, which cynics suggested as the explanation for why Hammond soon lost interest in a wife who no longer brought him financial benefit. At one point, Dorothy had to take a job, something which was still rare for married women. In 1933, Hammond was given a job as a sales promotion manager at the Cater Motor Company, a car manufacturer, for an annual salary of £1,000. The role was something of a sinecure and seemed to be more of a publicity stunt on the part of his employers than a substantial role. And as a salesman, he was not particularly effective. But it was a step in the right direction for Hammond’s social ambitions.

There were further rumours in August 1933 that Hammond would turn amateur if offered the England captaincy (as, according to the same story, Herbert Sutcliffe would have). The story appeared in an article written by “the Clubman” in the Daily Mirror (although the Gloucestershire Echo said that it was Lionel Tennyson who was the source).

And it seems that influential figures hoped to find Hammond a better-paying job which would allow him to do so. Foot suggests “a little coterie from the environs of Lord’s, headed by the unwaveringly loyal and effusive Warner, were busy sounding out people they knew in the City”, and that rumours were in full swing that Hammond planned to change his status. Even Gerald Howat, in his much drier 1984 biography of Hammond, hints at behind-the-scenes discussions: he suggests that business friends from Bristol, and his connections with men such as the Duke of Beaufort played a part. And he wrote how “influential members of the MCC” had approached Dunlop with a view to securing a directorship for Hammond to enable him to play as an amateur.

A photograph promoting Hammond’s appointment to the Board of Marsham Tyres
(Image: Wally Hammond: The Reasons Why (1996) by David Foot)

In the event, Hammond joined Marsham Tyres, a Bristol company, in November 1937. Advised by his business associates, he successfully held out for a place on the Board before accepting the role. His new job was widely reported in the press, as was the obvious follow-up that Gloucestershire had released him from his professional contract and that he would play as an amateur when the 1938 season began. Nevertheless, he dead-batted questions about whether he would be appointed England captain, even though it was clear to everyone what was going on.

Conveniently, this came at a time when the England captaincy was unsettled. After Bob Wyatt’s unsuccessful spell in charge, Gubby Allen led England against India in 1936 and against Australia during the 1936–37 Ashes, when England lost 3–2. Walter Robins led against New Zealand in 1937 but was not guaranteed a place in the Test team. Hammond had occasionally captained the Players against the Gentlemen, and had experience of leading Gloucestershire in the absence of the official amateur captain. Although he was generally considered to have done a sound job, he never stood out as an outstanding captain. His claims rested mainly on his status as the best batter in England.

Once Hammond entered the picture, most people therefore assumed that the role would be his. His only real rival was Gubby Allen; the latter made an effort to play regularly at the beginning of the 1938 season, something he did not always do. However, he was hampered by injury and when he was only made captain of “The Rest” during a Test trial at which Hammond was appointed as the captain of the England, he effectively sulked (although he claimed to be suffering from an injury) and pulled out of contention, not least because he was angry that Warner, the Chairman of Selectors, had not discussed it with him personally. Although he did not say so explicitly, E. W. Swanton was quite clear about what happened in his doting 1985 biography of Allen.

Therefore Hammond was named as captain for the 1938 series. He was the first former professional to captain England at home (although Jack Hobbs had taken charge mid-way through a Test during the 1926 Ashes when Arthur Carr was indisposed). The Establishment largely kept silent, although there were doubtless several eyebrows raised in private. Foot suggests that some critics were waiting to find fault with Hammond’s captaincy so they could blame his social status; he also records (without giving a source) one comment that “you couldn’t have a car salesman leading your country”, and another that Hammond “wouldn’t know which fork to use at the official banquets”.

Arguments were also rehashed about whether Hammond’s captaincy would be improved simply by his change of status. Hammond later betrayed some embarrassment at how the affair unfolded; Foot states that people who talked to him about the matter in later years got little out of him, and he “fidgeted without much comment”. In his own book, Secret History (1952), Hammond betrayed some confusion over his feelings towards amateur captaincy, suggesting both that it was illogical that he had been forced to turn amateur to captain England but also that all the best captains had been amateurs. But he later wrote that most amateurs did not understand the game in the same way that professionals did.

Unfortunately for Hammond, by the time he wrote those words, most critics had concluded that he did not understand the game either. By the time he left the role, a tired and disillusioned man, in 1947, his reputation as a captain had been ruined. But as with his batting, some distinction should be made between Hammond’s captaincy before the Second World War and after it. When he led England in Australia during the 1946–47 season, he was long past his best with the bat, rapidly became daunted by the scale of the task facing his underprepared team and was in the midst of intense personal strife as the failure of his marriage became public and the woman he intended to marry, Sybil Ness-Harvey, struggled to adapt to life in England while he was away. He was also palpably overweight, suffering from back problems and quite simply too old for the task. He came close to a breakdown and as such, was hardly in a fit state to captain. Although he should probably have retired beforehand, as long as he was available, he was the only realistic candidate to do the job. While the tour has its place in telling Hammond’s story, it should not in fairness form the basis of judgements on his ability as a captain.

Opinions on how he performed as captain before the war vary depending on how the person expressing them felt about Hammond. For example, E. W. Swanton wrote several disparaging pieces (mainly in later years) about him, but Swanton was extremely close to Gubby Allen. And even Swanton defended Hammond from criticism of his tactics during the 1939 series against the West Indies, in an article in The Cricketer that season. Charlie Barnett frequently tore Hammond’s captaincy apart in interviews, but the problems between the two men had far deeper roots than tactics.

Perhaps the fairest summary has been written by Alan Gibson in The Cricket Captains of England (1979) in which he observed: “[Hammond] won some praise for his captaincy before the war (not just conventional praise; [Jack] Fingleton, for instance, thought he was a good captain). After the war, he had some blame. Jim Swanton, in his later books, has been severe about him. I think it is fair to say that Hammond was not temperamentally well suited to the job.”

British Pathé footage of the first Test of the 1938 Ashes series, Hammond’s debut as captain

Hammond’s pre-war record was not too bad. He led England in three series in which he was undefeated: he drew 1–1 with Australia in 1938, defeated South Africa 1–0 in 1938–39 (on some horribly flat pitches) and won 1–0 against the West Indies in 1939. The latter two teams were stronger than they had been for most of the interwar period, and such results were not to be dismissed lightly. An overall record of three wins and one defeat from 13 Tests is very respectable. But even here, there were echoes of criticism.

Hammond’s biggest problem as captain was his inability to handle the different personalities within a team. Throughout his career, he had a reputation for being moody, difficult and unapproachable. He rarely gave advice or encouragement. In a team-mate, this was unfortunate but not disastrous; it was a source of regret rather than acrimony. But when he became captain, this was far more of an issue, particularly at Gloucestershire, where he replaced Basil Allen as captain for 1939. With England, he was surrounded by gifted players and, during home seasons, they were only around Hammond for a few days at a time. At Gloucestershire, a struggling county, he was with his team for six days each week. And many of his team-mates remembered his time as captain with considerable bitterness.

For example, A. H. Brodhurst, a Cambridge Blue who played for Gloucestershire in late 1939, was disconcerted when Hammond did not even speak to him as he was waiting nervously to bat in the middle of a collapse; nor did the captain offer any congratulations when he scored a fifty to rescue the team. George Lambert, Gloucestershire’s fast bowler, found Hammond difficult to play under. He told Foot how his captain would glare at him from slip if his line or length went awry, or if he conceded runs. Lambert also resented being over-bowled by Hammond, who would not allow him much chance to rest. He was heard to say several times: “What’s he got against me? When am I going to get a murmur of praise from him?” Barnett suggested in his own writing that Hammond was too curt and rude. Patrick Murphy, in his study of batters who scored a hundred first-class centuries, related how George Emmett once asked Hammond why he had been dropped from the team for a few games; the reply was: “Well, Emmett, you’re not a very good player, are you?”

And there are many more instances. Charlie Barnett suggested several times that Hammond would not accept advice from his team. F. R. Brown told Murphy that he thought Hammond was the worst captain under whom he had played: “He did everything by the clock, rotating bowlers at set stages.”

Not everyone was completely against him. The England wicket-keeper Les Ames had no complaints about his captaincy. Gloucestershire’s Reg Sinfield found him more approachable, and Hammond used to take him to inspect the pitch before the toss to ascertain his opinion over whether to bat or bowl. But even Sinfield’s reminiscences to Foot often ended with: “Such a great player — and such a bad captain.”

Perhaps part of the problem was that Hammond found captaincy difficult. He certainly felt the pressure as England’s pre-war captain; before Test matches, he went to stay with his friend and Gloucestershire team-mate William Neale to avoid the press, pacing up and down pondering selection problems and refusing to take phone calls. According to Foot, he also mentioned “feeling the strain” in one letter written before the war.

Embed from Getty Images

Wally Hammond, the England captain (right) tossing the coin with the Australian captain Don Bradman (left) at the Oval in 1938, watched by the groundsman “Bosser” Martin (centre)

If the consensus was that Hammond could not really inspire or motivate his players, what about his approach on the field? There were varied opinions on his tactical ability, but the 1938 series raised one or two questions. In the first Test, he pursued a very unusual strategy. England scored 658 for eight declared (and Hammond rebuked Denis Compton for getting out after scoring a two-hour century), leaving Australia simply looking to avoid defeat. They scored 411, batting for more than 130 overs before being asked to follow-on. And in all that time, Hedley Verity, a big threat to the Australians, bowled 7.3 overs. The explanation offered in Wisden was that “the probability that he would be in a position to enforce a follow-on influenced Hammond to conserve Verity’s energies”, but in his absence from the attack, Stan McCabe scored a brilliant 232; it was Verity who finally dismissed him after a tenth wicket partnership of 77 (Hammond attempted to keep McCabe off strike, to no avail). And had Hammond been braver, McCabe might have made far fewer runs. When the Australian batter came to the wicket, Sinfield, playing his only Test, asked Hammond for three short legs; Hammond eventually agreed on two, but early in his innings, McCabe put the ball in the air to where the third one would have been positioned.

Australia batted out the game after following on, scoring 427 for six in 184 overs, of which Verity delivered 62 overs. Perhaps such tactics did not affect the result on a very flat pitch, but it may not have inspired confidence. The inevitable Charlie Barnett, who played in the game, later told Alan Hill, for his 1986 biography of Verity, that this was “appalling captaincy”.

The second Test featured a Hammond double century, but he had little influence on the game tactically, apart from possibly instructing his later batters to hit out in the first innings. But a careless dismissal in the second innings — a one-handed shot to a ball pitched outside leg stump — put England in danger of defeat until the later batters salvaged the innings. There was one other incident which some observers called astute captaincy but which the watching Bob Wyatt attributed to luck. Doug Wright had taken an early wicket and when Don Bradman came in, beat the bat with three out of four deliveries. Hammond then removed Wright from the attack and brought on Verity; not long after, Bradman pulled a wide ball from Verity onto his stumps and was out for 18. Wyatt, who argued that on a flat pitch Wright’s wrist-spin was more likely to cause problems, later spoke to Bradman and said that he was surprised to see him get out in that fashion and that he had been equally surprised to see Wright taken off; Bradman responded that he was “very relieved”.

But with the third Test rained off, the crucial game was the fourth, played at Headingley. The match, played on a difficult pitch, was a low-scoring one. Australia took a 19-run first-innings lead and then bowled out England for 123; Hammond made a first-ball duck. Needing 105 to win, Australia struggled; several critics, including Neville Cardus, thought that spin was the answer, and Wright took three wickets. But Hammond persisted with his fast bowlers Ken Farnes and Bill Bowes, and Australia won by five wickets. Cardus wrote: “Hammond’s faith in fast bowling rather exceeded his faith in the arts of Verity and Wright. The result was sad disillusionment.” Again, Barnett had plenty to say about this to Alan Hill; he said that Verity wanted to bowl over the wicket to aim at a patch of rough on leg stump but Hammond would not allow it. He argued that Hammond should have used Bowes at one end to dry up runs and allowed Verity to attack from the other. Bowes himself spoke of the matter over the winter, suggesting that Yorkshire would have adopted this approach; some newspapers interpreted this as a criticism of Hammond, prompting Bowes to instruct his solicitors to request an apology and to write a hasty letter to Hammond explaining what happened.

The final Test, at the Oval, was the game in which England scored 903 for seven and Len Hutton scored 364. Hammond had little to do as captain, but as the game was a timeless one (played to a finish however long it took), instructed his batters to take no risks. When Hutton, having reached three figures, began to hit out at one stage, Hammond gestured for him to continue playing safely. Aiming for a total in four figures, Hammond only declared after it became clear that Bradman would be unable to bat, having badly injured his ankle when bowling. England levelled the series, winning by an extraordinary margin of an innings and 579 runs, although Australia had retained the Ashes.

One other unusual achievement that summer was that when Hammond captained the Gentlemen against the Players, he became the only man to lead both teams in the fixture.

In the aftermath of a relatively successful season, Hammond’s captaincy was praised. In his notes for the 1939 edition, the Wisden editor Wilfrid Brookes wrote: “Hammond last summer showed unmistakably that he was well fitted for the post; indeed, having regard to his limited experience of leading an eleven before he took charge of the England side in all the Test Matches, he surprised his closest friends by his intelligent tactics. Undoubtedly Hammond proved himself a sagacious and inspiring captain.” This hardly suggests that Hammond did quite as bad a job as others subsequently argued.

Less has been written about Hammond’s captaincy in South Africa. This was the first time that England had sent a full-strength Test team for a series there, a reaction to South Africa’s 1–0 win in England in 1935. Usually, teams to South Africa were experimental, or rewards for long-serving professionals who would not otherwise have played Test cricket. But the 1938–39 team contained all the leading players. Even so, there was far less pressure than experienced during an Ashes series.

Les Ames told Foot that Hammond had captained “beautifully” in South Africa: “I spent a lot of time with the Kent amateur Bryan Valentine, on that tour. We found ourselves discussing Wally a great deal. And we couldn’t find any serious faults at all.” One anonymous member of the team told Howat that Hammond had on one occasion stepped between two bowlers, one from each team, and prevented an argument spiralling out of hand. And Bill Edrich, whom Hammond had persisted in selecting despite his complete failure in every Test until he repaid his faith with an innings of 219 in the final Test, said: “He was the perfect leader, perceptive and astute on the field and an ambassador of the highest order off it.” The South African captain Alan Melville thought he did a good job too, telling Howat: “[The fielders] kept their eyes on him and responded to slight indications by eye or finger.” South African journalists were generally complimentary. E. W. Swanton, writing for the Illustrated London News at the time said that he had been a “sagacious tactician”; however, in later years he was more critical retrospectively, saying that Hammond’s captaincy on that tour had made him “apprehensive” about how he would handle an Australian tour, largely because of his moods and frequent silences.

There was less scope for Hammond to display his tactical skills in a light-hearted and fast-scoring series against the West Indies in 1939. But his captaincy of Gloucestershire was praised in Wisden for his “enterprising cricket and a spirit of adventure”.

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Wally Hammond in 1946

Had Hammond stopped there, he may have retired with a good reputation as captain. Maybe not one of the best, but a respectable captain of England. But he continued, perhaps out of loyalty, perhaps out of desire to prove himself and beat Australia. His captaincy of Gloucestershire in 1946 was mixed: the team began well before running out of steam, and he missed several matches with back problems. This may have warned what was coming, but he continued as England captain: against India in 1946 (England won 1–0) and then for the ill-fated tour of Australia in 1946–47.

The tour was a terrible failure for Hammond. He proved a moody, unapproachable and uninspiring captain. He was distant from the players, travelling separately to games, and gave little useful advice when they were struggling. Even Wisden said of the 1946–47 Australian tour that he “was not the same inspiring leader as at home against Australia in 1938”. Criticised for his tactics by the press, he increasingly retreated into his shell. Part of the problem might have been the contrasting attitude between Hammond — who saw the tour as a goodwill gesture after the war and to be played on friendly terms — and his opposite number Bradman, who wanted to crush the opposition. This difference was made clear when Bradman was given not out after apparently edging to slip in the first Test, drawing an audible complaint from Hammond that it was a “fine fucking way to start a series” (although some versions suggest a “fine bloody way”). After that, relations between the teams deteriorated, Hammond became more and more withdrawn and defeated, not least as he could no longer bat in his old manner. And it was notable — as pointed out in Wisden — that when Hammond missed the final Test with ill-health, England played better under his vice-captain Norman Yardley, whose field-placing and tactics seemed better than Hammond’s. Even so, England still lost; realistically, an outmatched team had little chance against one of the greatest Australian teams to take the field.

But Hammond was universally judged to have made matters worse. Attacks came from everywhere. Brian Sellers, the Yorkshire captain who covered the tour as a journalist, was extremely critical of Hammond’s field-placing. Within the team, Denis Compton resented him and Paul Gibb felt that his presence in the team had a negative impact on him personally, as revealed in his tour diaries. It was, in every respect, an utter disaster and coloured all retrospective judgements of Hammond’s captaincy.

But perhaps it is unfair to use this tour as a way to judge Hammond as a captain any more than it would be fair to use it to assess his batting. He was not a great captain. But nor was he as terrible as history suggests.

The rest of Hammond’s life was a sad anti-climax. He moved to South Africa where he joined another car business, which later folded, and was forgotten, despite his long career and amazing batting record. That final tour cast a long and embarrassing shadow. His family — he and Sybil had three children — faced serious financial problems, and he took a job as a sports administrator at University of Natal. A serious car crash almost killed him 1960, and he never really recovered, dying of a heart attack in 1965.

“I think he’s an absolute shit”: The Private Life of Wally Hammond

Wally Hammond in 1930 (Image: Wikipedia)

Of all the men to captain the England cricket team, few have been such complex figures as Wally Hammond. He has fascinated cricket followers since he first batted for Gloucestershire in the 1920s; even today, he is one of the few names from the past who is unquestioningly classed as a great batter. His average is among the highest of all time in Test cricket, and memories of his glorious off-side shots echo even now. No-one who had played alongside or against Hammond could resist talking about him (or writing about him), and he was the batting hero of many team-mates and spectators. Furthermore, he has been the subject of three biographies: by Ronald Mason in 1962, by Gerald Howat in 1984 and, most influentially by David Foot in 1996. The latter book is based on years of conversations with Hammond’s former team-mates in the Gloucestershire and England teams. But — and with Hammond there always seems to be a caveat — he was a solitary figure in the dressing room: admired as a cricketer but often disliked, and sometimes even despised, as a person. His personal life was messy and he had a (probably deserved) reputation among team-mates for promiscuity. He was also known to be a social climber, culminating into his manufactured ascent to the England captaincy in 1938. Why was there such a contrast between Hammond the cricketer and Hammond the person?

The story is fairly straightforward at face value, and quite well-known. Walter Reginald Hammond was the son of of William Hammond — a corporal in the Royal Garrison Artillery at Dover Castle — and Marion Crisp, but the date of his parents’ marriage, just six months before his birth in June 1903, suggest a somewhat enforced arrangement. Hammond’s early years were spent overseas as his father was posted to Hong Kong and Malta. They returned to England before the First World War, and Hammond was sent to boarding school. His father was killed fighting in France in 1918, and his mother appears to have been emotionally distant from her son. She was also, from all accounts of those who knew Hammond, a terrible snob and this may have rubbed off on her only child.

Hammond’s reputation as a school cricketer was good enough to interest Gloucestershire, and having played three games as an amateur in 1920, just after he left Cirencester Grammar School (having attended Portsmouth Grammar School for a time), he signed as a professional for the 1921 season. His first seasons were a challenge: he failed abysmally in his only two appearances in 1921, overwhelmed by the pace bowling of the touring Australian team, and an inconclusive start in 1922 was curtailed when the influential Lord Harris noticed his Kent birthplace and challenged his qualification for Gloucestershire under the County Championship rules in place at the time. He spent most of the 1921 and 1922 seasons working as an assistant coach under the former Yorkshire batsman John Tunnicliffe at Clifton College and playing football intermittently for Bristol Rovers. But once officially qualified for Gloucestershire, he began to make progress, with a century on his first appearance in 1923 and over a thousand runs in that first full season. His record over the next two years was unspectacular but clearly heading on an upward trajectory; critics purred at his technique and potential, while his bowling suggested an all-rounder in the making. And sometimes, he produced something very special indeed: 174 not out on a terrible pitch against Middlesex after Gloucestershire had been bowled out for 31 in their first innings; 250 not out in 1925 against a Lancashire attack including the Australian fast bowler Ted McDonald, whom he repeatedly hooked for four or six when he pitched short.

The next stage in his development was his selection for a strong, but by no means representative, MCC team which toured the West Indies in early 1926. In the first unofficial Test match against the full West Indies team, Hammond scored 238 not out, and clearly looked an England cricketer in the making. Then it went very wrong. He became seriously ill, and missed the entire 1926 season. At one point, his life was in danger and it was suggested his leg might have to be amputated. We shall return to this illness shortly, but after a winter convalescing in South Africa, he returned triumphantly in 1927, scoring over 1,000 first-class runs in May, only the second man to do so after W. G. Grace. He was selected to tour South Africa in 1927–28 with the MCC team, making his England Test debut in that series. He did well enough to be chosen in the fully representative England team at home against the West Indies in 1928, and although his Test record remained unremarkable, his weight of runs for Gloucestershire made him an obvious choice for Percy Chapman’s team which toured Australia in 1928–29. Any doubts about his ability were erased as he scored 905 runs at an average of 113.12; 779 of those came in five innings. He followed up with an average of almost 60 in the 1929 series against South Africa, and was clearly the best batter in the world.

Hammond batting in Australia in 1928; Bert Oldfield is the wicket-keeper (Image: National Museum of Australia)

But here we have another caveat because the problem for Hammond was that in 1930, Donald Bradman scored 974 runs at 139.14, and over the next decade proved himself almost unarguably (at least from a statistical viewpoint) the greatest batter of all time. And to compound the problem, Hammond’s form collapsed. While Bradman re-wrote the record books, Hammond averaged just 34 in the 1930 series. In 1934, Bradman averaged 94.75 while Hammond averaged 20.25, with a highest score of 43. Against the West Indies in 1933 (74 runs in three innings) and 1934–35 (175 runs in eight innings, average 25.00), Hammond similarly failed. His only real success against anyone other than New Zealand (a team with a somewhat weak attack) between 1930 and 1935 was in the Bodyline series of 1932–33, when he averaged 55.00 (still less than Bradman, who in his worst series averaged 56.57). Some of this was connected with ill health, and he gradually recovered his form in 1935 and 1936. It should also be stressed that throughout the 1930s, he remained supreme in county cricket, and topped the English first-class batting averages in every season from 1933 until 1939 (and again in 1946).

From 1935 until 1939, he averaged substantially over fifty in every series he played, including two against Australia, but never surpassed Bradman. In 1938, he became an amateur, a decision which cleared the path for him to captain England in the last three series before the outbreak of the Second World War.

Serving in the Royal Air Force during the war, Hammond did not see active service; he was mainly involved in welfare work. He was given easy and safe postings, and had time for a huge amount of charity cricket. He was also able to spend a lot of time in South Africa. He resumed his cricket with Gloucestershire in 1946, but was increasingly bothered by ill health. He toured Australia one last time in 1946–47, failed horribly and effectively retired afterwards, barring a handful of ill-advised later appearances.

That is the brief outline of Hammond’s career, although there is far more to be said about Hammond the cricketer. But what fascinated his team-mates, friends and later writers was not just what took place on the field. Other factors always bubbled away in the background. Foot records some of the many rumours that swirled around Hammond, amplified by the awe with which his contemporaries viewed his batting. The most important of these was connected to his serious illness in 1926. According to Foot in Wally Hammond: The Reasons Why, Hammond had contracted a sexually-transmitted disease, probably syphilis. The evidence — although purely circumstantial, far from conclusive, and sometimes overplayed — is reasonably convincing and Foot’s conclusions have been accepted by cricket historians. But this is not the only interpretation, as Foot acknowledged.

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The MCC team which toured the West Indies in 1925–26, pictured during the Jamaican leg of the tour, during which Hammond was already suffering symptoms of his mystery illness. Back row: L. G. Crawley, G. Collins. Middle row: F. Watson, C. F. Root, W. R. Hammond, E. J. Smith, W. E. Astill, R. Kilner, P. Holmes. Front row: Unknown, H. L. Dales, L. H. Tennyson, F. S. G. Calthorpe (captain), T. O. Jameson, C. T. Bennett.

Hammond’s explanation for the illness was a mosquito bite. He also wrote a letter during the tour in which he mentioned that he had received an electric shock through a ring on his finger before leaving England; the resulting burn had “turned to blood poisoning”. Others, including E. J. Smith (who was part of the team for that 1926 tour) and Alan Gibson, had dropped oblique hints about the nature of the illness before Foot wrote his book. Foot reports that others, off the record, were more explicit that Hammond had “picked up a dose”. And it seems to be these rumours which convinced Foot. But he also reports other rumours in circulation which he dismisses. For example, many of Hammond’s contemporaries thought that he was an alcoholic. Others hinted that he was of mixed heritage. Foot reported that many thought that he had Romani ancestry while he noted that Joe Hardstaff and Charles Barnett both thought — using offensive language — that he was mixed race. None of the rumours had much to support them (although he did drink heavily) and yet Foot accepted the ones about syphilis.

While the symptoms reported in Hammond’s case — including swelling and fever — would match those of syphilis or another sexually transmitted disease (and Foot did speak to medical experts in researching his book), they would also match a variety of other illnesses. When Roy Kilner died in 1928 of “enteric fever” (typhoid fever), no-one questioned how he had acquired it, even though it remained a mystery. The death of W. W. Whysall in 1930 was never attributed to anything other than the septicaemia caused when he injured his knee on a dance floor. But for some reason, Hammond attracted rumours just as much as he may or may not have attracted mosquitos.

A large part of Foot’s reasoning is that Hammond appears to have been far more moody and withdrawn after his return from the illness. This is not surprising: Hammond nearly died and his cricket career was endangered. But Foot attributes the change to Hammond’s treatment for syphilis, the most common medicine at the time being mercury. With no actual evidence, Foot suggests that Hammond’s apparent personality change was caused by mercury poisoning. This is probably the weakest part of his argument, not least because not many people to whom he spoke knew Hammond well both before and after the illness, but does not necessarily invalidate the idea that he was suffering from a sexually transmitted disease. And what is indisputable is that Hammond’s lifestyle put him at risk of acquiring such an infection.

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Hammond an an unknown friend in Australia, during the Queensland leg of the 1928–29 MCC tour of Australia

Foot spoke to several people who knew Hammond before his illness; most considered him quiet but likeable. They also noted that he liked to entertain women, although they were never too sure how far this went. Similarly Foot, along with Hammond’s other biographers, identified several girlfriends from this period, some of whom he became quite close to. Among these were Dorothy Oakey and Kitty Hall. Those who knew Hammond later suggested that women were the primary driving force of his life; one team-mate (unnamed by Foot) suggested that the “two ruling passions of Wally Hammond’s life … were his cricket bat and his genitals”. Or as Eddie Paynter, a frequent Test colleague of Hammond in the 1930s, put it: “Wally, well, yes — he liked a shag!” Always immaculately attired and a lover of fast cars, Hammond was doubtless quite an attraction for women as a famous cricketer. Foot believes that this lay behind the infection he possibly acquired in the Caribbean during the 1926 tour. He suggests that there would have been plenty of opportunity for Hammond to “indulge”, and records team-mates memories — although as ever with Foot it is hard to tell where his sources end and his imagination begins — of him slipping away from the group for an hour or so.

While recovering from the illness, Hammond had fewer girlfriends and appears to have had some intention of “settling down”. But there are suggestions that he had returned to his old ways, to some extent, in Australia. Ben Travers, a writer who accompanied the MCC team throughout their tour during 1928–29, later recalled how Hammond spent time during games perusing the “Ladies Enclosure” with binoculars. Whether anything came of this or not, there was a new development almost as soon as Hammond returned from Australia.

Footage of Hammond’s wedding at Bingley Parish Church in 1929

In a blaze of publicity, in late April 1929, Hammond married Dorothy Lister, the daughter of a wealthy Yorkshire textile merchant called Joseph Lister. Hammond had met Dorothy at the Scarborough Festival in 1927 but the couple cannot have spent much time together. Pathé cameras filmed the arrival of the bride, groom and guests, as well as huge crowds gathered outside the church in Bingley to be close to the wedding of the English batting hero from Australia. Afterwards, the couple had a brief honeymoon on the continent. But the marriage was never a happy one; Dorothy resented Hammond’s frequent absences through his cricket duties and was never a fan of the sport. People who knew the couple said that she could be difficult, and there are hints that she drank heavily (as did Hammond); he was certainly rarely an easy man. It cannot have been a pleasant atmosphere, and it was made worse when Joseph Lister died in November 1932. Following his death, his business failed when the price of wool dropped in the Great Depression, leaving Dorothy with no money — which cynics suggested was the main reason Hammond married her. In his biography of Hammond, Gerald Howat described how a friend of Hammond’s mother believed that it was “the warmth of the Lister household’s welcome rather than the attraction of Dorothy Lister which led him to marry into the family.”

The marriage foundered — and both Foot and Howat accepted that Hammond was primarily to blame, although they (unconvincingly) argued that Dorothy’s unwillingness to have children was also a factor — and Hammond began to see other women. When he was the MCC captain during the tour of South Africa in 1938–39, Dorothy travelled there in the middle of the tour in an attempt to save the marriage. But he had already met someone else: Sybil Ness-Harvey, generally described as a “former beauty queen”. He spent a great deal of time during that tour in her company, and they remained in contact afterwards. During the Second World War, when he was stationed for a time in Egypt, Hammond frequently travelled to see her. Dorothy realised that their marriage was over, sold the house and moved to the Isle of Wight. She later returned to Yorkshire.

Hammond and Dorothy Lister photographed in the 1930s (Image: Wally Hammond: The Reasons Why (1996) by David Foot)

Hammond with Sybil Ness-Harvey leaving the Registry Office after their wedding in 1947 (Image: Wally Hammond: The Reasons Why (1996) by David Foot)

Hammond’s relationship with Sybil Ness-Harvey continued after the war, and while he was captaining England to a heavy defeat in Australia in 1946–47, the press reported that he was attempting to divorce Dorothy. The resulting publicity caused him considerable stress, and once the divorce came through he married Sybil almost as soon as he returned to England. The couple eventually had three children and the family later moved to South Africa, where Hammond died in 1965.

If Hammond had an easy way with women, his relationships with men were more strained. While members of the Gloucestershire team were always in awe of his cricketing talent, and in later years younger players hero-worshipped him, he was not a good team-mate. He was happier surrounding himself with influential people or those who could help him with his ambitions. Contemporaries noted how he consciously copied the dress, style and manners of amateur cricketers such as the Gloucestershire captain Bev Lyon; he was close to very few professionals. Some Gloucestershire players actively hated him; other team-mates and opponents also had problems with him.

Learie Constantine was one such player, and wrote about this himself; he claimed that the pair had an ongoing feud on the field which arose from Hammond’s attitude towards him when the pair met during the 1926 MCC tour. Constantine believed that Hammond snubbed him owing to racism, having been friendly enough when they met during the West Indies’ 1923 tour. The result was a series of onfield encounters punctuated by hostility and short-pitched bowling. By Constantine’s own account, this ended when the pair shook hands during the second Test of the 1933 series in England; therefore the “feud” cannot have lasted long as they only faced each other in 1926 and during the 1928 tour of England.

Charles Dacre was a team-mate of Hammond in the Gloucestershire team; he and Hammond did not get along, although we only know this through the recollections of other players as retold by David Foot. Dacre was a New Zealander who remained in England after touring with the 1927 team to qualify for Gloucestershire. Foot wrote: “[Dacre’s] brash self-confidence and jaunty attitude towards going for his shots, not necessarily in the team’s interest, led to a number of bellicose exchanges with Hammond. ‘I just can’t get on with that bloody Kiwi,’ Wally would say. He bridled whenever Dacre’s name was mentioned.”

Confirmation of a kind came from Grahame Parker, who played for Gloucestershire in the 1930s; he recalled one match in which Dacre was keeping wicket and chose to stand up to the stumps when Hammond was bowling. Hammond bowled faster and faster, conceding numerous byes, forcing Dacre to stand further back and bowling wildly, making Dacre “more of a goalkeeper than a wicket-keeper” according to Parker. Reg Sinfield, who also played for Gloucestershire, also related to Foot how Dacre told him on one occasion that he got out to a loose shot simply so he would not have to bat with Hammond.

Others from the Gloucestershire team did not like Hammond; during a Gentleman v Players match at Lord’s, Pelham Warner was watching alongside Basil Allen, who played for Gloucestershire between 1932 and 1951, and captained the county in 1937 and 1938 when Hammond was in the team. Warner said at one point to Allen: “Basil, that Wally Hammond of yours really is a wonderful chap, isn’t he?” Allen responded: “If you want my honest opinion, Plum, I think he’s an absolute shit.” Foot claimed to have heard the story from “three impeccable sources”, but it does raise the question of who these sources might have been. Among the men who could have overheard such a conversation, all of whom would have been influential amateurs at the top of English cricket’s social tree, who would have been willing to pass along such gossip? Was there an actual witness, or was it just more rumours and second-hand gossip passed to Foot by his “impeccable sources”?

Perhaps the team-mate who had the biggest feud with Hammond was Charles Barnett. His contempt for Hammond, with whom he had once been close, poured from almost every interview he gave. His main issue was over Hammond’s treatment of Dorothy, but also over his apparent refusal to appear in Barnett’s benefit match in 1947. Some of his criticisms have validity, but others arose from blind hatred, making him an often unreliable witness. Another man who took issue with Hammond was Denis Compton, who played for England under Hammond’s captaincy. Many of his complaints concerned the disastrous 1946–47 tour of Australia, when Hammond was far past his best and extremely unhappy. And most of their contemporaries agree that Hammond disliked Bradman intensely, and the two men had a tense relationship throughout their careers.

In fact, there were few cricketers with whom Hammond had a close relationship, but those who liked him were very loyal, even to the point of protective defensiveness. Most describe a quiet, self-conscious character, completely at odds with the impression he gave on the field. While some saw him as aloof or self-absorbed, others perceived shyness. Players like his Gloucestershire team-mate Sinfield and his England team-mate Les Ames spoke very highly of him for the rest of their lives, as did Len Hutton, another England team-mate, to a lesser extent.

The overall impression, though, is clear. Hammond was not a popular man with many cricketers. His aspirations to reach a higher social class — culminating in his switch to amateur status — meant that he was never really “one of the boys” in the Gloucestershire or England team. But even those who actively disliked him had to admit that he was an excellent batter. However, looked at objectively, even here there were some qualifications…