“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?”

What Might Have Been: The Interrupted Career of “Bam Bam” Weekes

Ken Weekes in 1939

For the West Indies cricket team, the first years of Test status were not a happy time. The 1928 tour of England was disastrous: all three Tests were lost by an innings. Five years later the team returned to England but results were little better: two Tests were lost by an innings, although the team secured a creditable draw in the second match. Across these two tours, only Learie Constantine, George Headley and Manny Martindale experienced anything like consistent success. But the 1939 tour of England was different. Although hampered by some poor weather, and with the looming threat of the Second World War building in the background and overshadowing much of the cricket, the West Indies lost only the first Test and although the others two were drawn, the visitors held their own in the second and were on top for much of the third. Several men emerged who had not previously played Test cricket and could have formed the basis of a very good team, something that the West Indies had lacked since the early 1920s. However, because of the Second World War, Jeffrey Stollmeyer and Gerry Gomez were the only members of the 1939 team to return to England and have substantial post-war careers. In an alternative reality, we might today be talking of great West Indian players like Victor Stollmeyer, Tyrell Johnson, E. A. V. Williams or Ken Weekes. The most remarkable innings of the tour was played by Weekes, who scored 137 in 135 minutes in the final Test, only his third innings at that level. The bowlers were reduced to placing most fielders on the boundary at the height of his assault. But this was his final Test: by the time the West Indies next played a Test, Weekes had begun a new life away from cricket.

Kenneth Hunnell Weekes was born in Newton Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts in 1912, making him the first Test cricketer to have been born in the United States. His father, Joseph Weekes, was born in Barbados and worked in Boston as a porter; his mother, Isolene Powell, was from Jamaica. There is a suggestion in several places, including CricketArchive, that Weekes was a cousin of the later West Indies cricketer Everton Weekes (although Ken’s Wisden obituary said that he explicitly ruled this out); it is possible that he was distantly related through his Barbadian father but it seems unlikely that they were first cousins (Ken Weekes had only one uncle who survived into adulthood, and he also moved to the United States; Everton was born in Barbados).

Weekes’s parents met and married in Massachusetts, and had three children. But Weekes’ father died when he was just one year old; his mother married a man called James Thomas — who was originally from Barbados — in 1918, five years after her first husband’s death and had at least three more children. Weekes is recorded on the 1920 United States census as Kenneth Thomas. But around this time Weekes went to live in Jamaica — a feature in the Jamaica Gleaner in 1947 said he was eight years old — while his mother and her other five children remained in Boston. His step-father died in 1928.

We do not know why Weekes moved alone to Jamaica, although it makes sense that he would have lived with his mother’s family. He might have been educated in what is now known as Rollington Town; just before he departed for England in 1939, a cricket match was arranged (but rained off) between Kensington Cricket Club and “Rollington Pen Old Students” which was to be led by Weekes. At the same event, Weekes also stated that he learned all his cricket “as a small boy at the Kensington Cricket Club”.

Kensington Cricket Club, Jamaica (Image: ESPNcricinfo)

All we know with certainty, based on the passenger lists from his journey to England in 1939, is that he worked as a clerk away from cricket. Otherwise, we lose track of him until he emerged in Jamaican local cricket in the late 1930s. Like so many of his contemporaries in West Indian cricket, we know almost nothing of his life apart from what took place on the field. But given his background, it is probable that he was far from wealthy. And it should always be remembered when discussing West Indian cricket in this period that the sport, and society in general, was dominated by the white European authorities. But by the mid-1930s, there was a growing clamour for Jamaican independence; there were strikes and social unrest in the years leading up to the Second World War. Such considerations barely touched the consciousness of the cricket world, but the effects of the Great Depression on Jamaica in the 1930s and the growing influence of Labour Unions must have affected men like Weekes, whose stories will never fully be known.

What we do know is that Weekes made a huge impression in Jamaican cricket. He first played for Lucas Cricket Club in the Senior Cup — the highest level tournament in Jamaican cricket, the matches for which were played on Saturday afternoons — in 1937 (having scored over a thousand runs in the Junior Cup in 1936), quickly establishing himself as an attractive left-handed batter. But in 1938, he was without equal. He scored 1,018 runs in the competition; no-one had previously reached a thousand runs in a season. He also equalled the tournament record of five centuries in a season (only previously managed by Joseph Holt in 1921); one of these was an unbeaten 218 against Wembley Cricket Club, only the seventh double century ever scored in the competition. There was considerable attention as he neared the four-figure mark, particularly in the Gleaner, and when he passed it in the final match, he received a huge ovation.

But for all his statistical success, it was Weekes’ style which appealed to cricket followers; he played aggressively and took chances which meant that he was generally inconsistent but could be brilliant when he was in form. As a feature in the Gleaner said on his retirement from cricket in 1947: “Despite his many successes he was unpredictable. But it was that uncertainty about his batting that caused the crowd to go and find out just what the left-hander was going to do next. And rarely had he failed them — his scintillating hitting [often] bringing victory when ordinarily a draw seemed the verdict.”

Given his form, it was inevitable that he came under consideration to play for Jamaica. His first appearance at representative level came when he played for “Jamaica Next” — effectively a Jamaican second eleven, which included the Test player Vin Valentine — against the Yorkshire team which visited in 1936. He scored just 14, and bowled five overs; he bowled occasionally in this period, but seems to have given it up until after the Second World War.

But he was far more successful when his next opportunity arose. Jamaica rarely played first-class cricket. Its distance from the other cricket-playing regions of the Caribbean made it uneconomic for the team to take part in the Intercolonial Tournament, and it was only visits from English touring teams which offered a higher level of cricket. In July and August 1938, a team representing Oxford and Cambridge Universities toured Jamaica, playing a handful of games, including two first-class matches against the full Jamaica side. It was in the first of these that Weekes made his first-class debut. Batting at number four, he was dismissed for 12 as Jamaica conceded a first-innings lead of 128 to the Universities. But the English team were dismissed for just 99 in their second innings, leaving Jamaica needing 228 to win, with time running out. They went for the runs. Weekes was promoted to open the batting, and he shared an opening partnership of 122 with O. C. Stephenson. Weekes went on to reach a debut century, scoring 106 before he was dismissed by John Cameron (who although living in Jamaica, was playing for the Universities as he was an Oxford graduate). Jamaica came very close, reaching 204 for eight from 45.3 eight-ball overs when the match was drawn.

A few days later, Weekes scored another century against the University team, an uncharacteristically cautious 126 for Lucas in a non-first-class match. And in their last match of the tour, Weekes scored 58 in an innings win by Jamaica, to complete an outstanding season.

It was hardly a surprise that he was in contention for a place on the 1939 West Indies tour of England despite his lack of first-class experience. There were few quality left handers around at the time, so he had an immediate advantage. He was chosen for the trial matches played in Trinidad in early 1939. Conditions in Trinidad were different from those in Jamaica; matches were played on matting, which offered some assistance to bowlers. In the first match, played between Trinidad and Jamaica, Weekes scored 88 batting at number four (sharing a third wicket partnership of 151 with George Headley) in a drawn match. Then in a game between a “Combined XI” and Jamaica, he kept wicket, but still managed scores of 18 and a very cautious (by his standards) 100 not out.

With a record of 384 runs at an average of 76.80 and two centuries in his four first-class matches, Weekes was a certain selection for the West Indies team, not least as he could be the back-up wicket-keeper. He duly took his place alongside his fellow Jamaican cricketers George Headley, Leslie Hylton, Ivan Barrow and the vice-captain John Cameron.

After arriving in England, Weekes took some time to get going, but had found his form by early June: fifties against Northamptonshire, the Minor Counties and Leicestershire meant that he was chosen for the first Test match and made his debut at Lord’s. But scores of 20 and 16 were not enough to prevent a West Indies defeat by eight wickets, the team’s sixth loss in seven Tests played in England (and the first not to be by the margin of an innings). The only bright spot for the West Indies was that Headley scored two centuries in the match.

Ken Weekes meeting King George during the match between Surrey and the West Indies at the Oval (Image: Illustrated London News, 5 August 1939)

Weekes hit a century in a non-first-class match against Norfolk immediately after the Test but a series of low scores in the following games meant that he was dropped for the second Test, a rain-affected draw in which the West Indies held their own. He eventually returned to form with 146 against Surrey at the Oval, followed by fifties against Somerset and Warwickshire, and was recalled to the team for the third Test. This was to be the last Test match for seven years, but the teams put on an exhibition of carefree batting which suggested they were aware of the possibility. And one of the stars of the match was Weekes.

On a flat Oval pitch, England scored 352 in their first innings from 73.3 eight-ball overs. Having been 27 for one after the first day, the West Indies took their total to 395 for six by the close of the second day. Weekes came in at number six, when the score was 164 for four and the bowling had been worn down by Headley and Jeffrey Stollmeyer. Weekes and Vic Stollmeyer then shared a partnership of 163 in just 100 minutes. The Wisden report explained:

“Whereas the first 200 runs [of the West Indies innings] occupied three hours and fifty minutes, the next hour yielded 110, 43 coming in four [eight-ball] overs when Nichols and Perks took the new ball. England’s fielding became very slack and [D. V. P.] Wright made a particularly costly blunder when he dropped a simple catch offered by Weekes when 52, off [M. S.] Nichols … Weekes raced to his first century in Test cricket in 110 minutes and when he fell to a superb right-hand catch by [W. R.] Hammond high at first slip, he had scored 137 out of 225 in two and a quarter hours. Besides lifting [L.] Hutton for 6, he hit eighteen 4s. Weekes always hit fearlessly though his stance and footwork were somewhat unorthodox.”

But for a thunderstorm taking an hour out of the day, the West Indies would have been further ahead by the close of play, and the following morning Learie Constantine scored a rapid 79 to take the West Indies to 498, a lead of 146. England batted out time easily enough as Len Hutton and Wally Hammond both scored quick hundreds. In later years, John Cameron — who missed the match with an injury — recalled Weekes hitting Reg Perks back over his head for six. Jeff Stollmeyer also wrote about how Weekes and Constantine caused the English field to be spread around the boundary: “It was the first time I had seen fast bowlers of the calibre of Perks and Nichols bowling with no slips and all the men in the outfield.”

At one point, Weekes took four consecutive fours from Perks. It was one of the most devastating displays against English bowlers in the 1930s. Even with some of the leading players missing — notably Bill Bowes and Hedley Verity — it was a remarkable innings. It seems to have been this century (or possibly his batting in general during the tour) which earned him the nickname by which he was later known. The Daily Express dubbed him “Bang Bang Weekes”, and from that point, the Gleaner also used this, although later altering the nickname to “Bam Bam”.

After the match, the tour was abandoned owing to the increasingly tense situation in Europe. Weekes finished with 803 first-class runs at 29.74, which was nothing out of the ordinary but fairly respectable. His two centuries at the Oval made up for his variable form at other times.

The West Indies team that toured England in 1939: Back row: W. Ferguson (scorer) G. E. Gomez, J. B. Stollmeyer, L. G. Hylton, T. Johnson, C. B. Clarke, H. P. Bayley, E. A. V. Williams. Middle row: G. A. Headley, I. M. Barrow, R. S. Grant (captain), J. M. Kidney (manager), J. H. Cameron, L. N. Constantine, E. A. Martindale. On ground: K. H. Weekes, J. E. D. Sealey, V. H. Stollmeyer (Image: Wisden.com)

There was almost a tragic sequel to the tour. The team — apart from Constantine and Martindale who lived in England — travelled by train to Greenock to catch the first available ship, the SS Montrose, which departed for Canada on 26 August. Two days after their departure, the Admiralty recalled the ship to port, but six hours later reversed the decision and permitted it to continue. Had the team returned to Greenock, they would probably have taken the next ship available, the SS Athenia. Two days after the Montrose arrived at Montreal, Britain declared war on Germany. Meanwhile, the Athenia left Greenock on 1 September. A few hours after the declaration of war on 3 September, the ship was sunk by a German submarine. Of the 1,418 on board, 117 were killed — mainly in incidents involving life boats.

From Montreal, where they played a local eleven during their stopover, most of the team travelled by train to New York. From there, after a brief holiday, they went their separate ways. Weekes, Headley and Barrow arrived together in Jamaica, greeted by their families and officials. A report in the Gleaner indicated that Weekes had put on weight while he was away and was “bubbling all over with health”. He told reporters that England “was a university for cricket”. He indicated that his up-and-down form was not connected to the different pitches to those in Jamaica but to the effects of frequent rain which created sticky wickets.

We get a small hint of Weekes’ life away from cricket after this. A report in the Gleaner in 1940 revealed that he was a junior foreman at Tinson Pen Relief Work Centre; in his role, he had been encouraging men working there to take up cricket in their spare time. During this period, he continued to play in the Senior Cup. In total, he scored over 4,300 runs in that competition at an average of around fifty.

Once the war was over, Jamaica played far more first-class cricket than they had done before. In 1946, Weekes played three matches against Trinidad at Kingston. He scored three fifties, totalling 249 runs at an average of 62.25. He also resumed bowling a little, taking five wickets in the three games. In 1947, Jamaica played two games against Barbados where Weekes played against his namesake Everton, and actually bowled at him for a time. Everton and Kenneth dominated the games: Everton scored 97, 1, 123 and 2; Kenneth scored 31, 37, 84 and 70.

Weekes’ final two first-class matches came against British Guiana in late 1947. In the first, George Headley and Frank Worrell were injured during the second innings, meaning that Weekes had to bowl. He took three for 84, his best first-class figures. With the bat, his final innings were 15, 41 and 17, a slightly disappointing end to his career. In 11 first-class matches for Jamaica, Weekes had scored 928 runs at 58.

By then Weekes, had decided to return to the United States. He had visited “home” several times, including as part of a non-representative West Indian cricket team which occasionally “toured” in New York. The reason for his permanent return appears to have been that, having been born there, he had maintained his citizenship but had to return in order to keep it permanently. He even successfully applied for a short extension in order to play in Jamaica’s matches in 1947. However, his decision probably cost him a Test place; an England team toured the West Indies in 1947–48 and he was in contention for selection before his decision to leave Jamaica. Instead, John Goddard was selected as the left-handed batter and went on to captain the team.

When it was announced that he was leaving Jamaica, Weekes gave said: “After playing first-class cricket [i.e. the Jamaican competitions] for eighteen years it is naturally my deep regret to have to leave a country and people of which I have been a part for over 25 years. To have to break new ground with a big family in a new country considering the economic conditions of the day will naturally entail its hardships, but it has to be done and I am hoping for the best.”

As he indicated, Weekes had quite a large family by this time. He had married Viola Levy in July 1937, and already had a very young child by the time he went to England in 1939 (the report of his return from the tour mention that his wife and baby were there to greet him). Altogether, the couple had six children.

According to obituaries which appeared in The Times and The Guardian, Weekes worked as a nurse in the Brooklyn, New York, after returning to the United States. However, he often returned to Jamaica. In 1961, he brought “Wembley Cricket Club”, a team of ex-patriate West Indians which was based in New York, to tour Jamaica; a leg injury meant that he missed several games. He also returned on other occasions, for example timing a visit in 1965 with the arrival of the Australian cricket team.

In this later period, Weekes was also the manager of the Brooklyn Cricket team. On one occasion in 1969, he brought it to Jamaica, where the Gleaner covered his reunion with his old Lucas and West Indies team-mate George Headley.

After this, Weekes faded from the view of the cricket world. He died in Brooklyn at the age of 86 in 1998. He was survived by his wife and children, and most obituaries concentrated on his remarkable innings at the Oval in 1939. But he was a better cricketer than just that one innings; although he was never likely to have been as reliable as Headley, or as effective as Frank Worrell, Clyde Walcott and his possible cousin Everton Weekes in the next generation, he would almost certainly have played much more cricket for the West Indies had it not been for the war.