Yorkshire v Australian Imperial Forces
Bramall Lane, Sheffield
16th, 17th, 18th June 1919 (three-day match)
SCORECARD

Hampshire v Australian Imperial Forces
County Ground, Southampton
20th, 21st June 1919 (two-day match)

This week begun at Bramall LaneG.E. Markcrow, The Australian Imperial Forces XI cricket team come out to field at Bramall Lane, Sheffield at the start of their three day match with Yorkshire County Cricket Club, 1919, photograph, https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C1240944 with a keenly anticipated meetingCricket, The Northern Miner (QLD), Mon 8 Mar 1915, p.6. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article79078847 against the county of the White RoseEnglish Cricket, The Brisbane Courier (QLD), Mon 1 Jul 1912, p. 7. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article19850125 . The CountyCricket, Western Daily Press (Bristol), Thu 17 Jun 1919, p. 3. (as they are known up here, ye ‘kenFlashes and Glances, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 24 May 1919, p. 1. , to use an idiomatic turn of phrase)Art and Ideals, The Express and Daily Telegraph (SA), Thu 1 Feb 1917, p. 3. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article210633635 were initially inclined to look upon the visit as one of the least attractive of the fixturesThe Passer-By, Sheffield Independent (Yorkshire), Mon 16 Jun 1919, p. 4. . However, an undefeated run Veteran, Bowls, Critic (SA), Wed 26 Feb 1919, p. 13. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article212479955 thus far have proved the Colonials to be a very hot lotThe Editor, Leaves From My Notebook, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 14 Jun 1919, p. 1. . The Yorkshire players are quite keen on playing against the travellers, and are very desirous of being the first to lower their coloursThe Editor, Leaves From My Notebook, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 14 Jun 1919, p. 1. . Adding to the excitement was that this was the first opportunity Sheffield people had of seeing a first-class cricket match since 1914The Editor, Leaves From My Notebook, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 14 Jun 1919, p. 1. . Except for a match with the Yorkshire Council, the county eleven have not been seen at Bramall Lane since the first month of the war, when the game with Middlesex was played after notice of abandonment had been givenCricket, Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer (Yorkshire), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 14. . Whilst some who were not cricket enthusiasts were tempted to attend the match of a visiting Colonial touring team as a matter of curiosityTriangular Tests and County Cricket, West Sussex Gazette (Sussex), Thu 2 May 1912, p. 3. , and many others to introduce themselves to their County’s young talentNotes on Sport, Nottingham Journal (Nottinghamshire), Thu 21 Aug 1919, p. 2. , the highlight for most of us was seeing those two doyensFootball and Other Notes, Queensland Times (QLD), Sat 7 Oct 1911, p. 7. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article112050469 of the English XIOriginally I wanted to use ‘giants’ of the game, but this is definitely anachronistic. The google Ngram shows this popped up a few times not long after, but doesn’t become a common phrase until the 1960s. Likewise, ‘legend of the game’. Using ‘legend’ in the sense to refer to a great individual, as opposed to something or someone mythical, does not really come into use until the latter half of the 20th century. The phrase ‘legend of the game’ does exist from the time, but it is used in the mythical sense ‘the length bowler may shortly be a legend of the game’. Observer, Test Match Bowling, The Argus (Vic), Tue 9 Dec 1924, p. 21. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2082891. The phrase ‘legend in one’s own lifetime’ first appears to describe Florence Nightingale in 1918 when Giles Lytton Strachey wrote in Eminent Victorians ‘she was a legend in her lifetime, and she knew it’. The phrase ‘living legend’ came into the popular vernacular in the USA in 1939 when Jack Dempsey, Cordell Hull, Diego Rivera, Fiedling H. Yost, The ‘lost’ Apaches of northern Mexico, and D.B. MacRae were all described as such. Gary Martin, A Legend In One’s Own Lifetime, The Phrase Finder, United Kingdom, 2019, https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a-legend-in-one’s-own-lifetime.html (accessed 12 Apr 2019). In the end ‘doyens of the English XI’ was used as I could find several contemporary references, including the one shown which is about the cousin of Jack Gregory, Syd Gregory, in almost the exact same context. , Wilfred RhodesGeorge Beldam, A Cricketer Seen From The Front,1906, photograph, in Charles B. Fry, Great Bowlers and Fielders: Their Methods at a Glance, (London: MacMillan and Co., Limited), p. 310. and George HirstGeorge Beldam, Hirst Bowling,1906, photograph, in Charles B. Fry, Great Bowlers and Fielders: Their Methods at a Glance, (London: MacMillan and Co., Limited), p. 310. . Neither disappointed, taking runsRecreated scorecard and wicketsRecreated scorecard . This should have seen Yorkshire secure the winMid-on, Cricket, Western Mail (WA), Sat 13 Jan 1912, p. 29. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article37412789 , but a remarkably fine display of coolness and skill, splendidly representative of Colonial grit sawCricket, Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer (Yorkshire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 12. Gregory and Long, typical of the Australian spirit, refuse to acknowledge defeatSporting Gossip, Gloucestershire Echo (Gloucestershire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 5. and they scraped home by one wicketYesterday’s Cricket, Sunday Times (WA), Sun 16 Jan 1910, p. 1. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article57597122 . At this point the crowd–although PodsnappianInitially I had used ‘parochial’, but at this time that word is exclusively used in a religious context. Podsnappian, from Dickens’ Mr. Podsnap, meaning self-satisfied or blinkered, was in relatively common usage in Australia during the war. Mrs. Edgworth David, Red Plague, The Globe and Sunday Times War Pictorial (NSW), Sat 3 Jun 1916, p. 12. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article100573457 –gave an ovationYorkshire v. Australians, The Scotsman (Midlothian), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 8. of true sportsmanshipGood Sportsmanship Rightly Valued, The Register (SA), Tue 16 Jan 1912, p. 6. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article59043795 and joy at the return of big cricketMen and Matters, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 1 Feb 1919, p. 1. . One old hand recalledPersonal, The Richmond River Herald and Northern Districts Advertiser (NSW), Fri 7 May 1920, p. 4. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article132533162 it was like the old, happy, pre-war daysCover-point, Australians at the Lane, Sheffield Independent (Yorkshire), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 6. to see nobility rubbing shoulders with commoners on the benchesCricket at Bramall Lane, Sheffield Independent (Yorkshire), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 4. amongst the 7,000 people sitting in the glorious sunshineCover-point, Australians at the Lane, Sheffield Independent (Yorkshire), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 6. . Although not up to the giant crowdsJohn Manger, The Letters of Lionel Lynx, Worker (QLD), Thu 28 Nov 1918, p. 5. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72191143 seen here in 1909Yorkshire v. Australians, London Evening Standard (London), Thu 22 Jul 1909, p.13. , it was very satisfying to see a crowd similar to which the Australians are accustomed toThe crowd numbers for the three days were between 7-9000 on day 1, 5-7000 on day 2, and 4-5000 on day 3. This is comparable to 1912. Yorks. V Australians, Hull Daily Mail (Yorkshire), Mon 16 Jun 1919, p. 8. Yorkshire v Australians, Shields Daily News (Northumberland), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 3. Yorks Still Leading the Australians, The Sporting Life (Yorkshire), Wed 18 Jun 1919, p. 5. Yorkshire Ahead at Bramall Lane, Sheffield Daily Telegraph (Yorkshire), Tue 17 Jun 1919, p. 9. Yorkshire v. Australians, Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer (Yorkshire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 12. Exciting Cricket at Sheffield, The Sporting Life (Yorkshire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 5. when visiting “Home”Sport Salad, Saturday Referee and the Arrow (NSW), Sat 19 Oct 1912, p. 4. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article133435806 .

Many see county cricket on its trialCricket, Sheffield Daily Telegraph (Yorkshire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 9. this season, and indeed, our lotCpl. R.L. Harrowfield Soldier’s Letter, Avoca Mail (Vic), Tue 23 May 1916, p. 2. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article151724830 are revealing the keenest anxietyInitially ‘auditioning the popularity’, but the use of auditioning in this sense seems to come about in the second half of the 20th century. On searching for ‘revealing the anxiety’ I found many contemporary examples, most of which are referring to the anxiety of the German newspapers over the war. I have chosen to use this phrasing to highlight the anxieties of Australians in 1916 as shown in the article quoted following, against those perceived to exist within the German populace at the same time. In doing so I hope to highlight the incongruity of the Australian experience of the war and sport. Conquest or Ruin, Geelong Advertiser (Vic), Tue 15 May 1917, p. 3. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article119724869 for the resumption of international contestsJ.W., Cricket, The Australasian (Vic), Sat 7 Oct 1916, p. 25. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article140699917 . If what has been seen in the match between Yorkshire and the Australians at Bramall Lane during the past three days is part of that trial, it ought not to be difficult to find a following for the gameCricket, Sheffield Daily Telegraph (Yorkshire), Thu 19 Jun 1919, p. 9. . Indeed, some local cricketers who were watching the Yorkshire-Australian struggle declared that it is years since they endured such exhilarating agony. They could not sit stillFree Lance, Men and Matters, Star Green ‘un (Yorkshire), Sat 21 Jun 1919, p. 1. .

The story of the week is once more told in one wordNotes of the Week, Sydney Mail (NSW), Wed 3 Jun 1914, p. 6. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article158396579 : Barrackers. And I thought Englishmen, hampered and bound by every sort of tradition, did not barrackThis is a transcript of a toast Sir Archibald Weigall, Governeor of South Australia, gave at a valedictory dinner for the 1920 English Ashes side. The surrounding context gives an interesting perspective on Australian crowds by an English Aristocrat. Point, Englishmen’s First Win, The Age (Vic), Wed 10 Nov 1920, p. 9. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article206941613 ! As Ted Long was about to take the arena, a member of the crowd facetiously said “I’ll bet you a fiver Australia is beaten.” Ted stopped and clinched the bet and then strode to the wickets. He walked up to Collins and said ‘A guy bet me a fiver we wouldn’t do it so I’ll hold up my end while you make the runs’. The bet was won and Long and Collins saw that no one paid for a drink until a check of accounts showed that the fiver had been spent.J.M. Gregory with J.M. Rohan, Happy Days With the A.I.F. Team, Sporting Globe (Melbourne), Sat 9 Jan 1937, p. 8. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article190329823

The spirit of the A.I.F. has not left the ladsW.A.S. Oldfield quoted in J. Mathers, The Diggers Make a Team, The Daily Telegraph (NSW), Sat 27 Apr 1935, p. 6 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article246691864 . We’ve developed into gamblersThe journalist including himself in the ‘we’ of the team is a deliberate muddying of roles, highlighting both the shared experience of war, as well as the sometimes blurred lines of the embedded journalist –among ourselves, of course. The bug has bitten so deeply, indeed, that on the trip from one end of the nation to the other to get us to Hampshire, finding ourselves without a deck of cards, Ted Long, who is one of the wits of the team, devised the scheme of betting on the electric fan that cooled the railway carriage! He stuck a piece of paper on the frame-work of the fan, and gambled which blade would stop closest to the piece of paperI have no evidence this happened on this particular train trip, but I am taking a liberty to incldeW.A.S. Oldfield quoted in J. Mathers, The Diggers Make a Team, The Daily Telegraph (NSW), Sat 27 Apr 1935, p. 6 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article246691864 !

The Hampshire game saw the young former Eton boy, if one can still call him a boy given his service–three times wounded and twice mentioned in despatchesFrom Here and There, The Tatler (London), Wed 4 Aug 1920, p. 18. –and titles, Major the Hon.Gloucestershire Echo (Gloucestershire), Thu 6 Dec 1917, p. 1. Lionel TennysonUnknown, The Right Honourable Lord Lionel Hallam Tennyson, Hampshire County cricket team, c. 1922, photograph, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Lionel_Hallam_Tennyson_c1922.jpg , grandson of the poet of that name, play his first match against an Australian side. The war claimed so many of the county’s cricketers as victims that they have had practically to rebuild the teamHampshire’s First Match, Hampshire Advertiser (Hampshire), Sat 7 Jun 1919, p. 6. . In total they lost at leastNot all of the Hampshire players lost are listed as playing for Hampshire in the Death Roll of Sport (DROS – see following popups), but they were all reported as playing for Hampshire at the time they played. Additionally, there are a number of players missing from the DROS. Along with the 17 listed in the DROS is Gordon Belcher, whose death was reported in 1915. Captain G. Belcher, Reading Mercury (Berkshire), Sat 29 May 1915, p. 2. Not included in this number, but listed on the Hampshire County Cricket Club Roll of Honour memorial (date unknown) are C.N. Stucliffe and H. Rogers. The most comprehensive list, not published until 2014, lists a total of 24 Hampshire players who died, and also includes a photograph of the monument. The players on this list not already mentioned did not have their deaths reported in contemporary sources. Andrew Renshaw (ed.), Wisden on the Great War: The Lives of Cricket’s Fallen 1914-1918 (London: Wisden), 2014, pp. 22-23. The confusing nature of these lists helps to highlight the still chaotic nature of news around causalities of the war in 1919. 18This list helps to show the full extent of the cost of the war in the U.K. The Death Roll of Sport, Special Supplement to The Field, July 1919, pp. 22-3. Click to open in a new window: https://anthonycondoncom.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/dros-11.jpg first-class cricketersThe Death Roll of Sport, Special Supplement to The Field, July 1919, pp. 26-7. Click to open in a new window: https://anthonycondoncom.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/dros-13.jpg in the warDave Allen, Honours Board, 2019, photograph, https://anthonycondoncom.files.wordpress.com/2019/06/hampshire-honours-board.jpg supplied personally courtesy of Dave Allen. More than the 15 lost Australian Sheffield Shield playersThis is the number published by the Australian Cricketers’ Association in 2018, however, in June of 1919 – the time of this article – all of these deaths had been reported on in the Australian press. This presents a striking difference to the Hampshire players, many of whom were not reported on as having been killed by June 1919. ACA remembers fallen first-class cricketers, Australian Cricketers’ Association, Australia, 2018, https://www.auscricket.com.au/news-media/news-articles/aca-remembers-fallen-first-class-cricketers (accessed 14 Apr 2019). . Such was the depletion of the Hampshire side that Ledger HillLedger Hill, Scan by Northmetpit, taken from Famous Cricketers, dated 1896, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Arthur_Hill_Cricketer.jpg took the field for the home team. Hill first sawFear Absolutely Disappears, The Brisbane Courier (QLD), Fri 19 Feb 1915, p. 7. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article20017929 action‘First saw action’ as a military phrase comes into use in the First World War, and is used in several soldier’s letters published in newspapers in Australia and the U.K. It is never used outside of the description of a military engagement in this period; however, given the hypothesis tested by the quantification section, I have indulged in using this section to make a plausible creation of a term that becomes quite common following the Second World War. As the ngram shows, this phrase comes into popular use towards the end of the war before petering out in the 30s, and then having a massive spike in use in the Second World War, and again during the Vietnam War. against Australians playing for Cambridge Cambridge University v. Australians, South Australian register (SA), Mon 14 Jul 1890, p. 7. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article47282244 against Billy Murdoch’sUnknown, Billy Murdoch c. 1895, c. 1895, photograph, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/79/Billy_Murdoch_c1895b.jpg side in 1890 and hasn’t regularly played for Hampshire since 1911. Another young Hampshire man, Dallas BrooksThis is the same Dallas Brooks who goes on to be Governor General of Victoria from 1949-1963, got a deserved pat on the shoulder from our Anzacs when they discovered he had been wounded fighting alongside a number of them at GallipoliVic.’s New Governor, Soldier and Sportsman, Singleton Argus (NSW), Wed 4 May 1949, p. 4. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article82577453 . Like Trenerry, he was seriously wounded in that battle–half blown up when one of the jam tin bomb catapults invented in the trenches failedThis story is relayed in Matthews, Wayne & Wilson, David, 2011, Fighting Nineteenth: history of the 19th Battalion, AIF 1915-1918, (NSW: Australian Military History Publications), p. 48. C.f. McGuinness, Peter E. M. & 1/19 Battalion Royal New South Wales Regiment Association, 2011, Boldly and faithfully : the journal : the official history of 19th Australian Infantry Battalion Australian Imperial Forces, (NSW: Peter McGuinness 1/19 RNSWR Association incorporating 2/19 Australian Infantry Battalion), p. 60. . Docker gave a cheekyMy first sense was that using ‘cheeky’ like this is a bit anachronistic. However, on examination the phrase ‘a cheeky single’ (to mean taking one run when there probably shouldn’t have been a run there to take) came into the cricket lexicon by at least 1892 (top) in the UK and 1905 (middle) in Australia. Therefore, although ‘cheeky mention’ may not have contemporaneous examples, I feel it is legitimate in this sense to use, as the journalist is repurposing a cricket phrase to describe a conversational equivalent of a ‘cheeky single’. Having an example that happens to mention Kelleway (bottom) is a happy bonus, that also shows it was in contemporary use.
Top: To-Day’s Cricket, Derby Daily Telegraph (Derbyshire), Fri 15 Jul 1892, p. 3.
Middle: Victoria Second Innings, The Bendigo Independent (Vic), Fri 15 Dec 1905, p. 4. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article223512150
Bottom: Inter-State Cricket, Saturday Referee and the Arrow (NSW), Sat 27 Dec 1913, p.2 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article117418176 mention that he also had been wounded in the desertNAA: B2455, DOCKER C T Page 82 of 91, https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=3510078 . Nip Pellew, who was C.O. of the 5th BattalionNAA: B2455, PELLEW CLARENCE EVERARD Page 46 of 55, https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=8015043 later in the war, and knew some of the men who served with Docker in that unit in Egypt, suggested he didn’t deserve any medals for it as he had fallen off his horse riding in the campNot Out, The Umpire Matter, Referee, Wed, 16 Feb, 1916, p. 12. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article121179742 . Unfortunately, we didn’t get too see too much of Brooks in the rain-affected match Hampshire v. Australians, Aberdeen Press and Journal (Aberdeenshire), Mon 23 Jun 1919, p. 7. , but I wouldn’t be surprised to see him gracing our fieldsObituary, Mount Alexander Mail (Vic), Sat 29 Jun 1912, p. 2. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article199596310 in the not too distant futureI’m indulging in what I call an ‘anachronistic wink’ here – given Brooks’ future involvement in Australian government. Cricket, The Scone Advocate (NSW), Tue 25 Nov 1919, p. 2. http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article156905342 . Unfortunately, the forty-eight days’ drought at SouthamptonMatches Postponed, Dundee Courier (Angus), Sat 21 Jun 1919, p. 3. finally broke on the first day, meaning no cricket could be played, so the two-days match ended in a draw.