Cricket's Historians

Test Match status is defined and Overseas Publications multiply his own work and in 1895, the News of the World published in 18 parts, Alcock’s Famous Cricketers and Cricket Grounds . When republished as a single volume it contained 288 folio size pages, the vast majority of which contained a single photograph of a current player with brief biography and usually a facsimile signature. The back page of each part had a photograph of a county cricket ground. In 1897 The Jubilee Book of Cricket was published by William Blackwood & Sons, commemorating the Queen’s Jubilee. The author was given as Prince Ranjitsinhji (C.B.Fry is generally considered to be the actual writer) and the work was destined to be as popular at the time as the books of John Nyren and of James Pycroft. According to Padwick there were 11 editions of the work. The first 276 pages are detailed instructions on the playing of cricket with many illustrations showing notable cricketers performing batting, bowling or fielding techniques. There follows 36 pages on the major Public Schools with a smattering of history and 50 pages on the two Universities, with good historical notes. The next section runs to 78 pages giving the history of M.C.C. and the 14 first-class counties. From the historian’s point of view it is the section on the counties that is the major interest. Thomas Case is listed as the author of the Oxford University section, W.J.Ford of the Cambridge University section, but the county sections have no specific accreditations, except Essex (O.R.Borradaile), Lancashire (A.N.Hornby) and Leicestershire (T.Burdett). In 1905 A.J.Gaston stated he had been responsible for the Gloucestershire section and perhaps had a hand in other parts. He receives an acknowledgement in the Prefatory Note. Reading through the essays for the anonymous counties, it would seem likely that Gaston wrote most if not all of them, gleaning from cuttings and information in a variety of books, which would have been in his possession (see Chapter 3) Surprisingly the book does not contain a chapter on ‘Early Cricket’, but thereare some interestingnotes in theKent section. TheHampshire section, which does deal with Hambledon, reproduces, with acknowledgement, a very long essay which had been published in the Morning Post in 1896, 64