History of Bucks CCC

lost by nine wickets, and Haygarth reports that ‘in the second innings the first nine wickets fell for seven runs’. A first County Club is formed 1864 is a pivotal year in cricket’s evolution. It marks the legalising of over-arm bowling. It is the year in which Wisden was first published. It saw the young WG Grace, on the eve of his 16 th birthday, first give evidence of his exceptional talent with an innings of 170 for South Wales against the Gentlemen of Sussex at Hove. It also heralded the formation of official county clubs in Lancashire and Middlesex, making them the sixth and seventh of the present first-class counties to be established after Sussex, Nottinghamshire, Surrey, Hampshire and Yorkshire. So when Bucks formed a county club in this same year it was in good company. The avowed object of the committee was reported as being ‘to encourage cricket among all classes in the County’. The qualifications for admission to membership of the club were ‘birth, ownership or occupation of land, or one year’s residence in the County.’ Subscriptions were £1 for playing members and 10s (50p) for others. HE Bull, an Oxford blue in 1863 and soon to be a pillar of the landed gentry in the Buckingham area, was installed as secretary. JC Maul, a driving force behind cricket around Newport Pagnell, became treasurer for one year before Bull took on both jobs. Under the presidency of The Hon Percy Barrington, the committee lacked nothing in social lustre. Its other members comprised: the Reverend ET Drake and TT Drake, both with the middle name Tyrwhitt as members of the family who owned Shardeloes, where the Amersham Club still plays; Thomas Fremantle, who would become the 2 nd Lord Cottesloe and who lived at Swanbourne, where the family still resides, the present Lord Cottesloe having served as Lord Lieutenant of the county; the Hon. Charles Carington, the single ‘r’ denoting the family name of the present Lord Carrington; RA Fitzgerald, at the time Honorary Secretary of MCC; the president’s son-in-law AJ Robarts, an old Etonian banker and another prominent landowner from Lillingstone to the north of Buckingham; the Rev H Roundell and Charles Markham, who played a prominent part as a player. If there was a strong aristocratic presence in the first committee there was nothing plebeian about those who first represented the county on the field. The team which gathered at Newport Pagnell to play another newcomer, Middlesex, on 2, 3 June 1864 included not one member of the Twenty Two from the 1859 match at Fenny Stratford. In batting order it read: Rev CDB Marsham, T Hearne, HE Bull, RDB Marsham, Rev CG Lane, G Hearne, Charles Marsham, C Powell, CW Scriven, EG Sutton, J Fremantle. Apart from the two ordained gentlemen, both players of distinction, the only men not to be styled ‘Esq’ are the two Hearne brothers, both of whom were professionals and who were also the only players to have previously appeared for a Bucks team, both having been in the side against Berkshire in 1857. Of the two brothers Tom Hearne, born in 1826, was the more distinguished player. Fitting his Bucks matches into a career for Middlesex that stretched from 1859 to 1875, he made his mark comparatively late in life when he shared a first wicket stand of 149 with Robert Carpenter for the United against the All England XI at Lord’s in 1859. Two years later he toured Australia, though with little success, but he took centre stage at Lord’s in 1866 when he made 122 not out for the Players against the 13 A first County Club is formed HE Bull