Famous Cricketers No 95 - P.A.Perrin

Foreword by Douglas Insole, CBE (Essex and England, Test selector) It is, I think, remarkable that so little is known about a cricketer as accomplished as Peter Perrin. During many years spent playing with and sitting alongside Tom Pearce, and a lot of time listening to Jack O’Connor, who were two great stalwarts of Essex in the period between the two wars, I heard scarcely a mention of the name Perrin – Peter, Percy or otherwise. This very well researched booklet fills many of the voids that existed hitherto and makes an invaluable contribution to the sum total of knowledge about the man. His background and mine are not dissimilar. Both born in East London and moving out, when young, into the suburbs, although whereas my parents managed to get just over the Middlesex/Essex border, Peter Perrin’s did not. That he should qualify for Essex while living in Middlesex is a bit mysterious, but a very happy anomaly as far as Essex are concerned. That he was an enterprising and courageous batsman is indisputable. That he was an extraordinarily static fieldsman seems equally beyond doubt. Strangely, his running between the wickets seldom comes up for consideration, but his lack of mobility might explain the very high proportion of fours that he hit. A good and successful businessmen he certainly was, both in property and in his Stock Exchange dealings. Driving around the County circuit in a custom-built Roller must have been a terrific turn-on. How Roy Ralph would have enjoyed it! Perrin’s standing in the game at large was immense. That he was not offered the captaincy in 1911 is widely assumed to be due to the fact that when John Douglas, sr bought the ground at Leyton to save the club from extinction, he did so on condition that his own son became captain of the county side, when Perrin appeared to be the obvious man for the job. That being so, Perrin’s long period of service as an England selector and his taking over as chairman from PlumWarner in 1939 is the best possible indication of the extent to which his judgment of cricketers was respected throughout the game. In the context of the ‘Essex twins’, Perrin, who was described by people close to him as ‘innately shy’, was the straight man to Charlie McGahey’s comedian. Together they formed a formidable and very popular partnership in county cricket. Perrin was a modest, charming and highly intelligent man who died a year or two before my career began. Essex and England cricket are in his debt. I wish I had known him. 3