Cricket Witness No 5 - Whites on Green

12 Early cricket in Swansea Field Committee. One of its influential members was James Livingston, a distinguished shipbroker in the town and enthusiastic cricketer who also played for Swansea and Glamorgan. He was a man who, in subsequent years took every opportunity to criticise the Swansea Corporation for not setting aside an area in the town for healthy recreation. Indeed, he may have been instrumental for the local newspaper in August 1867 carrying an article in which it was stated: “I am surprised by the fact that the [Swansea] corporation – with such means at its disposal – does not make some provision for the healthful recreation of the inhabitants of the town. All available ground is being rapidly built upon. Why not therefore at once secure those (reclaimed) fields on the Mumbles road, by Gorse Lane, for a people’s park – a part of which might be reserved as a cricketing ground?” 6 A map of the area to the west of the town of Swansea, dated 1855, showing the Bryn-y-Mor Field.