Lives in Cricket No 10 - John Shepherd

… reported that when he and the Captain, M.C.Cowdrey, were in Barbados, they were very impressed with an all rounder by the name of Shepherd. [Ames] wished to know whether the Committee, as a matter of principle, were in favour or not with the idea of importation. After a lively discussion, it was agreed that the Committee were in favour and if the Captain and the Secretary/Manager were in agreement, an approach could be made. The financial risk attached to the ‘importation’ of Shepherd was removed when a generous Life Member of the county club, a Mr E.C.Wharton-Tigar, donated £500 to ‘... defray the expense of bringing J.Shepherd … from Barbados’. 38 The offer that Kent now formally made to John Shepherd, whilst not munificent, was acceptable to him and so he started to prepare for the biggest adventure and challenge of his life. Part of that preparation was a long chat with Everton Weekes who told him the dos and the don’ts of playing cricket in England, learned from his long spell with Bacup in the Lancashire League and his three tours with the West Indies. Part of this advice was about dealing with the vagaries of (still) uncovered wickets. But more important was the advice to ‘keep his nose clean’ away from the cricket grounds! It was to be, as we have seen, John’s first trip away from the island of Barbados – that one schoolboy tour to Jamaica excepted. But Everton Weekes was in no doubt that it was the right move for Shepherd at the time: He did the right thing at that time … to go there and expand his knowledge, which he did I’m sure in so many different ways. … He became a better bowler and a better batsman and … he had to work harder there … and conditions might not always be conducive to a man who’s come from a warm country. It can be very cold in some places in England! 39 And cold it was. On leaving the aircraft at Heathrow, John Shepherd walked across the tarmac and saw his own breath for the first time in the near-freezing air. At the terminal it was Penny Cowdrey, Colin’s wife, who was waiting to greet him. Mrs Cowdrey then took John to the family home, ‘Kippin’, in Hawthorne Road, Bickley – a detached house with large garden, complete with cricket net, in one of the most salubrious parts of north Kent. In the house there were some Golden Delicious apples in a bowl on a table. ‘Do have an apple, John,’ said Penny. ‘Not likely,’ thinks John under his breath, ‘apples are red and I wouldn’t eat a green mango so I’m not eating a green apple!’ Colin Cowdrey himself emerged from the net in the garden along with the Kent coach Claude Lewis; they greeted John and soon afterwards he was taken to the local station to catch the train to Canterbury where he was met by Les Ames and taken to digs in Castle Belleplaine Boy 25 38 Minutes of Kent C.C.C. General Committee, 25 June 1965. Wharton-Tigar was a distinguished ex-Special Services officer decorated for his actions in the Second World War, and later a successful businessman and a well-known cigarette card collector. He was President of Kent in 1977. 39 Interview with the author, February 2008.