Lives in Cricket No 13 - AP Lucas

On 5 June, after the first day’s play of a match against Warwickshire, there was a ‘Special Committee Meeting’. It was held in the pavilion rather than the usual venue, Green’s offices. The only men present were Owen, the club captain; Lucas, the captain on the day; O.R.Borradaile, the secretary; and George Gadsdon, who chaired the meeting. Gadsdon, a retired coach and saddle ironmonger from Ilford, was quite an active member of the committee from 1901 to 1906. The sole business was to pass a motion, proposed by Owen and seconded by Lucas, that ‘the Centre Gate of the Pavilion be used by both Amateurs and Professionals.’ 97 At the next committee meeting Green signed the minute but endorsed it ‘not agreeing’ – the only time he made such an addition. Although the minutes have no record that the decision was ever formally rescinded, Green evidently got his own way as usual, for in 1999 the Waltham Forest Oral History Workshop recorded fascinating recollections of Essex’s last years with Leyton as its headquarters, and several interviewees recalled that the separate gates were still being used when Essex left there in 1933. This may have had its roots in a more public event at Leyton three years earlier when, by coincidence or otherwise, the opponents were Warwickshire. They were fielding an all-professional side and the committee entrusted the captaincy to Edwin Diver, a former amateur who had a track record of minor insubordination. Some of the professionals were permitted to use the amateurs’ dressing-room, but Diver was told that 114 Essex committee man, 1890-1912 Servants do not come and go through the front door. Professionals continued to use a separate gate, just out of camera to the left, until Essex left Leyton in 1933. 97 Generous Use of Capitals as in the original.