Lives in Cricket No 13 - AP Lucas

cricket eleven with Bunny’s brother Philip, 9 and another to Clare College Cambridge, where he obtained his BA in 1874. In the following year he took holy orders and Bunny arrived at Clare. In 1885 Arthur assisted at Bunny’s wedding and, as a master at Tonbridge School, introduced him to Charles Kortright, who was to become one of the fastest bowlers of all time and a lifelong friend of Bunny. Orton Lucas was born at Great Yarmouth in 1808. He was a solicitor who had his own practice at Trafalgar Square in 1841, when he was also described in the census as being of independent means. By 1852 he was a partner in the firm of Fisher and Lucas at 50 Fenchurch Street in the City of London: he became senior partner in what seems to have been a lucrative practice. In 1839 Orton married Mary Rachel Salmon, so Bunny’s parents were first cousins. Her father, William Orton Salmon (1779-1828), was the brother of Orton Lucas’s mother Mary Ann. He entered the service of the East India Company and in 1803 married Elizabeth Frederica Potts at Kanpur. 10 In 1808 he obtained the important post of Collector of Benares, where Mary Rachel was born in 1815. A year later, with the patronage of Lord Hastings, he was appointed president of the Board of Revenue of Central India. In 1824 ill health forced him to return to England, but he never fully recovered and died in 1828. Bunny was the youngest of six children, four boys and two girls. It may well have been because of the connection with the Belgrave family that Orton Lucas sent his sons to Uppingham, rather than one of the more established public schools. His being able to afford the fees for all four boys, rather than just the eldest (as was the case in some families), indicates that he was pretty well-off. Of Bunny’s siblings, William Orton Lucas was born in 1844 and baptised at his grandfather’s church in Filby. In the 1861 census he was listed as a boarder at Uppingham and in 1863 he became school cricket captain. He won an exhibition to Exeter College, Oxford where he obtained a BA in 1867 and an MA in 1870. He took holy orders and in the 1871 census was described as ‘curate without charge of souls, acting assistant master at Uppingham School.’ Poor health prevented his continuing in the post and he died in 1874, aged only thirty. Eliza , born in 1847, and Fanny Margaret , born in 1855, never married. They are listed in censuses as scholars and no governess is mentioned so they probably went to school, but I haven’t found out which. Like William, Fanny died young, in 1884 aged only 29. Eliza remained at home with her mother. The last surviving sibling, she died at Cheshunt, Hertfordshire in 1937, aged 90. The Lucas family 11 9 Details of all Uppingham careers and other background information about the school from Uppingham School Roll: 1853-1947 , H.F.W.Deane, 1948. 10 Obituary in The Oriental Herald and Journal of General Literature , 19, 1828, pp 523-524.