Lives in Cricket No 13 - AP Lucas

successful: Uppingham thrashed Haileybury by an innings and 250 runs, and he was concerned that ‘they are a very nice set of fellows, and it will so spoil their outing’. Within six months the headmaster declared himself satisfied with the arrangements, and had ‘a constantly increasing confidence in, and regard for, the school professional.’ Evidently he was satisfied that Stephenson’s contribution at the school extended beyond cricket. Shortly before his death fifteen years later, Thring wrote: ‘Mark me, cricket is the greatest bond of the English-speaking race, and no mere game.’ Patterson describes A.P.Lucas’s arrival in 1870 ‘in the First [Eleven] of the Middle ground’, a very fine ground above the town that was allotted to boys in the lower school. Lucas was ‘then a little round figure of thirteen’ who had been ‘coached … by his father and brother on the paternal lawn near Esher’. In the following year he ‘remained in the First of the Middle ground [rather than progress to the School first eleven], doubtless owing to his size and age’. Lucas was in the house of Walter Earle, the joint-founder and first secretary of the Uppingham Rovers, who doubtless encouraged his cricket, but the crucial factor in his development was Stephenson’s appointment in 1872. Lucas had made good runs in matches at home during the midsummer holidays, and immediately on his return was selected for the first eleven against the Old Boys. He opened the batting and in the first innings was run out for seven, but in the second made 66 ‘by excellent play and occasionally showing some fine hitting’. It was said that his ‘style of batting shows wonderful promise’. Patterson recalled: ‘In this match he fully justified the selection, and the embryo qualities were shown which distinguished his batting for thirty years – the straight bat, and the firm, hard play.’ The Red Lillywhite annual reviewed the 1872 season: ‘Cricket is in a flourishing state at Uppingham, where H.H.Stephenson has taken up Uppingham School, 1870-1874 18 H.H.Stephenson. Lucas ‘never tired of sayng how much he owed to his teacher’.