Lives in Cricket No 2 - Johnny Briggs

Of course, Briggs never made it to the magic century. He was taken ill after the first day’s play having increased his tally to 97 by capturing three wickets and never appeared in another Test. Briggs did well on the first day on 29 June, 1899, taking 3 for 53 from his 30 five-ball overs as the visitors were restricted to an all-out total of 172 in their first innings. The Leeds Evening Express reported that Briggs was ‘in wonderful form’. By the close, the match was evenly poised with England on 119 for 4. Unfortunately, rain wiped out the final day’s play with England on 19 for 0, chasing 177 for what would have been a series-levelling victory. England had, of course, to make do without Briggs for the rest of the match. He went into the scorebook as ‘absent ill’ in their first innings and although he didn’t know it, he was never to play at the highest level again. Later on that first day, Briggs and some of his colleagues went on a night out to the Empire Palace music hall on Briggate in Leeds, which was considered to be one of the finest in the country. It staged its opening performances only ten months before the Headingley Test after being built in an area of Leeds between Briggate and Vicar Lane, which had been redeveloped by the Leeds Estate Company. The theatre seated 1,750 in three tiers and the audience certainly received value for money on the opening night on 29 August, 1898 when 17 acts were served up for their delectation, including Lydia Yeamens, the original ‘Sally in our Alley’, Harry Tate and John Higgins, who was billed as ‘The Human Kangaroo’. Later major stars like Charlie Chaplin and Vesta Tilley appeared on the Empire stage and in the 1950s top-of-the bill artistes included the Beverley Sisters, Joan Regan, Tommy Trinder, Dickie Valentine, Harry Secombe, Frankie Vaughan and Cliff Richard. The curtain came down for the final time on 25 February, 1961 after a performance of Babes in the Wood, starring Nat Jackley, and the theatre is now the site of the Harvey Nicholls department store, part of a busy pedestrian-only shopping street. The night Briggs and some of his England colleagues visited the Empire Palace, the entertainment was billed as being ‘under the Special Patronage and in the Presence of the Australian and English cricket teams’ according to the theatre’s own advertisement in that night’s Leeds Evening Express . Bunting was strung around the outside of the theatre and the lights were full on, picking out the crowds as they arrived. Over the main entrance was a stretch of canvas bearing a single word ‘Welcome’. Appearing on the bill that fateful night were Ludwig Amman, an Seizure at the Music Hall 79