Lives in Cricket No 2 - Johnny Briggs

Inside the asylum, the reality might have been somewhat different. In the final year of the nineteenth century, epilepsy, commonly known as the ‘the falling sickness’, usually meant removal either to a lunatic asylum or the workhouse. Sufferers were, by and large, stigmatized. The general public of 100 years ago believed that epilepsy was a mental illness. There was a feeling that with the right treatment patients could be cured of their epilepsy, but another reason for their confinement was as a protection for themselves and for the public at large, particularly if they were susceptible to regular seizures. The proportion of asylum patients with epilepsy might have been as high as 20 per cent and soon the medical authorities began to press not only for special epileptic wards but for separate institutions. By the late 1890s, when Briggs was confined, treatment of epilepsy was becoming more sophisticated. Older methods, including dosing with metallic salts and applying threads under the skin, blisters and cupping were gradually being phased out. Instead, Briggs would probably have been treated with bromide salts, especially potassium bromide although the side effects of such treatments included lethargy, muscle weakness and purulent acne. It is probable that while Briggs was having an epileptic fit he would have been isolated in a padded cell and would have had to wear a skull cap to protect his head. However, there are reports that occasionally during his stay in the asylum Briggs played cricket in the hospital grounds against a Manchester side led by his former Lancashire captain ‘Monkey’ Hornby and scored a number of centuries. It is also said that Briggs bowled long spells down the hospital corridors, afterwards regaling the medical staff with details of his ‘figures’. So it is likely that Briggs either didn’t fall Seizure at the Music Hall 81 Another Lancashire player, Jim Hallows, was to succumb to epilepsy. Hallows, an all-rounder who like Briggs bowled slow left-arm, was only 36 when he passed away. In 1904 he became only the second Lancashire player after Willis Cuttell to achieve the double of 1,000 runs and 100 wickets in a season. His performances were recognised by Wisden who made him one of their cricketers of the year in 1905. Hallows joined the Old Trafford staff in 1897 and made his debut the following year, but he was far from robust and missed several games through ill-health. He had an epileptic seizure during the 1905 Roses match at Old Trafford and had to be carried from the field by Cuttell and Lees Radcliffe.