Lives in Cricket No 23 - Brief Candles

86 His 1923 performances earned Hinde a place in the Minor Counties side that played H.D.G.Leveson Gower’s XI at Eastbourne at the end of June 1924, in what was to be the Counties’ first first-class match since the war, and only their second ever. This was the first senior match of Hinde’s season, but he showed no signs of rustiness. After the Minor Counties had been dismissed in around three hours for 143 (Hinde 0*), they reduced Leveson Gower’s side to 129 for nine by the close of the first day, with Hinde having taken seven for 61, six of them bowled. He finished off the innings with his eighth wicket, caught, early on the second day. Contemporary newspaper reports concentrate on the speed of his bowling: according to the Eastbourne Gazette G.E.V.Crutchley ‘had his stumps scattered by a straight fast one from Hinde’, W.H.G.Heath was ‘obviously puzzled by the fast deliveries of Hinde’ before eventually ‘falling a victim to a beautiful ball from Hinde which sent the bails spinning’, and Ernest Smith ‘appeared to be settling down to a good score when one of his stumps was removed by a fast ball from Hinde’. Pace and accuracy seem to have been Hinde’s watchwords, for a high proportion of ‘bowled’ dismissals in an innings was nothing new to him. In his Minor Counties career he took almost 42 per cent of his wickets in this way. After conceding a first-innings lead of four runs, the Minor Counties second time around exactly doubled their first-innings total – Hinde scored a duck – leaving their opponents a target of 283. Hinde took the first wicket of In the Wickets The Aldershot Command side of 1924. Standing (l to r): W.H.Harborne (umpire), C.C.Haynes, O.C.Adams, H.M.Hinde, T.E.M.Battersby, A.A.Durand, D.W.C.Ray, T.E.Clarkson (scorer). Seated: P.V.Williams, B.F.Clarke, J.S.Bostock, E.L.W.Henslow, J.W.T.Priestman, F.R.S.Shaw.