Lives in Cricket No 34 - Frank Mitchell

50 The Oxford understanding as to what was happening was well expressed by F.H.E.Cunliffe, later Major Sir Foster Hugh Egerton Cunliffe 6 th Bart. (Rifle Brigade), a Fellow of All Souls and a military historian. He died on 10 July 1916 at Ovilliers La Boiselle, France, of wounds sustained during the Battle of the Somme. Twenty years earlier, on 3 July 1896, he was batting at no. 10 for Oxford and out in the middle at Lord’s when the follow-on controversy erupted. This is what he subsequently wrote: When Hartley got out we required only 12 runs to save the follow-on. It was now about 4 o’clock, the Cambridge bowlers had been hard at work since half-past eleven and it was admittedly an open question whether Cambridge would not lose more than they would gain by making us follow our innings. Mitchell thought – and few cricketers would have disagreed with him – that it was better that his side should go in again that evening. He directed Shine to give us the necessary 12 runs by bowling no-balls and byes. Shine left no doubt of his intentions, sending down three wide high full-pitches, the last two no-balls. Not until the last second did I realise what was going on; but had I not done so, the angry shouts all round the ground of ‘shame’ and ‘knock your wicket down’ would have told me. However Shine bowled his last no- ball fourer; Cambridge achieved her object and after two more singles scored amidst deafening applause, Shine bowled me. An extraordinary outburst of hoots, hisses and howls greeted the Cambridge XI as they returned to the pavilion; among the thousands, who partly from ignorance, partly from sheer excitement, united in abusing Mitchell, Mr A.J.Webbe and a few others were honourable exceptions. Looking back at the distance of time, it is clear that the rule, and the rule alone, was responsible for the course of action, which though perfectly logical and fair in itself, was little understood by the great majority, and entirely opposed to the popular sentiment of the time. ( Fifty Years of Sport: Oxford and Cambridge , 1913). It is true that the uproar that had occurred was unprecedented at Lord’s and equally true that in the pavilion MCC members expressed their outrage at Mitchell’s instructions. Wisden called it ‘a very hostile demonstration’ and referred to ‘scores of members of the MCC protesting in the most vigorous fashion’. A leader writer of The Times writing in lofty terms stated that the ‘ Cambridge XI should not, twice in four years, attempt manoeuvres which excite popular instincts even in the most august assembly of the cricketing world. The Roman Senators, who once held a similar rank in politics are said by the translator of MOMMSEN to have rushed about on one occasion “with fury in their eyes and the legs of tables in their hands”. It is an error to promote such unreasoning displays among the wise and the good.’ In the same column the writer exonerated Stanley Jackson’s similar decision of 1893 on the basis that he was anticipating a trick of low etiquette from an Oxford batsman: ‘He [Jackson] therefore anticipated the manoeuvre, as FREDERICK THE GREAT did when he invaded Saxony because he suspected he would find justification in the archives of the Saxon Foreign Office. This year Cambridge did not even, we believe, allege such a querelle du Roi de Prusse.’ The 1896 season with the follow-on controversy