Lives in Cricket No 34 - Frank Mitchell

73 Chapter Eleven Country house cricket before World War I Frank Mitchell hugely enjoyed country house cricket, so that though this chapter is a diversion from the first-class game, the contents are an appropriate part of this brief biography. In such years as he was in England before August 1914, Mitchell gave himself many opportunities to relax by accepting invitations that flooded his way. Sport was ‘the foundation upon which country house parties were built. Come for some hunting’ the invitation would exhort ‘for a few days shooting – fishing – tennis, cricket....’ (Phyllida Barstow, The English Country House Party .) Never was recreational sport more enticing for the well-to-do than in the twenty years before World War I. Those who were not so well off, but had sporting ability and conversational skill would be included on the list of invitees to provide a further touch of quality to the arrangements of the host and hostess. Mitchell, almost before he left school, had become known to many of the Yorkshire landed class, not least, of course, to Lord Hawke. The games he played against and then for the Yorkshire Gentlemen on their Wigginton Road ground at York would have helped him to build up his list of acquaintances. From 1890 onwards, he played cricket in the summer months and built up his shooting skills each autumn. In 1935 he started his weekly article in The Cricketer entitled My Innings , but he had not, sadly, completed a full account of his life before his death in October that year. Even so, he had written three weekly instalments entirely about country house cricket. This is how he started in his first August 1935 article: There is not the country house cricket nowadays that existed years ago. Why? It may be that those who owned places then cannot afford it now; it may be that the young are so restless that they are not content to go for a week’s cricket in one place, meet charming people and have a good time. Everything seems to go at double speed now. There are motors, lawn tennis, golf, cocktail parties and jazz bands all going at express rate; no one seems to want to sit down for a quiet week or two. Even on Sundays the chauffeur has to go out for some excursion or other. When you play first-class cricket you do not get your share of these weeks, but what I had I enjoyed, and should like to see the old order resumed. He went on to describe his first such experience. He, together with the Yorkshire professional Ted Peate and the amateur Rev. E.B.Firth, were the guests of Mr and Mrs Charles Wilson (later Lord and Lady Nunburnholme) of Warter Priory in East Yorkshire. He wrote of arriving by train at