Lives in Cricket No 38 - Lionel Robinson

5 Foreword by Tom Walshe ‘Distinguished by his industry and integrity. His sense of justice and kindness of heart endeared him to all.’ Those defining words on the life of Lionel George Robinson speak to us down the years from his memorial in the picturesque parish church of All Saints at Old Buckenham in Norfolk. But is the epitaph justified? Can this be the man variously described by writers over the years as ‘a strange character’ who was ‘obstinate and aggressive’ and even ‘a vulgar Philistine’? It is indisputable that the Australian financier and sportsman left indelible marks on the history of Anglo-Australian commerce, cricket and horse- racing. He may have carved himself only a small niche in English society, but he made a big impression on the London Stock Exchange, became a significant figure in the annals of the Turf, and, at Old Buckenham in 1921, staged one of the most fascinating, idiosyncratic cricket matches of the age, a so-called private Test match between England and Australia. Has Robby (his nickname may help ‘endear him to all’) had an undeserved bad press? Literary and newspaper references in the past 30 years have tended to draw on an article published in the Sunday Times in 1977 whose author, Barry Wilson, asserted that Robinson failed in his ambition to gain acceptance as one of the gentry and, even more damning, that ‘as a country gentleman he was neither genteel, effortless nor stylish. He was obstinate and aggressive and known for his abusive slanging matches with staff.’ In this volume, Stephen Musk offers a far more reasoned and rounded picture of Robby’s complex character. Vain, quick-tempered and ostentatious he may have been, but he was also loyal and generous, a noted benefactor, and a devoted family man whose kindness of heart might have only been apparent to those closest to him. This is essentially a cricket book, however, for Lionel Robinson’s most enduring and evocative legacy stems from his role in the game’s pre-1914 ‘golden age’ and its slow renaissance following the dereliction wreaked by the Great War. Here, also, is a fascinating account of Robby’s association with Archie MacLaren, former England captain and icon of cricket-lovers in both England and Australia, whose twilight years in the game were largely spent organising and participating in country house matches at Old Buckenham. Stephen has meticulously traced long-forgotten fixtures and performances to provide a window on an amazing panorama of cricket, ranging from the rustic to the regal, that the swashbuckling Aussie and his right-hand Englishman brought to an unassuming East Anglian village. Tantalising questions remain, of course. The what-might-have-been conjecture centres on 1912, a significant year in Robinson’s cricket odyssey. He had finished building Old Buckenham Hall and his nearby