Lives in Cricket No 43 - John Jackson

33 and took 83 wickets for 919 runs at an average of 11.07. He took five or more wickets in an innings nine times, and on four occasions took ten or more wickets in a match. Jackson played in 18 matches for the AEE in 1859, putting in another marathon stint, both in bowling and travelling, in which he bowled more than 1100 overs and took 262 wickets. The merry-go-round began at the Hyde Park ground in Sheffield on 30 May where the AEE lost to XXII of Hallam and Staveley by eighteen wickets. Jackson bowled 62 overs in the first Sheffield innings, taking eleven for 70. An unusual incident involving Jackson occurred when one of the local batsmen, G.Thorpe, had his wicket broken by Jackson in completing a run. He was given ‘in’ on appeal by the umpire but left his wicket, having assumed he was out. Jackson promptly pulled up a stump and Thorpe was then clearly out. The local paper mentions a protest by the AEE about the ground being watered overnight to the benefit of the local team. Sheffield denied this strenuously, but you would expect them to. The paper does not say how the matter was resolved. In the next match against Manchester Broughton on 2, 3 and 4 June we find Haygarth once again bemoaning differences in the scorebooks, especially in the bowling analyses. Haygarth has Jackson bowling 36 overs and taking six for 53. The next game was at Fenny Stratford on 9,10 and 11 June, against XXII of Buckinghamshire, Jackson took three for 46 and eight for 24 in a total of 79 overs in an AEE victory. The first nine Buckinghamshire wickets fell for 7 runs in their second innings. On 13, 14 and 15 June the AEE played XXII of Wiltshire at Salisbury, where Jackson bowled 37 overs in each innings and had figures of five for 39 and seven for 29. This was immediately followed by a match against XXII of Monmouthshire at Newport. Jackson’s bowling was described by the local paper as ‘deadly’, as indeed it was. He took nine for 37 and eleven for 68 in a total of 76 overs, although the AEE still contrived to lose the match by 61 runs. On 20 June the AEE caravan next appeared at Redruth in Cornwall, a match in which, you may recall, Jackson had terrified the local batsmen the year before. He repeated the medicine, taking ten wickets for 1 run in XXII of Cornwall’s first innings of 22 which lasted only 45 minutes. He did not bowl in the second innings when Cornwall improved slightly, making 30, but the locals were clearly outmatched in a game in which George Parr hit a century. In a tribute to Jackson the West Briton declared: ‘Cornwall witnessed the extraordinary and beautiful bowling of that Prince of Bowlers – John Jackson’. The AEE moved on to Wennington Park near Launceston to play XXII of East Cornwall and Devonshire on 23 June who were also rolled over by Jackson. His figures of ten for 10 in 27 overs ensured another comfortable win for the AEE. The XXII made 58 and 33 all out, and the difference in class between them and the AEE was clearly apparent. Jackson’s next match for the AEE was on 7 and 8 July at Ipswich in Suffolk Seasons of Plenty