Lives in Cricket No 6 - Bill Copson

Chapter One Early Days and Family Origins The year 2008 sees the centenary of the birth of one of Derbyshire’s most respected and devastating quick bowlers. William Henry Copson, generally known of course as Bill, was an extremely dangerous, auburn-haired pace bowler who, in his relatively short first-class career of some twelve English seasons, accomplished a number of remarkable bowling performances for Derbyshire. In particular, he played a most important part in helping Derbyshire to win, in 1936, their only County Championship title to date. The county has had a long tradition of producing effective fast bowlers and Bill Copson can certainly take his place in their forefront. He can be considered somewhat unlucky to have only played in three Test Matches, two of which were at the time when he had reached the peak of his career in 1939. He was one of so many cricketers whose career was so abruptly cut off by the outbreak of the Second World War. To lose six full seasons at the age of thirty one, when he had just reached Test Match status, must have been a major blow to him. He did achieve selection for MCC’s 1936/37 tour to Australia and New Zealand as a result of his splendid season in 1936, but was unable to break into the Test side ahead of such experienced bowlers as Bill Voce, Gubby Allen and Kenneth Farnes. William Henry Copson was born at 324 High Street, Stonebroom, a small village near Chesterfield in North-East Derbyshire on 27 April, 1908: the house where he was born no longer stands. For many years his date of birth was erroneously recorded as 1909 in reference books. It was often the practice in those days for cricketers joining a professional county staff to understate their age, sometimes by two or more years, in order that they might be able to stay longer in the game as retirement approached. If he had deliberately misinformed the county, perhaps he was simply following the example of his county colleague, Harry Elliott, who on first joining the Derbyshire playing staff gave his date of birth 7