Lives in Cricket No 9 - JH King

when he took five for only 6 runs to end the innings. A curious feature of the Philadelphians’ match at Leicester was that both teams opened their bowling, successfully, with a King, J.B. taking seven wickets and J.H. five. Very early in the following season, on 22 May, his father died at the age of 85 from gangrene. His doctor wished to amputate a leg, but the old builder asseverated that he preferred to die with his leg on than live without it. James Temple King left an estate of £4,540 11s 9d, one house (‘Fashoda’), five cottages, one coach-house, seven villas, land and stables; and he lived long enough to be proud of his youngest son’s accomplishments on the cricket field. Leicestershire exceeded expectations, finishing equal seventh with Warwickshire and winning nine matches in all, including six in the Championship. Performances in the first half of the season were superlative and excited Knight to rhetorical ecstasy: ‘I have no desire to unwind the golden threads or to jingle the silver bells, for the gratifying successes of the county are far too eloquent for any analysis, and analysis of eloquence is too much akin to a dissection of the body, and implies the death of its subject . . . we no longer halt and stumble over the rough fields, but whirl along as swiftly and successfully as a dancer whirling o’er a well waxed floor’. King, fourth in both batting and bowling averages, was not, however, as dominant as usual, the latter average being high at 29.14 and the former enormously boosted by non-Championship matches. Nevertheless there were still some notable performances. Once more he raised his highest score, this time to 186 at Southampton, one of his favourite grounds, hitting 27 fours, mainly with ‘masterly drives’, and giving but a single hard chance at 158; but Hampshire was a poor team (losing by an innings and 219 runs and finishing bottom of the Championship that year) and Leicestershire made merry at over 100 runs an hour in their innings, although ‘at times the ball wanted a lot of watching’. At home against Worcestershire the county was left to make 350 to win in the fourth innings, a feat never before accomplished, but won by five wickets. Wisden called it ‘one of the biggest things ever done in the County Championship’, all the more meritorious since, according to the reporter of the Leicester Daily Mercury , ‘the pitch was in a dangerous condition’. King’s stand with Coe was ‘probably the pluckiest ever seen in Leicester’, and the match ‘one of the most sensational . . . it has been my portion to witness’. King, the mainstay, remained undefeated with From Journeyman to Master 53