London, 1886. It was a damp, foggy night and the sound of horse’s hooves from a wildly driven hansom cab rang out across the cobbled streets.
Inside the house on Baker Street, Holmes and Watson were recounting the recently completed Lord’s Test match. “But how did W.G misjudge that one Holmes?”
“It was elementary my Dear Watson. Through my glass I could detect a slight bead of perspiration on The Demon’s brow.
“This occurred from the exertion caused by repositioning his index finger. It was an outswing grip you see Watson, any batsman worth his salt should have picked it.”
At that moment the cab was heard to pull up outside, followed by a desperate ring on the bell. Mrs Hudson opened the door and let out a shrill scream as a wild eyed stranger stood for a moment then fell face down onto the floor. Watson took the man’s pulse.
“Dead?” asked Holmes. “No, he’s been on a bender”.
Holmes examined the mysterious stranger.
“The white garb, he must be a cricketer. The red patch on his trousers, could only mean a bowler. The scent of eucalyptus oil on his hands, must be an Australian.”
Inside the man’s pockets Watson found a package with a note that read “from your teammates commemorating your recent achievement”. Inside the package was a pair of spectacles.
Unfortunately my little mystery isn’t nearly as interesting as a Sherlock Holmes whodunit but a bit of sensationalism never went astray. A few years ago when my mother passed away, I was left with a box of her memorabilia. I put this away in a cupboard and promptly forgot all about it.
Recently as I was doing my winter spring-clean I came across the box once more. Grateful for any excuse to stop cleaning I perused the contents of the box. What caught my attention was a little bag tied with a neat ribbon that contained three small booklets.
Just to put this into some perspective, my mother’s grandfather was a reasonable cricketer back in the colonial days. A New South Wales bowling partner of ‘The Demon’ Spofforth, he was good enough to play some Tests including a few in England.
In fact he may have even ridden in a hansom cab in London. I suspect that the items in the bag belonged to his widow who may have had access to cricketers through her husband’s contacts.
So let’s look at the three booklets.
The first has the title “Centennial Park Cricket Association” for season 1931-1932 signed by Alan Fairfax. Notable are the ads featuring establishments such as the Tea Gardens and Coogee Bay Hotels as well as famous retailers Nock and Kirbys (George Street near Circular Quay) and WA Oldfield’s Sports store in Hunter Street.
The second one is called “Test Cricket and Cricketers 1877-1934” which contains records and statistics. Under the section “curiosities” I found out that at the Oval Test in 1890, WG Grace was dismissed first ball in the first innings, dropped first ball in the second and never scored a “pair of spectacles” in his career.
The third is a leather bound autograph book. True to its name there are two pages with autographs inside. It is these autographs that piqued my interest. The first page has twelve signatures. I will do my best to transcribe them:
J Ryder
WM Woodfull
Alan Kippax
Pat Hornibrook
Archie Jackson
C Grimmett
Alan Fairfax
W Wall
W Oldfield
Don Bradman
A Oxenham
E L a’Beckett
The second page has the following signatures under the heading “England”
Maurice Tate
H Sutcliffe
M Leyland
E Tyldesley
And another I cannot make out.
Sure I could research this myself but it might be fun to obtain help from some readers, particularly if they have some knowledge and interest in this period of cricket history. So here are the questions for my little mystery;
1) When exactly were these autographs taken? Other entries in the book have the dates 1929 and 1930.
2) Does it represent players from an actual match? The absence of the Victorian Ponsford makes me think that this could be a NSW rather than an Australian team.
3) Does anyone have any anecdotes about any of these players, especially the lesser known ones.
4) Can anyone identify the signatures I can’t make out?
Oh, and one final mystery. Can you figure out who my ancestor is? He is represented by the mysterious stranger at Baker Street. Holmes and Watson provide all the clues.
I’ll leave you with a little verse from the autograph book, written by my great grandmother: “She studies mankind as thieves study a house – to take advantage of the weakest parts of it.”
Professor Rosseforp
Guest
Oh, that drug-crazed Holmes! Watson would have been struck off nowadays for supplying!
Professor Rosseforp
Guest
Your transcription of as "A. Oxenham" is actually "R.K. Oxenham" -- his stats have been duly noted above by JGK. I must admit I can't remember having heard of him. The Test Cricket and Cricketers 1877-1934 is held at various libraries, including the State Library of New South Wales. Compiled by E.L. Roberts, it was produced over several years. I cannot find a reference to the other season fixture book, based on the cover. There may be an alternative title inside. If not, your local State Library would probably be interested in at least digitising it as a heritage item. The autograph book is a one-off, and a pretty spectacular one, given its list of names and its verifiable pedigree. Congratulations!
Pope Paul VII
Guest
I'm still getting over missing C P Mead. No hard feeling after WW1 with Otto Nothling and later, Hans Ebeling, getting a run.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
Ha well there you go. No doubt Alec would claim it. It's a pity they don't put first names on streets in general actually.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
Gee Banjo didn't miss much!
JohnB
Guest
Chappelli probably would like it JGK - I do think it's more accurate to think of his grandfather rather than Nothling having replaced Bradman though. Incidentally I've done Nothling a bit of a disservice - in rugby he didn't just play for NSW, he played 19 games for teams called Australia against Sth African XV, NZ XV and NZ Maori teams earlier in the 1920s. I think the ARU considers these to be tests, although NZ and SA don't.
Paul Nicholls
Roar Guru
Yes he didn't trouble the Test scorers too often. He was a very Victorian era sportsman, loved shooting and horses. I have a lovely excerpt from the Sydney Mail. He had a job as a government inspector of stations. Here's a little extract: "he astounded us by picking up a rifle and killing a kangaroo that was going past at full speed" and then "Truth to tell, his inspections were somewhat casual for when shown some miles of fence running up a steep hill he would say, "Oh, it looks alright: let's get back to the creek. There's a big mob of ducks just gone down there"". Ha! Incidentally, the author of the article was A.B ("Banjo") Patterson. Ah, the good 'ole days.
JGK
Roar Guru
Yep. And Bannerman St!
JGK
Roar Guru
Murdoch's 211 was the first ever double ton in Tests and remained the highest score in Tests until Foster's 287 on debut at the SCG about 20 years later.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
Wow didn't realise there were so many with sport shops. I think you may be right re ex cricketers of the time. Yep Blackham fought on behind the stumps. Murdoch meanwhile scored a whopping 211 which I think was the aussie record for a long time. I notice your great grand dad had some better days for Australia, he must have had a good sense of humour.
Pope Paul VII
Guest
History is everywhere. Near Spofforth St no doubt.
Paul Nicholls
Roar Guru
Great spot. PP7. I think Blackham was the one actually chosen and turned out to be a pretty good choice. In fact he caught WG of Spofforth in the Lord's Test of 1886. There are ads for Murdoch's, Kippax, Fairfax and Oldfield sports stores as well as one featuring an illustration of Don Bradman advertising bats. Methinks that the elite cricketers of this era were much closer to being fulltime professional sportsmen than we might imagine. They certainly made some money from their association with the game if not the game itself.
JGK
Roar Guru
I used to live on Murdoch St in Cremorne!
JGK
Roar Guru
Ian Chappell might like the thought that Vic was the one to replace Bradman! Kellaway was a vastly underrated cricketer. Here is what I said about him in my article on the All Time "K" Team: Kelleway is the only person to play Test matches with both Victor Trumper and Don Bradman. Bradman’s first Test was Kelleway’s last. He was brought back to the team after a three year absence aged 44 and broke down bowling 34 wicket-less overs as England piled on 521 runs. He only played two more FC matches after that. Ironically, the other debutant in that match was Bert Ironmonger, who was older than Kelleway at the time. As a player, Kelleway gets relatively little recognition despite his excellent record (and missing his prime due to WWI). In the Ashes whitewash of 1920-21, he scored 330 runs at 47 and took 15 wickets at 21. </i?
Pope Paul VII
Guest
Hey 70sMo, I noticed the Centennial Park Cricket Association booklet is sponsored by "Murdoch's Famous Bats". I reckon the Murdoch in question is the very same Billy Murdoch whom your great grandad and his NSW mates wanted to wicketkeep for the first test. Turned out he probably should have been picked for his batting. I notice the advertising isn't "Murdoch's famous wicketkeeping gloves" so that might back the selectors of the day.
JohnB
Guest
Entirely fair enough JGK! It's actually a bit of a furphy that Nothling replaced Bradman - if you look at the teams for the first 3 tests of the series (ie the one Nothling played and Bradman didn't, and the ones either side of that), these changes occurred: Dropped from 1st test Bradman, Charlie Kelleway, Jack Gregory - replaced by Victor Richardson, Otto Nothling & Don Blackie. Far more realistic to think of Richardson, a specialist batsman, replacing Bradman and Nothling (bits and pieces seam bowling all-rounder) and Blackie (spinner - and I think Australia's oldest ever debutante in this game - well over 40) between them replacing Kelleway (batting all-rounder, bowling medium pace - forgotten today but a good cricketer over a long period. This was his last test, but he opened the bowling despite being over 40) and Gregory (previously great fast bowler and hard hitting batsman nudging true all-rounder status, but down to fast medium by then, with this test being his last because of a knee injury suffered during it). That impression is reinforced by the changes from the 2nd to the 3rd test - Nothling went out all right, and Bradman came in, but Ted a'Beckett and Ron Oxenham also came in, and Bert Ironmonger and Bill Ponsford also went out. Again, much more realistic to think of Bradman being a like-for-like replacement for Ponsford, Oxenham (medium pacer) for Ironmonger (left arm spin) and a'Beckett pretty much a like-for-like for Nothling (both bits and pieces all-rounders, bowling fast medium). Much better story of course to say you replaced Bradman and were dropped for him, than to say you replaced Kelleway and were dropped for a'Beckett!
Paul Nicholls
Roar Guru
JGK. It's interesting that you say this was the Melbourne Test as with the autograph book's owner's links to NSW cricket I would assume this would be from the Sydney game. As Jackson debuted in the 4th test then I can only assume the book was actually signed in Melbourne (unless there was a function in Sydney after the series perhaps.) All good stuff.
JGK
Roar Guru
Yes - I didn't mean to demean Nothling (who has one more Baggy Green than I do) but I couldn't resist the line.
JohnB
Guest
Looks like they were both effectively put in as nightwatchmen with the 2nd innings starting shortly before stumps.
JohnB
Guest
JGK - a little unfair on Otto Nothling but he seemed to realise his position in the scheme of things, apparently commonly self-mockingly introducing himself as "the man they dropped Bradman for" in later life. He made 8 and 44 in that test, and opened the bowling (bowling a pile of overs economically but without a wicket), so not a great performance, but not quite nothing! The story goes his first ball in test cricket hit Jack Hobbs on the pad. Nothling didn’t appeal not being sure it was out (an utterly incredible concept to the modern mind). The umpire is reputed to have said to him later “why didn’t you appeal? I thought it was plumb”. If Nothling had got that one, then got one or two others early, would Bradman have come back for the next game (where he got his maiden ton)? Nothling, a Qld-er, also played rugby for NSW while doing his medical training.