Tholthorpe CC

posted by John Winn

In a posting I made a week ago about the Forest of Galtres League, from the list of clubs no longer in existence I omitted the name of Tholthorpe CC who in 1925 were playing in the western section of the league. Through a neighbour of mine who has business premises in that area I have made contact with a village resident, Mr Geoff Wood who played for Myton on Swale and later Alne in the 1950s. Geoff has kindly emailed me some lovely photographs one of which is displayed here.

 

This shows the team in 1923 and Geoff's dad, Ernest Wood is standing next to the scorer. It would be interesting to know why most of the players and both umpires are wearing black armbands.

 

     Below is a map of Tholthorpe showing clearly the location of the ground. 

 

 

Geoff recalls how in 1939 the pavilion was brought into the village to serve as the HQ for the Local Defence Volunteers, later known as the Home Guard. Tholthorpe is situated about 12 miles north west of York and was home to an RAF air station operated by Bomber Command during WWII.

 

One of the other photographs Geoff sent me shows his Uncle Lewin as a team member and on a picture of the ladies' team taken before the first world war some of his aunts feature. A family club indeed.

 

Thanks to Geoff for his help with this and for allowing me to reproduce the photos on the blog.



One still standing

posted by John Winn

Before there was a blog there was a book and for a while there were both and then the there was just the blog. The original book, and the one that opened my eyes to the possibilities of professional cricket watching, was published in 2007 and recorded the previous season's travels of Tony Hutton, Brian Senior and the late Mick Bourne under the title 'Off the beaten track'. I well remember buying my copy from the boot of Mick's car on a lovely day at Stamford Bridge. A copy of the book graces the library at Lord's and is one of the most treasured on my shelves.

On page 75 Tony describes a visit he made to Newburgh Priory for a game in the Pilmoor Evening league when Thirsk were the visitors. Tony's description on the ground was summed up by three words 'A magical place.' Since that visit eight years ago both Brian and I have made trips to Newburgh the subject of postings and both of us have endorsed Tony's sentiments. Magic indeed.

In a posting I made in May 2011, shortly before my visit to Newburgh, I suggested that the word Pilmoor might be more familiar to rail rather than cricket enthusiasts for it was from here, on the main line between York and Darlington, that a branch line ran for more than a hundred years to Boroughbridge until its closure in 1950. The league is organised in two divisions and last year Sessay won the first division title and Sheriff Hutton the second. There is coverage of the league in the York daily paper, The Press.

My interest in the league has been revived by the discovery that in its earlier days it was a Saturday League for, as is often the case when dipping into newspaper archives, one thing leads to another and in the Darlington and Stockton Times for 1925 I found a report on the previous Saturday's matches in the Pilmoor and District League. The league table below shows that there were just seven clubs and of these only one (Helperby) survives today.

Some of these villages are very small, Birdforth, six miles south of Thirsk on the A19 had at the 2001 census, a population of just 13. It is hard to imagine that it was ever much bigger. Still 13 is enough  for eleven men, scorer and umpire but with not much cover for holidays and haymaking. Their  local derby would have been with Carlton Husthwaite, less then a mile away, their longest journey and the longest in the league, was a whisker under nine miles to Myton on Swale. For the Birdforth players their annual trip to Myton must have seemed like going to the big city for the 1881 census gives Myton's population as 189 and in 2001, 154.

This photograph is of the splendid grade 2 listed Myton bridge restored for the millennium. Shortly downstream from here the Swale loses its identity when it joins the Ure. 

When this league started and when it became an evening league, I know not and if I ever finish looking into the history of the Wensleydale and Swaledale leagues then the Pilmoor League can join
a list that includes the Felixkirk and District, the Vale of Mowbray and the Forest of Galtres leagues for future investigation.

A Norfolk legend

posted by John Winn

Think of Norfolk cricket and most people will recall the Edrich family particularly England pre and post second World War batsman Bill of that ilk. It is not however, a member of that family who is the subject of today's posting but one Michael Falcon, who played for the county from 1906 and 1946 and then served as its chairman and later president.

In previous postings I have written about cricketers whose talents extended beyond the 'best loved game' to other sports and even into public life. One such subject was the South African test player Clive van Ryneveld who found time to play Rugby Union for England (sic) and was a prominent anti apartheid politician in the 1960s. More recently I described the life of Australian Reg Bettinger who played county cricket for Middlesex, was amateur golf champion of his native country and went on to be a distinguished medical practitioner.

Michael Falcoln's life outside cricket was sufficiently successful that he could attach the initials LLB, MP and JP to his name. He has been the subject of one of the ACS lives in cricket series (author Stephen Musk) which sadly I have not read. I first came across Falcon's deeds in a book by Mike Davage 'Knights in Whites, Major Men', a who's who of Norfolk CCC from 1876 to 2011 in which the author used his skills as historian and genealogist in interviewing almost every living player and tracing their families.

Falcoln died in 1976 and in the following year's Wisden his obituary follows that of Gloucestershire stalwart and holder of one test cap, George Emmett. In addition to his one test appearance against Australia in 1948 when he was not alone in finding the pace of Lindwall a bit much, Emmett scored over 22000 runs for Gloucestershire. His Ashes appearance may best be  remembered by some as the match for which Hutton was dropped. Sanity was restored when Leonard was recalled for the next match and responded with scores of 81 and 57. In spite of his relatively illustrious career Wisden's final word on Emmett is afforded only half the space given to Falcon, a man whose fist class career was restricted to 89 matches, mainly for Cambridge University and the Gentlemen.

If Falcon could be said to have had one shining hour then it was probably in 1921 when he was part of MacLaren's XI that overcame in remarkable circumstances Armstrong's Australians at Eastbourne, their first of only two defeats on that tour. Falcon took 6 for 67 in the first innings. In his excellent account of this game Ronald Mason describes Falcon as an 'admirable pace bowler with fine command of swing'. 'Sixfors' seem to have been his speciality for he took 6 for 58 against the Players in 1913,  6 for 41 for the Gentlemen against the Australian Forces in 1919 and in 1926 went one better with 7 for 42 for the Minor Counties* against the Australians in their opening match of the 1926 tour.

 

Falcon played almost 250 games for Norfolk, hitting 21 centuries and finishing with just short of 700 wickets. In his last season (1946) when aged 58, he topped the batting averages. A career best of 205 was made against Hertfordshire in 1920. Born at Horstead Hall, the above picture of which suggests a privileged upbringing, his list of clubs reinforces the idea of the amateur gentleman, Harrow School, Cambridge University, Free Foresters, Harrow Wanderers, Leveson Gower's XI and I Zingari were generally not for 'horny handed sons of toil'. Falcon died suddenly aged 87 at his home in the Cathedral Close in Norfolk, a legend indeed.

* Some authorites describe this match as being Martineau's XI v the tourists. This mistake probably arises because it was played on Martineau's private ground.

February Jim the Cat

Posted by John Winn

The February Jim the Cat meeting has reverted to its original date and will  be on February 21st not the 14th as published last week.

The twins have twins

posted by John Winn

These three photographs show changes being made to the entrance to Darlington CC in order to allow access to the housing development now being built on the football ground. You will observe that the twin towers have become quads.

September 2013

December 2013

January 2013

Down in the forest something stirred

published by John Winn

The Forest of Galtres was established by the Norman Kings of England. Spreading northwards from the city walls of York it reached its greatest extent by the reign of Henry II (1133-1189). Within its 100,000 acres there were 60 villages, several of which, eight centuries later, formed a cricket league.

 

The name Galtres lives on to the present day in the titles of several organisations in the Easingwold area including a golf club, a primary school, an entertainment and leisure centre and a three day event to rival Glastonbury, held at Duncombe Park near Helmsley. Although there is no longer a Forest of Galtres League the cricket connection is maintained through the Forest of Galtres Cricket Development Group whose girls' Under 13 XI play in the Hambleton Junior Cricket league.

The Darlington and Stockton Times for 1925 has coverage of the FOG showing it organised into two sections based on geography even though the area covered by its 16 member clubs was quite small. Six of these run teams today, spread across the Nidderdale, York and Pilmoor Leagues but Skipton (by Beningbrough ),Tollerton, Aldwark, Newton (on Ouse), Dalton, Sutton on the Forest, Brandsby, Husthwaite and Hawkhills do not, I am sure, play any organised cricket.

 My travels take me through this area quite frequently, stopping off on occasions to sample the several excellent dining pubs found there but I have never seen any evidence of former cricket grounds. Googling Forest of Galtres cricket provides a link to the York Vale league site. This league was formed in 1933 to provide a standard of cricket for club cricketers in the City of York of a standard similar to that provided in the FOG, Thirsk and Derwent leagues. The Vale has now 80 years of history behind it and over 40 clubs. What happened to cricket under the banner of The Forest of Galtres remains to me a mystery but one I am tempted to investigate.

In the past I and other bloggers have described visits to some of the grounds in the Pilmoor Evening League. In the 1920s this was a Saturday league with seven clubs. More of this in a future blog.

Tidying up Sunday

posted by John Winn

Tony Hutton has been in touch with Chris Wildman from Malham, one of the organisers of the annual match between Malhamdale and Appletreewick described in Monday's posting.  Readers may recall that Tony, Brian Sanderson and I left at the mulled wine interval but thanks to Chris and Tony I am able to bring you the result, a victory for Malhamdale by 5 runs. Consolation came for the home team in the form of victory in the after match dominoes tournament played in The New Inn. Good that both of these excellent pubs should play their part in hosting this crazy event.