Legends of Hatfield Cricket Club

was Louis de Soissons who designed much of Welwyn Garden City in the 1920s. For the other side of Ann’s family, life was less glamorous. Far removed from the allure of Marylebone, Kensington, and Westminster, it was the bleak industrial landscape of North Kent on the southern bank of the River Thames. A son of a shipbreaker from Chatham, Sydney Albert Lovey was born in Woolwich on 25 May 1890. The Lovey family resided at 129 East Street, Charlton. Now called Eastmoor Street, the area has become a rundown light-industrial estate and access road to the Thames Barrier. Sydney, the youngest of five brothers, was a late addition to the household. One of his older brothers worked in the cartridge factory at the Royal Arsenal. Later, another brother and a sister were born. Lovey was one of those names that are repeatedly misspelt in the records, and whatever variation was used for the 1901 census rendered all searches fruitless. After Sydney’s mother, Sarah Ann, passed away in 1907, he did not remain with his father. By 1911, he was living instead with his aunt, Harriet Allen, at 17 Crescent Road, Plumstead. Although it was not stated on the census, Sydney was employed as a labourer; therefore, he was likely working at the Royal Arsenal, just a short walk from Crescent Road. Ten years later, by which time he was married, he was working in the filling factories at the arsenal. Sydney’s future wife, Bessie Upton, was born in Erith, Kent, on 16 December 1889. She wasn’t in Erith for long, as by the time of the 1891 census, the family resided at 100 Brookhill Road, Woolwich, half a mile south of the ferry terminal. Ten years later, the family comprised Alfred, a harness maker from Wickford, Essex, Elizabeth from Limerick, Ireland, and their two sons and five daughters. They had moved next to the terminal, to 1 Cock Yard, an address that no longer exists but was just off Woolwich High Street. Alfred must have been doing reasonably well in the harness trade, for in 1911, when she was 21, there was no apparent necessity for Bessie to enter the workforce. The family had migrated yet again, albeit by a matter of yards. Chez Upson was now at 173 Powis Street, the ground floor of which is now a hairdresser’s. Sydney and Bessie got married in 1914 and moved into 50 Inverine Road, Charlton. It was a new build, so it was an upgrade over the other properties the pair had encountered. It may have been a coincidence, but it’s also possible that the outbreak of war prompted both of Ann’s parents to marry that year. Ann’s mother, Ivy May Lovey, the couple’s eldest child, was born on 4 October 1916. In time, she was joined by Sydney Jr (1917), 92

Ernest (1922), and Bessie Jr (1924). How Eric and Ivy first met remains an unresolved mystery. Again, the bombed-out census of 1931 is the missing link in the chain. Of course, he may have been based in the London office, but it is more likely that Eric worked in the Welwyn Garden City office of Louis de Soissons and Partners, which was located above WH Smiths (now Superdrug) in Howardsgate. Either way, it is safe to assume that Eric didn’t travel to Charlton to make her acquaintance. Logic dictates, therefore, that Ivy must have found employment either in the Welwyn/Hatfield area or wherever the architect’s office may have been. Although… having said that, when the couple tied the knot in 1937, the wedding was in Woolwich, so it is not impossible that Ivy was still living in the area. More likely, she was working away from home. When a record of the civilian population of England and Wales was taken on September 29, 1939, as Britain prepared for World War II, Harry and Katherine Simson, Eric and Ivy Simson, Roy Simson, and two of Katherine’s brothers were living at The Old Palace, West Avenue, Hatfield Park. As for the war years, as far as this story goes, unfortunately, nothing is known about Eric’s contribution. That is not to suggest that Eric did not play his part. He was fortunate to emerge unscathed and to be among the first to return to civilian life. It is hoped that Eric was not among the early recruits or volunteers in the battle against fascism, as Ivy was pregnant when Neville Chamberlain declared war against Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. It’s ironic, but the closer we get to the present day, the harder it becomes to trace people’s movements. Sandra Simson was born in Hatfield in early 1940, and, as might be expected, Ann did not arrive until after the war in September 1946. All that can be said with any certainty is that she was born within the registration district of Barnet. Crudely speaking, this encompassed an area bordered by Chipping Barnet, Elstree, Shenley, and South Mimms. This could explain how Eric, reputedly a decent goalkeeper, came to be playing for Barnet FC Reserves. That is all there is to say until we fastforward seventeen years to 1964, when the family lived at 11 Graysfield, Welwyn Garden City (via 18 Fordwich Road). According to Tony, Andrew Anthony George ‘Andy’ Foster was conceived on the cricket square in Hatfield Park. Fortunately, as far as we know, no witnesses were present who could verify this claim. Folks must have been hardier in the old days, as this liaison would have taken place in February/March, when it would have been somewhat cold for alfresco action. Tony 93

and Ann were married at St Etheldreda’s on 25 April 1964, leaving the church through a guard of honour of raised cricket bats in the tradition of Hatfield CC. The happy couple returned to the church on 7 March 1965 for the Christening of Andy, who came kicking and screaming into life on 2 December 1964. I cannot say when the Fosters became near neighbours of my family; however, from the club’s 1968 fixture card, I can confirm that they had arrived at 8 Broomhills, Welwyn Garden City, by then. Captain Foster Before these joyful events occurred, on 7 October 1963, at the new clubhouse of Hatfield CC at 19 Great North Road, Tony was elected to captain the Sunday XI for the 1964 season. There is a misconception regarding his appointment as captain that needs clarification. It was said at the time that he was the youngest-ever captain of the club, a belief that lasted for some time. Yes, he was the youngest since the Second World War, but Walter Whitby was only twenty when he first captained the original Town club, in the days before it merged with the Estate club. Whether inspired by the captaincy or the knowledge that he was a father-to-be, 1964 proved to be a season to remember. Where to begin? The first highlight occurred on Saturday, 4 June, when he was involved in another record partnership. Hatfield were on 57 for two against Totteridge when Tony and Barry Hugman came together at the crease. The pair stayed together for the remainder of the innings, with Hatfield declaring on 203 for two after the pair had added an unbeaten 146 runs to the total. Tony finished on 79 not out, while Hugman scored 64 not out. On Saturday, 4 July, at North Mymms, set a target of 154 runs to win, Hatfield were falling behind the rate before Tony smashed them to victory with a scintillating array of strokes, including four sixes and twelve fours. With an unbeaten 102, scored in 81 minutes, Tony accounted for two-thirds of Hatfield’s runs. He couldn’t quite match that scoring rate at Vauxhall Motors on 8 August, when it took him 98 minutes to score 103 out of a total of 183 for three declared. During the match against Hemel Hempstead at Hatfield Park on 29 August, Tony became only the fourth batter in the club’s history to surpass 1,000 runs in a season, and he still wasn’t finished. He delivered another commanding batting display at Old Elizabethans’ Mays Lane ground on 5 September. Chasing 171 for victory, he opened the batting and was still present when the winning run was struck, with the last man at the crease. Tony’s modest contribution to the run chase was an unbeaten 127. A week 94

later, he recorded his fourth century. The report submitted by Kenton CC didn’t reveal much about Hatfield’s reply to their 202 for 8, other than that Hatfield won with five minutes remaining. Once again, Tony was still batting at the death, unbeaten on 102. Tony still managed to find time to get among the wickets. Continuing his steady progression, for the fourth successive season, he beat his personal best and, with 54 wickets, reached the half-century mark for the first time. There is no doubt about his highlight with the ball. The day after hitting his highest score against Old Elizabethans, he set a new personal best with the ball at Broxbourne. With figures of 9 for 48, Tony became only the second Hatfield bowler to take nine wickets since the war. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he was never to surpass this achievement. By the time the season had come to pass, Tony had amassed 1,324 runs, usurping Eddie Wakeling’s record for the highest number of runs in a season by a Hatfield batter. This was almost 500 runs more than that season’s second-highest. With an average of 42.81, the fourth highest in the club’s history at the time, he secured his second batting prize, a country mile ahead of second-placed Bryan French’s 27.67. To add to his record-breaking year, with 4 hundreds and 6 fifties, he equalled Bryan French’s record for the most half-centuries in a season, and he also became the first Hatfield player to score 1,000 runs and take 50 wickets in the same season. In the years that have followed, only one other player has equalled this feat. So, how did Tony’s first season of captaincy go? Of the nineteen matches to beat the weather, his record was 5 wins, 6 defeats, and 8 draws. It is dangerous to draw any conclusions as to a captain’s ability based on results alone, as they are limited in their ambitions by the quality, or lack thereof, of the players placed at their disposal. His teammates must have been encouraged by what they observed, because at the General Meeting held on 12 October 1964, he replaced Mike Russell as skipper of the Saturday 1st XI, the blue ribbon of club captaincy. It says something of Tony’s temperament, tactical nous, and leadership that he was to lead the club’s premier eleven for the next thirteen years. Nobody else has come close to matching this length of incumbency. Regarding his batting, 1965 was a case of after the Lord Mayor’s Show, with ‘only’ 529 runs. His bowling, on the other hand, reached new heights. Tony smashed his previous best by taking 79 wickets at an average of 11.54. This performance earned him the club’s bowling prize, and as a result, he became only the sixth player in the club’s history to have won both the batting and bowling prizes. 95

While with Charles Lambert and Ernest Elliott, hard facts were scarce, with Tony, the opposite is true, and there is a risk of being overwhelmed by them. A constant stream of facts and figures can become tedious, so some will be omitted. However, 1966 is not the time for that, especially with this season marked by more milestones. During the annual early-season Sunday fixture against Welwyn Garden City at Hatfield Park on 1 May, Tony achieved what would be his all-time career high score, to add to the bowling feat he accomplished against Broxbourne in 1964. The grammatically questionable match report in the Welwyn Hatfield Times (submitted by WGCCC) does little to set the scene; however, it is clear that Tony’s heroics earned Hatfield an undeserved draw. In reply to the Citizens’ 249 for two declared, with only 40 runs scored after an hour’s batting, it appears Hatfield had given up hope of forcing an unlikely victory. The flowing narrative of the report was as follows: ‘Tony Foster batted well. He took much of the bowling, hitting when possible, and in hitting his century, made seven sixes and 13 fours. He saved the game for his club.’ When time was called, Hatfield’s last pair was at the wicket, and of their total of 175 for nine, 129 (not out) runs came from Tony’s bat. With the emphasis on averages when it comes to awarding the club’s batting and bowling prizes, runs and wickets are often overlooked. While not unique in the club’s history, 1966 was certainly a rare occasion, with Tony finishing the season as the club’s top run-scorer and wicket-taker with 1,059 runs and 77 wickets. Pre-war records are too incomplete to make any confident claims. That said, it is beyond any reasonable doubt that Ernest Elliott achieved this in 1926. Apart from that, there is no evidence to suggest that other players might have done so. However, they might have. In the post-war era, after George Hanlon in 1954, Tony was the second person to do so. Now, fifty-nine years later, no one has added their name to this exclusive list. Of lesser significance in the overall context, he was also the second Hatfield batter to score over 1,000 runs in a season twice. Despite all this, Tony was the bridesmaid of the season – third in batting averages, second in bowling, and second in catches. As a reflection of his importance to the club, he was the only player in contention for more than one award. Before progressing to the next stage of his career, a quick note on his fielding abilities. In the list of those with the most catches in a season, he was third in 1961, second in 1962, second in 1963, second in 1964, third in 1965, second in 1966, and second again in 1967. It was unfortunate for Tony that at the time, the club was lucky to possess a quality wicket-keeper in Alec Warner, who won the catching prize in each of those seasons. Non96

etheless, it was quite an achievement for an outfielder. Tony Enters Office Following nineteen years of unprecedented stability behind the scenes, John Gray announced his intention to resign as the club’s Hon. Secretary in 1967. During this time, he had combined the position with that of Fixture Secretary, but at the General Meeting held on 20 October, it was decided to reinstate the latter. Tony duly stepped up to the plate, also continuing as captain. While he had been on the committee since 1963, this was the first time that he had been involved in an administrative capacity. A relatively straightforward affair today, arranging fixtures was a more hands-on occupation back then. Although Tony’s appointment coincided with the formation of the Hertfordshire Cricket Competition, clubs retained the responsibility for arranging dates for league matches until the mid-1980s, so the summer calendar was entirely within the purview of the Fixture Secretary. Although the 1968 season was not the highlight of his career, he still received two awards at the annual dinner. It speaks volumes of Tony’s ability that 754 runs and 47 wickets are viewed as underachieving! Mere mortals would be content with being the club’s leading run-scorer and winning the batting prize. Of greater significance was the fact that after seven years of being in contention, he finally succeeded in beating Alec Warner to win the catching prize. This elevated Tony into the select company of Hatfield players who have won all three prizes: batting, bowling, and catching, alongside Ernest Elliott and Frank Shepherd. Tony began the 1969 season in impressive style, and it only took him until Sunday, 15 June, to score his fourth half-century of the season, a match-winning 58 against Walthamstow at Hatfield Park. It is a shame that this fourth fifty was the first to attract the local press’s attention. From a personal perspective, it was his third of the summer that held greater significance. Whenever and against whomever, following in the footsteps of Eddie Wakeling and Bryan French before him, Tony became the third Hatfield batter to score 50 or more fifty times. While he conceded the role of leading run-scorer to Henry Cutino, finishing second, he reversed the roles in the bowling department, securing 64 wickets, seven ahead of Henry in that particular match. As the United Kingdom waved goodbye to the swinging sixties and entered a new decade of industrial strife that resulted from the disastrous premiership of Ted Heath, the Fosters welcomed a new addition to the family. Social norms had evolved greatly over the period covered by this 97

book. The days when couples had numerous children and families often reached double digits were gone. We had now entered the age of the nuclear family with 2.4 children, and after the arrival of Jillian Sarah Foster in January 1970, Tony and Ann decided that enough was enough. It may not have been the easiest of pregnancies. In his report on winter activities presented to members at the 1970 Annual General Meeting, Albert Hudson noted that ‘Tony Foster was relieved of his 1969 anxieties when his wife Ann presented him with a Daughter after long suffering.’ Relieved of his anxieties, Tony celebrated the arrival of his daughter with impressive style. Narrowly missing out on a thousand runs for the season, he was the club’s leading scorer with 995, including a knock of 127 against Bushey, equalling his second-best. Never a one-trick pony, he also excelled with the ball and ended the season as the club’s leading wickettaker. His total of 81 victims for the season was a new personal high. Not content with this, although he missed out on the batting and bowling prizes, he also held the most catches, completing a hat-trick that has not been replicated either before or since. And still the landmarks continued. On Saturday, 15 May 1971, on Redbourn Common, Tony reached fifty runs for the 59th time as a Hatfield player. That in itself is of little interest. What is though, is that in the course of his innings he became only the third player in the club’s history to pass the 10,000 run mark, following in the footsteps of Eddie Wakeling and Bryan French. The following season, on 5 August 1972, against the same opponent at the same venue, he was the first person to reach another milestone; however, due to some shoddy work by the scorers, it went unnoticed at the time. The match report lamented that Tony had been caught on the boundary, one run short of his century; however, the minutes from the meeting of the General Committee held on 14 August showed that it had agreed to amend his total in the scorebook to 104. Albeit belatedly acknowledged, he had thus recorded his tenth century for the club, the first player to do so. Both of these last two records have been replicated since, but for his next trick, Tony carved out a niche in the annals of Hatfield Cricket that is unlikely to be repeated. Initially, against either Old Owens or Kings Langley on the weekend of 15/16 September 1973, he passed the 100-wicket mark for the first time. Nobody in the club’s history had completed the 1,000 runs and 100 wickets double before, and Tony was now just 18 runs shy of achieving it. After a nervy, nail-biting week, the following Saturday, he was caught in the gully against Henlow for 16, still two agonising runs short. 98

The champagne was uncorked on Sunday, 23 September, when five runs against St Albans finally nudged him across the line. The previous year, the club had introduced a new award to reward ‘the most meritorious performance on the field’ during the season. Traditionally, this has been awarded based on a single match. However, on this occasion – uniquely – it was instead given to Tony in recognition of this landmark achievement. He finished the season with 1,050 runs and 107 wickets, which incidentally meant that he was the first Hatfield CC player to hit 1,000 runs in a season for a third time. The curtain on Tony’s seven-year spell as the club’s Fixture Secretary came down following the 1974 season. External events ultimately shaped his decision. Cricket in Hertfordshire had been rocked by the decision of sixteen rebel clubs, based on snobbery and self-importance, to break away from the Hertfordshire Cricket Competition and form the Hertfordshire Cricket League. To quote the President of Bishops Stortford CC, ‘leading clubs have been worried that if they had a bad season they would be relegated and could face village sides.’ So ‘patronising’ can be added to the charge sheet. At a meeting of the remaining clubs, held in Hatfield CC’s clubhouse at 41 Park Street, on 11 December 1973, Tony was elected as the Competition’s Hon. Secretary. By this time, Ann had assumed responsibility as the organiser of the club’s Catering Committee, and Tony was still 1st XI captain, so, understandably, he announced his intention to step down as Fixture Secretary to the General Committee on 18 February 1974. The Records Keep Tumbling When is a club record (possibly) not a club record? When a stray V-1 flying bomb wipes out the pre-war averages. Although it is not known whether such records were ever kept, if they were, they were destroyed on the night of Tuesday, 10 October 1944. As far as the post-war records were concerned, on the eve of the 1974 cricket season, Frank Shepherd was Hatfield CC’s leading wicket-taker, on 896, with Tony hot on his heels with 880. The spanner in the works is that, as has already been said, Ernest Elliott in all probability had taken more than this. With Elliott’s total officially on 689, Tony moved into first place on Saturday, 1 June 1974, when taking five for 36 against North London. He has now been the club’s leading wicket-taker for over five decades, and barring something unexpected happening, will remain so for all time. Just for the record, Tony was again the club’s leading run-scorer and wicket-taker for the season, with 945 and 101. This was the second successive season in which he had taken 100 wickets, the 99

fourth and final Hatfield bowler to do so. Where to begin in 1975? Let’s start with the mundane. With another 92 wickets to his collection, he was the club’s leading wicket-taker for the fifth year in succession. While there may have been an element of doubt concerning Hatfield CC’s leading wicket-taker, no such issues existed when it came to the identity of its highest run-scorer. Once again, the mystery of Ernest Elliott’s career statistics muddies the waters. Whatever total he may have accumulated, by the mid-1950s, he would have passed the mantle to Eddie Wakeling, who, two decades later, was still leading the pack with 14,279. Even now, Eddie is the club’s sixth leading scorer. Who knows what he could have achieved had he not lost six of the prime years of his career to the Second World War? To overhaul Wakeling, Tony broke the 1,000 run barrier for the fourth time with 1,159, the second-best return of his career, and by the season’s end, his aggregate was 14,835. Nothing lasts forever, and Tony’s spell as the club’s leading scorer would only last for thirty-two years! Surprisingly, that season he wasn’t the club’s leading scorer for a change, with that honour going instead to Roger Smith, who scored 1,201 runs. Even though the pair of them were a country mile ahead of the rest of the pack, neither finished at the top of the averages, with Richard Taylor doing so, having scored less than 500 runs. Rough justice indeed. The final word on the 1975 season is of another first. Before Tony, nobody had scored 10,000 runs and taken 100 wickets for the club. Fifty years later, only two other players, David Sankey and Andy Ashley-Smith, have managed to complete this impressive task. Of the current crop of Hatfield players, no one has the remotest chance of joining this selective group of all-rounders. Okay, not quite the final word on 1975, but it does lead nicely into 1976. If Tony did the decent thing and bought the customary jug of beer every time he scored a fifty, these would have been expensive times for him. There was no match report published for one of his half-centuries, but during the season, he had innings of 115 not out vs. the Single XI, 112 vs. Highgate, 96 not out vs. North London Polytechnic, 89 vs. St Albans, 76 vs. Stevenage, 58 vs. Old Finchleians, and 50 vs. Hatfield Hyde. To put his run-scoring into perspective, since the start of the 1970s, Hatfield’s batters had scored seventeen centuries, eight of which were Tony’s. This form continued into the first weekend of the 1976 season. Taking advantage of a benign wicket at Hatfield Park against Broxbourne on Sunday, 25 April, with some ferocious blows, he slammed 104 runs to secure his fifteenth century 100

for the club. What was then a club record has only been matched by one player since. When time was called on the 1976 season, Tony had scored 1,066 runs, and he had passed the magic thousand run mark for the fifth and final time. Although Keven Whitehead’s performances in the 1980s and 1990s might make this achievement seem unspectacular, it still stands the test of time when compared with others, with only Roger Smith also accomplishing it three times. A very strange thing happened in 1977. Or rather, nothing happened in 1977. Well, to be more precise, nothing if you had set yourself the same standards that Tony had. Most of us would settle for scoring 891 runs, taking 53 wickets, being the club’s second-highest run-scorer, and finishing second in the batting averages. His days as an exceptional batter were nearing an end, and he would have to settle for being very good for the next twenty years. To say that nothing happened in 1977 is only correct concerning cricketing matters, for early in the year, Tony’s father, Arnold George Foster, sadly passed away aged 64. Returning to the Ranks After thirteen consecutive seasons as Saturday 1st XI captain, by far the longest run in the club’s history, 1977 was Tony’s final season in charge of Hatfield CC’s blue riband eleven. At least it was at the time. It is unlikely that Tony had tired of the role, as captaincy was in his blood. These were trying times for the club, and he likely decided it was prudent to concentrate on off-the-field matters. At a meeting of the General Committee held on 12 August 1974, an opinion was aired that the ground and accommodation within Hatfield Park did not meet the requirements of a modern cricket club. It was agreed to establish a subcommittee to discuss the club’s future needs and determine a plan of action. Tony was elected as one of its six members. Armed with a list of demands, on 20 January 1975, Tony accompanied Ken Goulding (Hon. Secretary of the Future Development Sub-committee) and John Lance (Hon. Secretary of Hatfield Cricket Club) to a meeting with Lord Salisbury (who didn’t attend), Lord Cranbourne, and Harry Clegg (Agent for Gascoyne Cecil Estates). It would not be an understatement to suggest that the meeting at the Lodge House, Hatfield Park, didn’t pan out exactly as the cricketers had hoped. Rather than the Estate leaving the meeting to consider the club’s proposals, the Cricket Club left with notice to quit Hatfield Park, and for cricket in the Park to cease after two hundred years. Lord 101

Salisbury offered the club a site for a new ground at Ascots Lane, but it would require a massive fundraising effort and a hell of a lot of hard work to pull it off. The story of the move had been documented in Hatfield Cricket Club: The Ascots Lane Years 1979 to 2012, and Parklife: Hatfield Estate Cricket Club 1946 to 1978. All that is important to this story is that, during this trying time, Tony was elected Chairman of the General Committee on 1 November 1976 and played a pivotal role in ensuring the move was a success. As I have said, these were difficult times for the club, and it would understandably have caused increased tension among members, leading to shorter tempers and less patience. None of these issues was directly connected to the club’s predicament; however, a few members departed under a cloud. This caused significant bitterness among some of the club’s executive, which persisted for quite some time. More than a decade later, if an unsuspecting newer member mentioned the name of one of the pariahs, it would trigger a barrage of expletives from the old guard. In 2022, nearly fifty years after the event, I showed Tony an old team photograph, hoping he could identify some unfamiliar faces. Tony’s immediate reaction was to point at two players, whom I had already recognised, and exclaim, ‘cunt, cunt!’ For me, Tony maintaining such a long-standing grudge demonstrates how much the club meant to him. Let’s return to cricket. How consistent was this? Since winning the batting prize in 1968, Tony did not finish outside the top three of the averages in the nine seasons that followed, with four second-place finishes and five third-place finishes. It was in 1978 that he finally got it right, earning a fourth batting award with an average of 33.37, his best since 1966. Perhaps it is the fact that his total of 827 runs would never be matched again that indicates, at thirty-nine, his skills as a batter were starting to decline. That said, players much younger than him would have traded anything to average over five hundred runs a season, as Tony did over the next twenty-three seasons. If Tony had not joined the club until he was forty, he still would have been its seventh-highest run-scorer. That’s a sobering thought. Even more striking is that he would be the second-highest wicket-taker! As was so often the case with Tony, winning a prize wasn’t the most important achievement of his season. Already the club’s leading run-scorer and wicket-taker, in 1978, he completed the hat-trick. Tony’s father-in-law, Eric Simson, had surpassed Frank Shepherd as the club’s most successful catcher during the 1961 season, and when he retired, he had 345 catches to his name. Logic dictates that Tony snatched Eric’s record before the match 102

against Tye Green on 22 July. In the act of taking a catch off the bowling of Alan Cook, Tony dislocated a finger, forcing him to take no further part in the game and enforce an absence from the side for a month. Just as he had done so often with balls hit in his direction in the field, he held the records for batting, bowling, and catching simultaneously for twenty-two years, until Mick Debenham eventually overtook his catching record. Mick, though, had the advantage of wearing gloves. Earlier in the season, another milestone had been chalked off at Hoddesdon’s Low Field Ground on Saturday, 27 May. Alas, it was all in vain as Hatfield lost by eight wickets; however, Tony’s innings of fifty runs was his one-hundredth half-century for the club. Not a bad return for what was only the beginning of his twentieth season. It may not come as a surprise to learn that he was the first to do so in the club’s history. His batting nemesis, Keven Whitehead, is the only other batter to have done so since. Despite work on the new clubhouse at Ascots Lane continuing, minor details such as having no electrics or running water still needed to be overcome, the committee decided by a narrow margin of 9 votes to 6 to hold the annual wind-up match of the season, Married versus Single, at the club’s new ground on 1 October 1978. As befitting his stature within the club, Tony was honoured with the captaincy of the Married XII. On the positive side, Tony was the first captain to win a game at Ascots Lane, with his married men triumphant by three runs. A less memorable moment was his batting. By tradition, the skippers in this match were bowled a ‘gimme’ first ball to allow them to get off the mark safely. One can only imagine Tony’s disgust at hitting a gentle delivery from Mick Ford straight into the safe hands of Ron Curtis. Sensing the significance of the occasion, someone annotated the scorebook with a list of firsts at the new ground. Preserved for posterity – 1st Duck: A G Foster! The departure from Hatfield Park opened a new chapter in Tony’s relationship with the club. The payback for the club returning to the grounds of Hatfield House after the war was that Lord Cranborne (son of the marquess) wanted to be captain. This led to the farcical situation in 1947, where the 1st XI captain did not play a single match all season. A diplomatic resolution was reached, with Cranborne being offered the newly created role of Club Captain. This position remained within the Cecil family until the club played its final game in the park and no longer had to heed the whims of its landlord’s family. At the General Meeting on 26 October 1978, the final meeting held at the 41 Park Street clubhouse, Tony, as the club’s longest-serving player, accepted his nomination to become the first non103

titled Captain of the Club. He held this position until his death. While not entirely seamless, it was nevertheless a successful move from Hatfield Park and 41 Park Street to Ascots Lane. After the upheaval of the previous four years, simply playing cricket without constantly worrying about off-field matters was both a blessing and a relief. From that point of view, Tony probably wasn’t overly concerned about his 1979 performances, which yielded his worst overall stats since 1961. Since he had been awarded the B G Merriott Club Prize in 1958, two things had changed. First, the award had been renamed the Whitby Club Prize in honour of former Club Chairman and stalwart Walter Whitby, who passed away in 1968. Second, it was no longer given to a promising young player – though being young didn’t disqualify anyone – but was now awarded to a member whose contributions went beyond what could reasonably be expected of them. Tony’s relentless effort in ensuring the new clubhouse was ready for the 1979 season earned him the trophy. It marked his tenth club prize, and, funnily enough, he was the first player to achieve such a record. Other than ending the 1980 season as the club’s leading wicket-taker with the modest total of 55, it was an unremarkable season by Tony’s standards. However, Hatfield’s fixture against Hatfield Hyde on Saturday, 23 August, when he was deputising for the absent captain, Dave Sankey, offered an insight into Tony’s attitude towards the game of cricket. Despite it being not only a league match but also a local Derby, he took a chance on an early declaration, a decision that backfired and led to defeat in the last over of the day. This was by no means an isolated incident. Over the years, I witnessed many such bold calls. Timed cricket has an unfavourable reputation, with the criticism that it leads to negative cricket, where teams are mainly content to avoid defeat and settle for a draw. There is no doubt that some clubs played in this manner, but not all. A born gambler, Tony was always prepared to risk defeat in the pursuit of victory. Leaving cricket for a moment, the temperature in 8 Broomhills was particularly frosty during the winter of 1980/1981, when Andy Foster and his girlfriend, Denise Bowes, became the hot topic of conversation among their fellow pupils of Sir Frederic Osborn School, Welwyn Garden City. Tony became a grandfather somewhat earlier than he had anticipated, with the arrival of David Andrew Foster in the spring of 1981. Andy and Denise were sixteen years old when parenthood was sprung upon them, but, erm, let’s say that they weren’t necessarily that old when their son was conceived and leave it at that. Not that babies held any great fascination for the twelve-year-old me, but a chance meeting with Denise, surrounded by a 104

gaggle of her cooing mates, on a bus led me to be introduced to a very young David. Tony’s return to the ranks didn’t last long. It had been a difficult few years for the club on the cricket field, and the club turned to Tony in the hope that he could revive the fortunes of the Saturday 1st XI in 1981. And this wasn’t his only contribution to the well-being of the club. In addition to the captaincy, he also agreed to take on the most thankless task in club cricket, the Team Secretary. It should be simple. Players provide their availability for the following weekend, the teams are selected, players notified, and the job is done. Yes, there will be occasions, such as a family crisis or injury, that force someone to drop out, but three or four every week? And so late in the week. My debut for the club came about when another player dropped out on the morning of the match. I was playing for Sir Frederic Osborn School at Stanborough School when my dad accepted Tony’s request on my behalf. There are two extremes when it comes to performing in the role of Team Secretary. On one side, there was Tony’s successor, Ian Cope. With Ian, it was remarkable that he managed to phone everyone. My mum would answer the phone, and even though they didn’t know each other well, Ian would have a long chat with her. When I was finally called for, another lengthy conversation ensued. Tony’s approach was quite different. Presumably, the club wasn’t reimbursing him for his calls. A typical phone call: ‘Graham. Tony Foster. Saturday. 3rd XI. 1 o’clock.’ Short and to the point, but effective nevertheless. Resuming the captaincy had a positive effect on Tony’s on-field performances. He may have missed out on the batting prize to the club’s new sensation, John Walton, but his average of 33.37 was his best for fifteen years. Repetition is an occupational hazard when it comes to Mr Foster, and in 1981, he had the accolade of being Hatfield CC’s leading wicket taker for the eighth time in eighteen seasons. But it wasn’t all about repetition. Remarkably, in his twenty-seventh season with the club, Tony achieved something that had previously eluded him after more than 6,500 overs of trying. In his defence, it is one of the rarest cricketing feats realistically achievable in club cricket. Having relinquished the 1st XI captaincy to Brian Sheffield, Tony was imparting his knowledge on the Saturday 2nd XI when Knebworth Park visited Ascots Lane on 10 July 1982. Inspiring Hatfield to an eight-wicket victory, aged 43, Tony bowled the first hat-trick of his career. I feel confident in saying that this was the first time he had achieved this at any level, as when I told him that, 105

by 1983, I had done so twice in school cricket, it greatly annoyed him. Entering his mid-forties, Tony’s time as a 1st XI stalwart appeared to have reached its conclusion with his acceptance of the nomination to become the Saturday 2nd XI captain for the 1983 season. It was also notable that he seems not to have played on Sundays, with the season marking his fewest appearances since his National Service some thirty-four years earlier. Nevertheless, what cricket he did play was particularly fruitful. Although his body was slowing down, his sharp cricketing brain allowed him to make the most of the reduced demands of 2nd XI cricket. In seventeen innings, he produced five scores of fifty or more, including 90 against St Margaretsbury, 78 against Southgate, and 58 not out against Potters Bar. Averaging 41.07, the third highest of his career, Tony comfortably secured the fifth (and final) batting prize of his Hatfield career. Perhaps the most significant of his 602 runs for the season was the 259th. For this was his 20,000th run as a Hatfield batter, and, as you would expect, he was the first person to reach this remarkable landmark. Trouble in Paradise When Tony’s marriage to Ann came to an end, it wasn’t a major surprise, for the writing had been on the wall for some time. My family and the Fosters had a long history. From as far back as I can remember, my dad and Tony, both employed by Hawker Siddeley (British Aerospace), had carpooled. Andy and my brother, Colin, played cricket and football together, and undoubtedly, Tony was the reason my older brothers, Paul and Mick, enjoyed their cricket with Hatfield despite living in Welwyn Garden City. Ann had worked as a dinner lady at Panshanger JMI School during my younger days, and as an amateur hairdresser, she had occasionally cut my hair. Times were tough. All of this resulted in a joint family holiday in August 1983, the scars of which remain with me to this day. Eric and Ivy Simson owned a holiday home in a quaint village in the west of Devon, the name of which has long escaped my memory (possibly Milton Abbot, but that is no more than an educated guess). To illustrate its remoteness, in the days before telephone numbers were standardised and the digit count reflected the size of the exchange, the Simsons had a twodigit phone number. The closest I can come to pinpointing it is that it was likely somewhere between Bude, Cornwall, and Dartmoor. I know it wasn’t far from Bude because one day I was forced to endure Steve Wright and the Radio 1 Roadshow. On holiday at chez Simson were Tony, Ann, Jillian, my parents and I. It 106

soon became obvious that the Debenhams were there as peacekeepers. The general theme of the vacation was Tony acting the fool, while Ann, deeply embarrassed by his antics, kept asking him to stop whatever it was that amused him. Before long, this pattern of behaviour became the norm in the cricket club pavilion, and the members came to the consensus that Ann was on the lookout for fresh meat. Ann had become Chair of the club’s Social Committee, and she sought solace with a member of her committee. All hell broke loose after the pair were caught in flagrante delicto in the clubhouse. The opinion of the General Committee was that it was not their place to take sides in what was a non-club dispute. However, something had to be done because of the toxic atmosphere that was hanging over the cricket club. The decision taken was to suspend both players while they settled their differences. This would have been hard for Tony to take as he was embarking on his thirtieth season with the club. Tony’s immediate response to his wife’s infidelity was to leave the marital home. One of his teammates, David Cross, offered him his spare room while he found his feet, a move that caused great merriment among their contemporaries. Please don’t get me wrong. David and Tony were both thoroughly decent blokes, and it was a pleasure and an education to have known them. But the thing is that they both had a reputation, deservedly or not, of being miserable, cantankerous bastards at times. You felt that this unlikely pairing of housemates had the makings of a sitcom. I vaguely recall that, during this period, Tony played some cricket for de Havilland CC, although that may be a false memory. The impasse was resolved when his romantic rival chose to join Hatfield Hyde CC, allowing Tony’s suspension to be lifted and paving the way for his return to the fold. With the divorce settled, Tony purchased 27 Hare Lane, Hatfield, ready to embark on the next chapter of his life. With the Simson family’s involvement in our story at an end, this would appear to be an opportune moment to round up their fate. After retiring, Sydney and Bessie Lovey moved to the Welwyn Hatfield area to be closer to their daughter, Ivy. Bessie passed in 1969, and Sydney in 1972. Wasting little time after her divorce, Ann and the new man in her life were married in May 1985, and the following year she gave birth to a daughter, Hannah. Eric passed in 1987, and Ivy survived until 1994. Ann’s health deteriorated in her later years, and she died on 27 February 2018. Although only peripherally related to the events, I would like to say a word or two about Eric Simson. Eric was the archetypal clubman that every club needs to survive. Treasurer from 1948 until 1973, followed by a stint as 107

Chairman of the General Committee and then Club Chairman from 1975 until his death. It is hard to imagine that he did not encourage his son-inlaw to become immersed in club life. You would be hard-pressed to find someone with a bad word to be said of Eric. I only encountered Eric when he was performing his duties as Chairman, such as when he presented me with my 3rd XI player of the year award. Despite this passing acquaintance, on my 18th birthday, he presented me with a pair of batting gloves. This was no token gesture. They were of high quality and lasted me for many years. A Slight Return While the events just described unfolded in the background, Tony was enjoying a renaissance with the 1st XI. And not just as a player. Unfortunately, no summary or league table remains as evidence of how the 2nd XI had fared under his leadership; however, it was mentioned at the General Meeting that ‘The Second Eleven performed well and with a bit more luck could have finished in the top three.’ The 1st XI had performed poorly, and in the words of the club’s pre-season press release, ‘Hatfield Cricket Club have elected Tony Foster [as] Saturday skipper in a bid to revive the club's flagging league fortunes. The Ascots Lane-based club is determined to improve on last year’s Herts Selectaglaze Competition position, a disappointing 13th. Foster’s vast wealth of experience is sure to guide Hatfield towards a top ten position.’ It didn’t. The club finished the 1984 season in 11th place. It did wonders for his bowling, though, ending the season as the club’s leading wicket-taker with 75, his best return since his glory days in the early 1970s. In a neat symmetry, just as his rejuvenated batting the previous season made him the first player to score 20,000 runs for the club, wicket number 28 in 1984 marked yet another milestone, providing victim number 1,500 of his career. At this point, it is worth emphasising how far ahead of the field Tony was at this stage of his career. By the end of the 1984 season, he was 6,758 runs ahead of Eddie Wakeling and leading Frank Shepherd by 651 wickets. The 1st XI captaincy was retained for the 1985 season, but after that, with his fifties fast approaching, it was time to settle into life as a 2nd XI player, and, you would think, enter the twilight of his time as a cricketer. Of course, you would be wrong to think this, although, as far as records were concerned, there were some lean years ahead. In fairness, he was so far into uncharted territory that any new landmarks at this stage required a gargan108

tuan effort. Despite this, it can only be described as a lean spell when compared to the greatness that had gone before. Between 1986 and 1991, he finished in the top six of the batting averages five times and was runner-up twice. His bowling performances during this period were even more impressive. In the averages, he finished second in 1986, fourth in 1988, third in 1990, second in 1991, and third in 1992. This list omits the 1987 season, when, with 60 wickets taken at an average of 10.92, the lowest to date of his thirty-two-year playing career, Tony won the second bowling prize of his career after a gap of twenty-two years. This is the longest wait between prizes in the club’s history, surpassing Vic Dean’s twenty-year interlude from 1930 until a second bowling award arrived in 1950. Unlike Tony’s wait, Dean’s was interrupted by the inconvenience of World War II. This was also a busy time for Tony behind the scenes. After a year off in 1985, he returned to the role of Team Secretary for the 1986 and 1987 seasons. Having relinquished this position in 1988, he began his second spell as Chairman of the General Committee, which ended after the 1990 season. His appointment as Bar Secretary for the 1991 season would sound unlikely were it not for the fact that he replaced Alan ‘Shonsh' Johnson in the role. A ‘character’ if ever there was. Hertfordshire Seniors A mere thirty-two years after playing for Hertfordshire Colts, Tony entered a new phase in his cricketing journey and found himself representing the county once more. Upon turning fifty in January 1989, Senior’s cricket was still in its infancy and regarded as somewhat of a novelty. Always eager to champion the interests of Hatfield CC, Tony offered Ascots Lane as a home venue for Herts Over 50s, and I was among a smattering of club members who turned up expecting to enjoy a laugh at the expense of the old boys. Although there was a lack of pace bowling, the overall standard was better than expected. This highlights how much club cricket has evolved over the decades, as once upon a time, a player over the age of fifty was an oddity; today, clubs would struggle to survive without them. Tony was a pathfinder for Herts Seniors. In 1998, as an inevitable influx of younger players threatened his place in the eleven, he took the initiative to establish a second eleven. To ensure the success of the new team, he took on the role of captain, which he held until the end of the 2001 season. From here, a familiar pattern emerged. With many of the older players refusing to retire gracefully from the game, his next pet project was to help establish a Herts Over-60s side. Naturally, he captained it from its inception 109

in 2004 until 2006. Still, Hertfordshire’s cricketers refused to fade away, and to ensure his continued participation in representative cricket, along came the Over 70s, something that was inconceivable when I started playing the game. Although only sixty-nine, thanks to a quirk in the eligibility rules, surprise, surprise, Tony became its first captain from 2008 to 2013. The final chapter of his Hertfordshire career was a tour of Argentina in November 2015, and he left behind an impressive legacy. He played in the 1st XIs of the 50s side 35 times, the 60s side 48 times, and the 70s side 85 times. His overall record for the Seniors stands at an impressive 272 games, in which he took 304 wickets at an average of 24.40. Highlights of his time with the county include taking 6 wickets for 7 runs against Leicestershire 50s in 1991 and 7 for 47 against Surrey/Sussex 70s in 2009. A Second Bite at the Cherry The early 1990s produced two marriages among the Foster clan. Andy and Denise had gone their separate ways after David’s birth, and Andy had married in 1987. This proved to be a short-lived state of affairs, and the couple rekindled their friendship before finally marrying in June 1990, giving Tony another grandson, Aaron, in December of the same year. As for Tony himself, upon embarking on a cricket tour of Barbados with Hertfordshire Over 50s, Tony probably wasn’t expecting to meet his future wife, but that is precisely how he first laid eyes on Olive Tomaszek. Olive Jane Lane was born in Westerham, near Sevenoaks in Kent, but her story begins in what is now West London. In 1862, the year of John Thomas Lane Sr’s birth, Stanwell, Middlesex, was a peaceful village just south of the hamlet of Heathrow. Now, it lies mere yards from the southern runway of one of the busiest airports in the world. John Sr was the fourth child of William and Mary Lane, though their firstborn, Jane Maria, had died before John arrived. They did not remain in Stanwell for long, and by the time of their daughter Eliza Jane’s birth, they had moved a couple of miles east to Hatton Road, East Bedfont. The Lanes were a typically large family; however, John’s father passed away shortly before the arrival of his and Mary’s thirteenth child in 1874. By 1881, John Sr was working as a farm labourer, and in 1884, he married Susan Amelia Easden. A native of Brandenham, High Wycombe, she slipped under the radar of the 1881 census, making it impossible to determine when she arrived in the vicinity of John. At the time of the 1891 census, John was employed at a brewery, and the couple resided at 215 Lancaster Road, between Notting Hill & Ladbroke Grove Station (renamed as Lad110

broke Grove in 1939) and Latimer Road stations. One of life’s coincidences positioned them as near neighbours to Tony’s grandmother-in-law, Katherine, who lived in the Latimer Road area. In an era of large families, John and Susan remained childless, which is unlikely to have been a conscious lifestyle choice, suggesting that Susan was unable to conceive. Susan died, childless, in 1898, after fourteen years of marriage. John didn’t remain a widower for long. On 6 September 1901, his second wife, Jane, gave birth to a son and heir, John Thomas Lane. Frustratingly, I have been unable to find any record of John Sr and Jane’s wedding, so with her maiden name unknown, knowledge of Olive’s grandmother is limited, bordering on non-existent. All that is known is that she was born in either 1870 or 1871 in Netherton, Worcestershire. This is unfortunate, as it would be interesting to know how she came to travel over a hundred miles from a rural village in the West Midlands to the heart of metropolitan London. As is the way of things, knowledge tends to move in decades. Still employed in the brewing industry, but now as a drayman, and with the addition of two further sons, by 1911, John Sr and family had moved from west to north London and 369 Hornsey Road, Upper Holloway. Located to the west of Finsbury Park Station, the even-numbered houses are still standing, while number 369 has been demolished and replaced by flats. It was the next (known) move of the Lane family that was important to Olive’s existence. John Sr was still making a living from delivering beer, so it is possible that industry contacts led him to leave the hustle and bustle of London life for the tranquillity of the north Kent countryside. Come 1921, the Lanes were to be found in Westerham, a village approximately five miles to the west of Sevenoaks, living in Brewery Cottage. Despite its size, Westerham was the home to both the Swan Brewery and the Black Eagle Brewery; however, as Brewery Cottage is to be found close to Black Eagle Close, it is safe to assume that the latter employed him. As for John Jr, he would have finished his education some years previously and was at this time in gainful employment as a gas engine attendant for a timber merchant. Jane Lane passed away in 1926, while John Thomas Lane Sr was buried at St Mary the Virgin, Westerham, in 1937. Shifting to the other side of Olive’s family, we enter the familiar territory of North London. 37 Downham Road in De Beauvoir Town, situated between Islington and Hackney, to the north of the Regent’s Canal, was the home of William, an upholsterer, and Harriett Whitbread. The area, predominantly constructed in the Jacobethan style, was developed in the mid-19th century, mainly as part of a plan for a new town to entice affluent 111

residents. Olive’s grandfather, Alfred James Whitbread, the couple’s fifth child, was born in 1885. After leaving school, Alfred commenced an apprenticeship as an upholsterer, a vocation that was not to be a lifelong one. Ellen Blackborough, Olive’s maternal grandmother, was born in Haggerston, Shoreditch, on 28 April 1889, just a few miles from De Beauvoir Town. At that time, the family home was 127 Mansfield Street, which ran parallel to the Regent’s Canal on its southern side. The original properties have all been demolished, and the street has since been renamed Whiston Road. Her father, Richard, who had been a coffee mill maker when she was born, had become an engine driver for the gas works by 1901, and the family had moved the short distance to 304 Kingsland Road, which is now part of the A10. Number 304 stood next to Haggerston Station and was adjacent to De Beauvoir Town. As near neighbours, it would have been easy for Albert and Ellen’s paths to cross, and the couple married in early 1908. The newlyweds moved to 67 Cloudesley, Islington, a three-bedroom Georgian house that still stands, and buying it will set you back a couple of million pounds. Before the year was out, on 18 December 1908, Ellen Sr gave birth to Ellen Jr. These weren’t the only recent changes in the life of Alfred Whitbread, for he had also undertaken a change of profession, and was now an electrical engineer’s clerk. The big mystery is how Ellen Jr ended up close to John Jr. Acting Corporal Alfred Whitbread of the 2nd Battalion of the Northamptonshire Regiment, joined the ranks of the fallen in the First World War on 9 May 1917 and was laid to rest at Fort Pitt Military Cemetery in Rochester. His widow and their four children left London behind and, for reasons unknown, began a new life in Tatsfield, Surrey. Although they are in different counties, Tatsfield and Westerham are only three miles apart, today separated by the M25 motorway. It didn’t take Ellen Sr long to get over the loss of Alfred, and she soon found herself a younger man, whom she married in 1919. George Edward Burbage, born in Winchester in 1899, was as close in age to his step-daughter, Ellen Jr, as he was to his bride, Ellen Sr. They may have been conscious of the age-gap, for on the 1921 census, when they were living at Emily Road, George had added two years to his age, while Ellen had knocked a couple of of hers. John Thomas Lane Jr and Ellen Whitbread Jr tied the knot in the early months of 1928 in Tatsfield and established their home in Westerham. Before the summer sun had shone its final rays that year, the couple welcomed John Thomas Lane III into their lives. No one could accuse the Lane family of being imaginative when it came to naming their male offspring. Born on 112

12 June 1931, Olive was the couple’s second child. When war was declared on Nazi Germany on 3 September 1939, they were living at 11 The Green, Westerham, and Olive had been joined by two sisters, Rosemary Ellen (1935) and Margaret Edith (1938), with further additions, Peter (1944) and Wendy (1946), to follow. Because there were so many men named John Thomas Lane in Kent at that time, I have not been able to complete the story of Olive’s father. It appears, however, that Ellen Lane married her brother-in-law, George Lane, in 1960. When John, Jr, and Ellen died must unfortunately remain an unsolved quandary; however, it is known that Ellen Sr passed in 1961. What do we know about Olive’s life between the end of the Second World War and her first meeting with Tony in sun-soaked Barbados? In 1949, she married Jan Tomaszek. As there is no record of his birth in the United Kingdom and the assessment rests solely on his surname, he was likely a Polish national. If this assumption holds, then the theory is that he served in the Polish army and settled in this country after hostilities ceased. Together, they had two children: Marian, born shortly after their marriage in 1949, and Geoffrey John in 1957. As you can imagine, Jan Tomaszek is not a particularly common name in this country, so it is reasonable to assume that he is the same Jan Tomaszek who died in Devon in 1981. Whether this amounts to mistaken identity or not, Olive was back, assuming she ever left, in Kent by the time she met Tony, whom she married in 1992. Legendary Status Confirmed Tony was among the first generation of cricketers for whom there was meaningful life after fifty. I am grateful for this, as in the 1990s we found ourselves in the same elevens, and it was an education. In the dark days before the invention of satnav, I dread to think how many hours of my life were wasted being aimlessly driven around, hopelessly lost, trying to find an away ground. For this reason, I always vied to get in Tony’s car, as, with his experience, he knew where he was going! These lifts were informative. Countless hours were spent, I would say conversing, but it was mostly Tony talking and me listening, about the club, past and present, opposing clubs and players, and the dark arts of cricketing mind games. Despite his age, it was obvious that in his younger days, he must have been an extremely talented cricketer, although I was blissfully unaware of his career statistics. I don’t claim to have been a great captain (although I would (modestly) place myself above many others that I played under). But Tony was a major in113

fluence on my attitude to captaincy. Influenced but not overwhelmed. With Tony at first slip and me at mid-on, I was able to turn a blind eye to his gesticulations; however, when I needed a second opinion, Tony was my go-to man. We will come to Tony’s performances of the early 1990s in a moment, as it would do them an injustice to separate them from the following season’s endeavours. For now, let’s be content with a hat-trick of firsts. A disclaimer – unfortunately, for reasons that should not be dwelt on here, the playing records of Hatfield CC for 1985 are, for the most part, missing, so it is possible that all three of these landmarks were reached a year earlier than claimed. Officially, Tony entered the 1994 season with 1,990 wickets to his name, so (if he hadn’t done so already) he would have become the first, and only, bowler in the club’s history to hit the 2,000 mark. Only three others have taken 1,000. Later that season, another first, 25,000 runs, which, by the season’s end, had given him an 8,810 run lead over the competition. The following year, he became the first player in the club’s history to have held 500 catches. To this day, he is the only non-wicket-keeper to have done so. Coaching and Late Career Renaissance For me, it is a shame that Tony only became a qualified coach in 1995 and assumed responsibility for managing the club’s Colts sides. I was lucky enough to be coached by Henry Cutino, who oversaw a continuous flow of talent from 1973 to 1984. The only coaching tip that truly stayed with me throughout my playing career came from an impromptu lesson Tony gave me. Colts’ practice throughout my time was held on Monday evenings, which coincidentally was when groundwork was taking place. Henry was a one-man band, so when he supervised a net session, there was often some sitting around doing nothing. Tony approached our group and pulled a few of us aside for a brief fielding session, mainly focused on attacking the ball and then picking up and releasing in one smooth motion. Those who remember my limited ability will hopefully agree that this was the strongest part of my game. The relaunch of the Colts section in 1995, with Tony ably assisted by Ross Durkin, was encouraging enough for the club to re-enter the leagues the following season. However, this enthusiasm was temporarily dampened in 1997 when several of the club’s promising young players were persuaded to join Welwyn Garden City. This resulted in the under-15 XI withdrawing from the league and forced the rebuilding process to start over. After this 114

setback, the Colts grew stronger, and by the end of the decade, a new pipeline of talent helped to fill the adult teams. His Colts coaching team, later reinforced by Gareth Wynne and Ian Golder, had unearthed a wealth of talent by the time he retired from coaching in 2006. Two members of this group would later go on to represent the full Hertfordshire XI, but, sadly for Hatfield CC, they had already left the club to achieve this. The successful integration of Hatfield CC’s new tranche of youth into adult cricket was driven by Tony’s relentless desire for captaincy. In the same season (1998) that he helped establish the Herts Over 50s 2nd XI by offering his leadership, he also agreed to oversee the club’s newly reinstated 3rd XI. His seven-season tenure in this role set two additional club records. Uniquely in the club’s history, Tony remains the only player to have been elected captain of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd XIs. His final season as captain, 2004, marked the twenty-fifth of his career, a record that comfortably surpasses all others. Albeit his days as a 1st XI player were behind him, and he was in his fifties, his performances were still the envy of many a younger player. He began a remarkable run in 1991, scoring over 500 runs in a season eleven times over the next twelve years and amassing eleven fifties and two centuries in the process. Fittingly, Hatfield Hyde provided the opposition on 11 July 1999 when yet another milestone was reached. Presumably, I was a member of the Sunday 2nd XI that witnessed Tony’s knock of 52, unknowing that he had become the club’s first player to have reached the half-century mark for the 150th time. By the same measure, I was likely one of his teammates on Sunday, 14 September 1997, when he rolled back the years to score an unbeaten century against North Enfield. A poignant moment, as this was the 18th and final century he would score for the club. His 154th and final half-century, 50 not out, was scored at Broxbourne’s Mill Lane Close Ground on Saturday, 22 June 2002. (It was a very high-scoring match, so I’m assuming it was played on Broxbourne’s postage-stamp-sized second ground.) At the same time as he was enjoying this flurry of runs, an equally successful time was being had with the ball. In the thirteen seasons from 1991 to 2003, Tony took fifty or more wickets ten times. During this period, there were four hauls of seventy or more, which resulted in his being the club’s leading wicket-taker in 1993 (70), 1994 (75), 1999 (71), and 2000 (79). The last of these, aged 61, was his best return since 1975. The first forty-two years of his Hatfield career produced two bowling prizes. He followed this by heading the averages three times in a row from 1998 to 2000. In the final 115

season of this hat-trick, he produced an average of 10.11 runs per wicket, the best of his long career. Talking of hat-tricks… After taking one hat-trick in forty-four years, in 2000, he took two in the space of seven days! First up was against Bayford & Hertford II on Sunday, 25 June, swiftly followed by Southgate Adelaide III six days later on Saturday, 1 July, when he returned figures of seven for 15! Incidentally, this made Tony only the fourth Hatfield player to record a hat-trick (or more) of hat-tricks. It’s hard to imagine that in his 46th season playing for the club, Tony was still capable of achieving career firsts. And yet, on Sunday, 6 May 2001, against Botany Bay II, he did just so. In all probability, he was also incidentally involved in what, at the time, at least, was the highest aggregate of years involved in a Hatfield wicket. I’m positive that I wasn’t playing, and it is hard to imagine a team selection that required the sixty-two-year-old Tony Foster to don the gloves behind the stumps! On the plus side, this allowed him to complete the only stumping of his career, off the bowling of Ian Cope. Ian, then a sprightly sixty-one, gave them a combined age of 123. There was still more to come. 2002 provided a double first. First up was on Sunday, 21 July, when against Southgate Adelaide II at Ascots Lane, he snared the 2,500th victim of his long career. He was the first bowler to do so, and, realistically, there is no likelihood of anyone else doing so. Less than a month later, on Saturday, 17 August, against Chorleywood III, Tony scored his 30,000th run for the club. Again, he was the first player to do so, although Keven Whitehead has since joined him in this feat. In addition to the three bowling prizes already mentioned during this period, the awards continued to accumulate. Had the 1st XI Player of the Year existed in 1956, who knows how many times Tony might have won it? Despite his advancing years, he received the prize for 2nd XI Player in 1994 and 1998, and for 3rd XI Player in 2000 and 2002. Before that, in recognition of his tireless efforts with the Colts, he was awarded his 4th and 5th Club Prizes in 1995 and 1996. Not quite the swan song, but to conclude this run of silverware, in 2004, Tony marked his final season as captain of the 3rd XI by collecting his sixth bowling prize – his fourth in seven years. Although it has since been surpassed, he was the first to reach this number of awards. While Tony was busy expanding his trophy cabinet, a moment of sadness touched his life. His widowed mother, Mary, who had moved to Dalbeattie in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, died in 2003 at the age of 90. 116

For reasons unknown, her funeral was held across the border in Carlisle. The Beginning of the End Everyone at the club was saddened to learn, in July 2005, of the passing of Olive Foster at the age of 74. They had been a perfect match, and the years that they were together were the happiest that I had known Tony. Understandably, this hit Tony hard, and he was visibly shocked in the immediate aftermath. Two things stick in my mind about the funeral, or more accurately, the wake held at the Ascots Lane Clubhouse. Tony and Olive had developed a keen interest in naturism, and upon entering the clubhouse, mourners were greeted by a collage of photographs showcasing the pair, many of which depicted them in various states of undress. Their neighbours must have dreaded the onset of summer. The service at West Herts Crematorium in Garston took place in the morning, and if my memory serves me right, the wake commenced at midday. On what was an emotional and challenging day, Tony was hesitant to return to his now-empty home. Accompanied by John McCarthy and Keven Whitehead, we continued drinking and reminiscing with Tony until the midsummer sun dipped below the horizon, after which he reluctantly agreed to call it a night. It’s probably best if I don’t elaborate on how we all got home. For my sins, I spent the following day indoors with the curtains drawn, unable to cope with the daylight! The 2005 season was Tony’s 50th as a player, yet he still showed no sign of losing his desire to compete. As he got older, his ability to score runs diminished; however, his wile was still sufficiently intact to allow him to outfox batters less than a third of his age. If proof is required, it can be seen in his bowling average for the 2007 season of 11.41, the third lowest of his career. The following year, his seventieth on this planet, she secured his seventh bowling prize for the club. Between times, he somewhat reluctantly agreed to take another role at the club, without relinquishing his cherished club captaincy. With the club in shock at the loss of its Chairman, Ian Cope, in February 2006, Tony agreed to assume the position, but only on the proviso that he would stand aside as soon as a more suitable candidate could be identified. It would be more accurate to suggest he meant as soon as a more willing candidate came forward. His spell as Chairman lasted from the March AGM until the October GM, when Alan Dudman relieved him of his duties. When a septuagenarian, remarkably, Tony continued to play every Sat117

urday (weather permitting) into the next decade, and following the merger of Hatfield CC and Hatfield Crusaders CC, he experienced the novelty of playing in the 4th and 5th XIs. This came with benefits, and after the inaugural season of the merged club in 2013, he was awarded the 5th XI Player of the Year trophy. This was the twenty-fourth and final club prize he had secured. It is a testament to Tony’s love for the game that even the onset of Parkinson’s disease failed to draw a veil over his career. Somehow, despite his condition visibly affecting him, he continued to take wickets regularly. His main motivation was likely a determination to see out the 2015 season, which would be his sixtieth for the club. Bank Holiday Monday, 31 August 2015, was set aside as a day of celebration. The main element of the day was to be a cricket match between a Tony Foster XI and an XI composed of various teammates of Tony’s from across the years. While I was honoured to be selected to play, despite having hung up my boots two years earlier, I was secretly relieved when heavy rain forced the game to be cancelled. The dinner, at which Tony was presented with a silver salver to commemorate the occasion, went ahead as planned, and, to be fair, the absence of cricket allowed more time for socialising and reminiscing between former comrades. In appreciation of Tony’s contribution to the club over six decades, the clubhouse was renamed the Tony Foster Pavilion – a fitting honour for a tireless servant. The final honour bestowed upon Tony in his sixtieth season was to be chosen as a captain for the traditional end-of-season match, the Married Men versus the Single Men. On this occasion, widower Tony was entrusted with leading the nuptial members’ XI. Fittingly and predictably, for the umpteenth time in his career, as the winning captain, Tony was presented with the cup after the match. In an ideal world, Tony would have chosen to continue playing cricket until he had breathed his last. Fate had other ideas, and a prostate cancer diagnosis forced his hand. In his sixty-first season, he still managed to appear six times, but his declining health prevented him from bowling – a poignant close to a brilliant career. A clubman to the end, Tony continued to attend matches at Ascots Lane every Saturday, accompanied by his new companion, Rita Parker. Given his declining health, it is a minor miracle that, with Tony driving, they arrived at the ground and returned home in one piece. Life is a cruel mistress. In 2022, when I was researching the book Parklife: Hatfield Estate Cricket Club 1946-1978, and badgering him for snippets of information, he was the most 118

lucid he had been for years. It was always my hope that he would have read the finished product, but it was always a race against time. Sadly, time won. Early in 2023, Rita discovered Tony in a state of unconsciousness, and his subsequent state of health was such that he was to spend the remainder of his days in care. The end came on Wednesday, 28 February 2024. Hours before his death, his final visitors had been former teammates Adrian Bonner and Alan Dudman. We said our final goodbyes to Tony on Tuesday, 2 April, at the Oak Hill Lawn Crematorium in Hatfield. Tony’s influence on my cricket journey was so significant that when Andy asked if the obituary I posted on the club’s website could be used as part of the eulogy, it was not only a no-brainer, but an honour. After I had bowed my head to his coffin to the sound of Dreadlock Holiday by 10cc, as you would expect, we headed to the Tony Foster Pavilion at Ascots Lane to raise a glass, or two, or three, in honour of the great man. Legacy How do you summarise that? The statistics show that Tony is the most prolific all-rounder in the club’s history. With the bat, he scored 31,564 runs. Only Keven Whitehead, a specialist batsman, has surpassed this, and nobody else has, or is likely to, reach the 20,000 mark. Likewise, only Keven can better Tony’s record of 154 innings of fifty or more, and Tony is 60 clear of third place. With the ball, there is nobody to touch him. His total of 2,893 wickets is over 1,000 more than the closest contender. Excluding wicketkeepers, his record as a catcher is even more exemplary. For an outfielder, the 605 catches he held are more than double the next best. It was an impossible task for his son, Andy, to live up to that, but he made a decent fist of it and is a member of the select band of Hatfield CC players to have scored 5,000 runs and taken 500 wickets. But he was more than just an outstanding talent on the cricket field. His election as a club official for sixty consecutive years tells only part of the story. Beyond his formal responsibilities, Tony gave countless hours of his own time to maintaining the club’s facilities. From odd jobs in the clubhouse and general groundwork to perimeter maintenance and tending the garden by the pavilion entrance, he was always a willing volunteer. Clubs need people like Tony. 119

120Hatfield Estate Sunday XI vs. Old Fincunians 12 August 1956: Tony is sixth from the left (glasses). Also in picture, future sister-in-law, Sandra Simson, and father-in-law, Eric Simson (wicket-keeper). This was one of Tony’s earliest games for the club.The 2015 Married vs Single XIs in front of the Tony Foster Pavilion. Tony’s final match at Ascots Lane.

121Ann Foster, Tony Foster, and Sandra Jones (neé Simson) at Hatfield Park.

122Budding cricketer Andy Foster

123A slightly older Andy Foster playing for Hatfield Estate CC Colts. [I think that’s me in the red shorts, obscured by my mother]

124Tony offering some words of wisdom to Hatfield CC colts. [Picture courtesy of Stephen Cope]

125With pint in hand, a post-match debrief at Ascots Lane. [Picture courtesy of Stephen Cope]

126Club Chairman Alan Dudman presenting Tony with the 5th XI Player of the Year award in 2013, the final individual award of his illustrious career. [Picture courtesy of John McCarthy]

127Tony being presented with the Married vs Single cup by John McCarthy in 2015 [Picture courtesy of John McCarthy]

128The presentation of a silver salver to commemorate Tony’s 60th season. [Picture courtesy of John McCarthy]

129Tony, Aaron, Jillian, David, and Andy Foster in front of the newly named Tony Foster Pavilion. [Picture courtesy of John McCarthy]

HATFIELD CRICKET CLUB NEWSLETTER JULY 1990 MY FIRST GAME FOR THE CLUB by Tony Foster Appalled by the prospect of further reminiscences of David Cross’s life and unexciting times, Tony looks back to 1956. 1956, not 1856, as has sometimes been suggested. Being a modest chap, I have been ignoring the hints dropped in the past newsletters, as after all this time, I can only remember a few personal details, but I have been finally persuaded to put pen to paper to recall mainly the times, but at least some of my first game for the club. In those dim and distant days, HCC ran two Saturday XIs and one Sunday team, and it was the policy that all newcomers should play their first game in the 1st XI so that the committee and selectors could assess their ability. The committee was made up mainly of good-class cricketers who also did most of the work (some things change, but others do not). The previous weekend I had been selected as 12th man on both days, but fate conspired to ensure all were available and turned up. Date: June 1956 Opponents: Northampton Exiles * Venue: Hatfield Park As a spotty, short-sighted youth (still two out of three), I thought that the opposition had travelled down from Northampton to see how southern aristocrats played country house cricket. The atmosphere 130

was certainly different from school cricket, which was all that I had played, what with a flat wicket, a mown outfield that was lightning fast and some less than athletic fielders. I finally entered the arena at 3.45 with Hatfield Estate and Town on 100-5, to start the first of many partnerships with the club skipper, Mike Russell. By tea, we had taken the score to 210, of which I made 53, in a partnership which became the club record for that wicket (I told you I was modest). I don't remember whether or not I bowled or the result or that night in particular, but I recall many of its type. We still had a bar in the grounds of the Park (now part of the catering facilities), and with such privacy, late-night drinking was always a temptation. Not wishing to cast aspersions on some sorely missed people, the likes of Albert Hudson, Eric and Roy Simson, Walter Whitby, Mike Russell and Norman Randall were not always too keen to leave before the lodge keepers shut the park gates at 10 pm. This meant that we had to creep past the Old Palace to the cemetery wall and climb (bikes and all) into the church grounds at the top of Fore Street. As quiet as drunk people always are, we were rarely challenged, but I'm sure that it was one of the reasons why restrictions in the park got tighter. We were eventually forced to move the bar into Park Street, firstly opposite the Eight Bells and then past the Horse and Groom near the viaduct. This was a pleasant, well-appointed bar with one major drawback in that we could not guarantee the opposition coming back once they left the Park. Eventually, Ken Golding, who was emerging as a leading light in the Club's management, contacted Lord Salisbury about improving facilities in the Park with a separate entrance. It was rather a shock to find that his lordship had an alternative proposal that we should leave the park altogether, as it was becoming a danger to the growing number of visitors. This precipitated our move to Ascots Lane after inspecting a number of other sites – the horse field by the roundabout at Welham Green Station and over the railway tracks from Mollem's Sports Ground (now the Mitsubishi offices) – this move is a story in itself for another day. The first game at Ascots Lane was the Marrieds vs. Singles of 1976. We were all apprehensive about how the wicket would behave, but were determined to play even though the clubhouse was not ready. (I told you that some things don't change). I had the honour of skippering the married side, and as usual, they won 131

comfortably. The game was a statistician's dream (first six, first wicket, etc, on the ground), but I suffered the indignity of hitting the donkey drop, given traditionally to all skippers, straight to square leg. A Foster ct M Ford b D Curtis… 0 * It was, in fact, Northampton Polytechnic. 132

Epilogue: All Things Must PassOn Sunday, 25 August 2024, the club staged The Tony Foster Memorial Cricket Match, an inter-club affair between elevens consisting of former teammates of Tony’s to celebrate his life. The number of familiar faces who visited the ground on the day was a testament to the high regard in which he was held. Such was the success of the day that the General Committee has decided to make this an annual event. In time, a fitting and lasting memorial to Tony will be unveiled, funded by a generous bequest in his Will. Sadly, but inevitably, in time, no matter how good a player someone is, eventually, they will be forgotten. It is not out of a lack of respect; it is only natural that people identify with players that they have played with or have seen play. It is for this reason that polls conducted to determine the greatest anything of all time are meaningless, as they are by nature skewed in favour of the modern. Professional players have the chance to achieve sporting immortality, but what hope does a club player have of being remembered once their career ends? The clubhouses of Hatfield Cricket Club have been adorned by an Honours Board erected as a memorial to Walter Whitby. How many of the current members have ever read the plaque with his dedication? If they have, it’s unlikely that their interest was genuinely piqued as to who Walter was and why he was deemed worthy of such a tribute. The problem is that even if they were interested, who could they ask? Walter died in 1968, and Tony Foster was the last actively involved club member who would have remembered him. A lot of time has passed. David Sankey is the last remaining ex-player from the 1960s with any ongoing connection to the club, and the start of his career coincided with the close of Walter’s. This is not a criticism. I was just as guilty as anyone. Walter had died before I was born, so why would I be interested? From its unveiling in 1971 until sometime in the 2000s, a photograph of Walter was displayed next to the board, accompanied by details of his family, some of whom had also been involved in the club many years ago. Yet, all I knew of Walter was that he held the club record for the highest number of wickets taken in a season. I now understand that he was an archetypal clubman. His best days as a player belonged to his youth; however, he continued to play for two decades after the Second World War, captaining the Sunday XI for eight seasons, later becoming an umpire. Throughout, he was an active committee member and helped establish the club’s Colts’ Section. Walter was an exceptionally popular member of the club. After his death, besides the Honour’s 133

Board, the Club Prize was renamed the Walter Whitby Prize, and it was proposed that if the club ever managed to build a pavilion, it should be named after him. The cup bearing his name has long since disappeared, and although only a decade had passed, by the time the club moved to Ascots Lane, the idea of the Walter Whitby Pavilion had been long forgotten. Time is fleeting. When Charles Lambert took ten wickets in an innings for the third time in his career on 28 July 1894, it was a feat worth publishing in a national magazine and the London Evening Standard. Over a decade later, none of Lambert’s contemporaries was still playing for the club. Obituaries after his death only mentioned his real tennis achievements. Within the club, knowledge of his exploits probably faded with the death of William Groom in 1908. It was not until 1957, when the club sought historical records of cricket in Hatfield, that details of Lambert’s achievement reemerged, with a nephew of Lambert contacting H J Gray, the club’s Hon. Secretary. When the club’s records were gathered, Lambert’s feats had either not been recognised or were deemed too distant in the past to be included. With what is known of his on-field exploits, one can only assume that Ernest Elliott’s reputation was immense during his playing days. And yet… by the time cricket recommenced after the war, all that remained of his contemporaries were a few who would have been teenagers when Shoppy was fifty years old. As far as recognition was concerned, he probably lived too long. By the time he died, his exploits on the cricket and football fields were so distant that they were never going to trouble the pages of the local press. One young aspiring cricketer who recalled watching Elliott was H J Gray, and although he had not seen him in his prime or fully understood the true greatness of his achievements, he still wrote of him in glowing terms. With Gray’s passing, so passed the last memories of Elliott as a player. How long will Tony’s exploits on the cricket field be remembered? One advantage held over Lambert and Elliott is that the club maintains detailed statistics of the post-war era, so no one who played with him is in any doubt of his achievements. There are few cricket clubs the size of Hatfield that have had so much written about them. In a small way, this gives its legends their slice of immortality. 134

Bonus Legend No. 1. 1801-1850 – William StocksIn the introduction to this book, the notion of selecting a ‘legend’ from the first half of the nineteenth century was dismissed as impractical. The thing is… as difficult as it may be, this was an era when the club’s reputation within Hertfordshire, at least, was, if declining, still high. It therefore stands to reason that Hatfield’s outstanding player of this period deserves to be recognised as one of its ‘legends’. If nothing else, the brevity of this chapter will demonstrate why the main body of this work was restricted to three ‘legends’. Issues encountered in identifying Charles Lambert’s grandparents were exacerbated in the case of Stocks, as his parents also lived out their lives before official records began. Thankfully, it was not a complete dead end, and some basic details have emerged. Surprisingly, it has been possible to identify William Stock’s maternal grandparents as Richard and Mary (née Pilgrim) Perrott. At least that may have been their surname, for alas, we are at the mercy of those who transcribed the parish records of St Etheldreda’s Church, Hatfield. It has at various times been deciphered as Perott, Parrett, and Purrott; however, these may all be incorrect, as the register also shows the names Perrot, Parratt, Parrott, Parrat, and Parrot being prevalent in Hatfield dating back to the late seventeenth century. Considering the poor literacy standards of the time, it is understandable to see such variations, as many of these individuals likely never saw their names written down. It was difficult to determine Richard’s year of birth with confidence. The most plausible candidate identified is Richard Purrett (another spelling variation), baptised on 20 April 1731 in the parish of St Peter’s, St Albans. This possibility stands out because at that time St Peter’s parish stretched eastwards to what is now the A1(M). There is a little more clarity with Mary, whose age was quoted on her burial record, so it can be said that she was born circa 1739. The question of her birthplace is entirely different. No one with that surname was recorded in Hatfield before Richard and Mary’s marriage on 11 September 1759 at St Etheldreda’s. However, a Pilgrim family was present in Codicote at the time of her birth. It should come as no surprise from the pages preceding this that the couple’s firstborn, Sarah, who was baptised on 13 April 1760, arrived less than nine months after the wedding. With the parish register as the only guidance, the evidence suggests that the Perrotts were a relatively small family. Four further children followed, spread across a period of sev135

enteen years. Of interest to us is child number four, William’s mother, Elizabeth, who was baptised on 25 February 1768. Little else is known of the Perrott family, other than that Mary died aged 73, and was buried on 17 December 1812, and Richard was interred on either 25 January 1782 or 6 April 1786. If only this much were known of William’s father’s family. The marriage of Thomas Stock and Elizabeth Perrott at St Etheldreda’s Church on 27 September 1784 was the first mention of the name Stocks in a Hatfield context. Alas, the place of Thomas’s birth must remain a mystery, as does the identity of his parents. It wasn’t long before the happy couple welcomed Thomas Jr into the world, but happiness soon turned to despair, and the infant child was buried on 15 January 1787, fourteen months after he was christened. Before the year was out, a daughter, Sarah, was born, followed by Elizabeth Mary (bap. 1790), Thomas Jr, the 2nd (bap. 1792), Richard (bap. 1795), and Charles (bap. 1797). Although there is no record of his death, it must be presumed that Charles died prematurely, as the couple had another child of the same name baptised two years later. There were two more siblings, Joseph (bap. 1802) and Mary Purrott (bap. 1803), before William entered the scene. William was baptised on Sunday, 15 November 1807 in St Etheldreda’s, and his place of birth proved, at first, to be confusing, as it wasn’t Hatfield, or indeed, Hertfordshire. As luck would have it, the only thing known of Thomas Stocks was that his occupation was as a drummer in the militia. The chapter on Charles Lambert gave a brief résumé of the history of the Hertfordshire Militia, so I thought that it would be interesting to have a look at what the militia was up to during Thomas’s days. It was a fortuitous decision. The Hertfordshire Militia Part 2. An unlikely combination of the Hertfordshire Militia, the War of American Independence, and James Cecil (1748-1823), who was Viscount Cranborne at the time, later becoming the 7th Earl Salisbury in 1780 and the 1st Marquess of Salisbury in 1789, was responsible for Thomas Stock’s arrival in Hatfield. The Hertfordshire Militia was called out in May 1778, following the outbreak of the American War of Independence, in response to the invasion threat posed by France and Spain, allies of the Americans. During the summer of 1778, the Hertfordshire Militia was stationed at Coxheath Camp near Maidstone, Kent. This was the army’s largest training camp, 136

where inexperienced militia units trained alongside regular troops within a divisional structure. This reserve was intended to provide support in case of a French invasion of South East England. The Hertfordshires, under Colonel Lord Cranborne, formed part of the Right Wing under Major-General William Amherst. Each battalion was equipped with two small field pieces, or ‘battalion guns’, manned by men of the regiment, instructed by a Royal Artillery sergeant, and two gunners. In June 1780, during the Gordon Riots, an anti-Catholic demonstration, the regiment was camped in Hyde Park and deployed on the streets of London. In October 1783, the Hertfordshire Militia was disbanded after the American War ended with a peace treaty. To help his discharged men re-enter civilian life, the Earl of Salisbury (as he had become) employed two hundred of them on the improvements he was making to his Hatfield estate. Between 1784 and 1792, a period of national peace, the militia continued its 28-day annual training. However, to save money, only two-thirds of the men were called out each year. However, trouble was brewing across the English Channel (or, to piss off the little Englanders, La Manche). The militia was summoned again in January 1793, just before Revolutionary France declared war on Britain. In February, the Hertfordshire Militia was embodied at St Albans, still under the command of the Marquess of Salisbury. During the French Wars, the militia were employed throughout the country for coast defence, manning garrisons, guarding prisoners of war, and ensuring internal security. The regulars regarded them as a valuable source of trained men if they could be persuaded to transfer. Their traditional local defence duties were taken over by the part-time Volunteers and mounted Yeomanry. In March 1793, the Hertfordshire Militia was deployed to the Sevenoaks area, later moving to Ipswich and Warley. They returned to winter quarters around Hertford in October. In May 1794, it marched out again, spending the summer under canvas on Warley Common. It was billeted in the Chelmsford area for the winter. The steep rise in food prices in 1795 caused trouble in many militia regiments. During the year, the Hertfordshires were involved in food riots while stationed in Chichester. In June 1795, the regiment was part of a large camp at Warley, Essex, under Lt-Gen Cornwallis. In April 1797, the Hertfordshires were stationed at Harwich in Essex and provided a guard of honour when the Prince of Wurttemberg arrived by sea to marry Princess Charlotte. Returning to Ipswich in 1797, the regiment moved to Reading Street Barracks at Ashford, Kent, where it remained until October 1799, when it marched to 137

Beaconsfield. In a fresh attempt to have as many men as possible under arms for home defence, the Government created the Supplementary Militia. This compulsory levy required men to be trained in their spare time and incorporated into the Militia in emergencies. Hertfordshire’s additional quota was fixed at 500 men, bringing the establishment of its regiment up to 1,060. In May 1800, the regiment was stationed in the St Albans area to participate in a Royal Review at Hatfield, after which it moved to Colchester. In July 1801, it was sent to guard the large Prisoner-of-war camp at Norman Cross. In December 1801, it went into winter quarters in the Hertford District until it was disbanded in April 1802, following the Treaty of Amiens. The Peace of Amiens was short-lived, and the regiment was re-embodied at St Albans in May 1803. In 1804, it was stationed at Ipswich, and during the summer of 1805, when Napoleon was massing his ‘Army of England’ at Boulogne for a projected invasion, the Hertfordshires, with 514 men in ten companies under Lt-Col Robert Chester, were at Ipswich Barracks. They were part of a militia brigade under Lt-Gen Lord Charles Fitzroy. The regiment remained in East Anglia until July 1808, when it moved to Sunderland and later Hull. It returned to Ipswich in October 1809. This is a very roundabout way of explaining how William Stocks came to be born in Ipswich, Suffolk. This generation of the family was completed with the arrival of a younger sister, Rachel, who was baptised on 18 March 1810. She did not survive into adulthood and was buried on 17 June 1821. The Dark Ages Details of cricket matches from the first half of the nineteenth century are scarce, affecting not only Hatfield Cricket Club but also cricket clubs in general. The main reason for this is that newspapers are the primary source of information. Publications at the time were considerably more slender than those of today, with half a dozen pages being par for the course, so with only limited space available, cricket was not an automatic choice. Given the limited number of matches played each year, the uncertainty of coverage, and the scarcity of surviving archived material, it’s perhaps a miracle that so much has survived. Perhaps surprisingly, much of what is known of Hatfield CC from this period is to be found in a London publication, Bell’s Life in London and Sporting Chronicle. Principally a source of racing news, Bell’s Life was a weekly sporting paper published as a pink broadsheet between 1822 and 1886, a forerunner of the late-lamented Pink ‘Un, a must for foot138

ball fans on a Saturday evening in the days before the internet and rolling news. When Stocks made his debut for Hatfield is a difficult question to answer confidently. Added to the possibility that no match report survives of his first appearance is the complication that Thomas Jr was also a cricketer, and frustratingly, it was all too common for newspapers to omit players’ initials. It was not until the mid-eighteen-twenties that ‘regular’ news of Hatfield CC began to emerge, and Stocks opened the batting against Islington Albion (a leading club of the day) on Tuesday, 5 July 1825 at Hatfield Park. It’s impossible to determine which brother this was. It is, though, beyond doubt, that William was playing by 1826, as both brothers were in the side that was comprehensively beaten by Welwyn CC on 11-12 September. It was a miserable performance. In losing the two-innings match by 167 runs, Hatfield were dismissed for scores of 40 and 75. Not a single Hatfield batter managed double figures in the first innings; however, William could console himself with the knowledge that he was one of three men to do so in the second. Stocks would have been classified as an all-rounder, although it is important to bear in mind that runs were at a premium in the nineteenth century and half-centuries a rarity. When Stocks learnt the art of bowling, underarm was still the order of the day. Attempts to introduce roundarm deliveries were first made, without success, in the 1790s. Subsequently, in 1816, the laws of the game were amended explicitly to prohibit them: The ball must be bowled (not thrown or jerked) and be delivered underhand, with the hand below the elbow. But if the ball be jerked, or the arm extended from the body horizontally, and any part of the hand be uppermost, or the hand horizontally extended when the ball is delivered, the Umpires shall call, ‘No Ball’. Matters came to a head in the 1820s. John Willes, a keen proponent, opened the bowling for Kent against the MCC at Lord’s on 15 July 1822 and was promptly no-balled for using his roundarm action. Since 1807, he had made several attempts to introduce the style. For Willes, being noballed on this occasion was the final straw. He reportedly threw the ball away and withdrew from the match, literally going straight to his horse and riding away. He refused to play again in any important fixture. In 1826, Sussex were considered the best team in England and their success owed much to the prowess of two top-class bowlers, William Lillywhite and Jem Broadbridge, both of whom were champions of the roundarm style when they could get away with it. In 1827, to test the validity of roundarm bowl139

ing, three All-England v. Sussex roundarm trial matches were arranged. Lillywhite and Broadbridge used roundarm with great effect, to the disdain of the England batters. The batters were losing the argument, so in 1828 the MCC amended Rule 10 to allow bowlers to raise their hand as high as their elbow. Despite the limited nature of this change, Lillywhite, Broadbridge, and their ilk continued to bowl at shoulder height, with the umpires declining to no-ball them. Powerless to resist the rising tide, in 1835, the MCC amended the laws to make it legal, with the relevant law stating: If the hand be above the shoulder in the delivery, the umpire must call ‘No Ball’. It wasn’t long before bowlers’ hands began to rise above the shoulder, prompting the 1835 Law to be reinforced in 1845 by removing the benefit of the doubt from the bowler regarding his hand height when delivering the ball. What did this change mean for the average club player? When writing about the Hatfield bowlers of the eighteen-hundreds, I have often been curious about whether they used underarm, roundarm, or overarm deliveries. Stock’s approach to cricket was not affected by the legalisation of roundarm bowling, for in a 1851 match report, he was described as an ‘underhand’ bowler. Backtracking slightly, as a wicket-taker, Stocks was off the mark, dismissing three of the Welwyn batters in the first innings. A Hertfordshire Lad? The Hertfordshire County Cricket Club, as we know it, was established in 1876. Before this, there was the County of Hertford. Playing home matches at No Man’s Land Common (Nomansland), Wheathampstead, the club had no official status, no affiliated clubs, and no membership. This wasn’t in itself unusual, as county clubs as we know them today did not exist, and their fixture list pitted them against club sides rather than other counties. Hatfield CC’s relationship with the county side was deep-rooted, with the first known fixture between the two played in 1790, with matches continuing for five decades. It stands to reason that, if the club were good enough to compete with the county as equals, then its players would have been good enough to represent the county. The county had played against the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) on 22 June 1814, which, famously, was the first fixture to be staged at the current Lord’s Cricket Ground, and they made a return visit on 3-4 August 1835, to face the same opposition. 140

The Hertfordshire team included a player named Stocks (no initial). The question, though, is, was this William? A clue appeared in the Hertfordshire Mercury on 8 September 1835, but it is perhaps unreliable. It was a report on a match played at No Man’s Land between an eleven raised by Lord Grimston from the south-west part of the county, and the Hon. Spencer Cowper from the north-west. The geography is a little skewed, and from the handful of identifiable players, the XI of Lord Grimston, from Gorhambury, St Albans, appears to cover the Watford, St Albans, Hemel Hempstead area. Our interest, therefore, is with the north-west, whose XI included Edward Thomas Daniell (1815-1875) from Little Berkhampsted, who made occasional appearances for Hatfield, which was at the southern end of the area (Potters Bar was in Middlesex), which would have included Hitchin in the north. Spencer Cowper was a nephew of the then Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne (1779-1848) (Henry William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne), and the youngest son of the 5th Earl Cowper. With the family seat of the Cowpers being Panshanger Park, it is possible that players from Hertford, now considered to be in East Herts, were also in the equation. On this occasion, the allocation of players’ initials was plentiful; however, not all may have been correct. The reason for saying this is that the first six in the line-up were attributed the initial ‘J’. Although not implausible, it would be a hell of a coincidence. From a Hatfield CC perspective, three of these players are of interest, namely Hammond, Farr, and Stocks. These would be expected to be Thomas, William, and Thomas. It doesn’t help that they had brothers called Joseph Hammond, John Farr, and, of course, William’s brother Joseph, who had been living in Hertford from at least 1820. There is no record of any of these brothers playing cricket, but the proviso must be added that details of relatively few matches from the era survive. The match itself was a thriller. Hertfordshire held a two-run advantage after the first innings, and eventually limped over the line to win by two wickets. Stocks, with ten runs, was one of only two batters reaching double figures. Unfortunately, because of the way in which cricket scorecards were reproduced in the newspapers at this time, it is impossible to confidently state how many wickets could be attributed to each bowler. All that can be said is that Stocks, whoever he was, took at least two wickets in the first innings and one in the second. There is, however, no question that William’s form at this time merited selection. Less than a week after the match at Lord’s, although he ended up 141