“My baby milk was diluted with cricket.”
Maurice Tate
FAMILY RESPECTABILITY JUST about maintained, Maurice William Tate was born at 28 Warleigh Road, Brighton, on 30th May 1895. It was the hottest May day for 27 years, the temperature reaching 86.2 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. The reason for leaving the marriage until just one day before Maurice’s birth will probably never be known. Did Fred prevaricate over his commitments? Was he frogmarched there by the Beaches? Of course, the exact birth date cannot be predicted, but Gertrude’s waters might even have been breaking by the time of the ceremony.
Whatever the situation, Fred took three weeks off work after the birth, not appearing for Sussex again until 20th June. This may have followed an offer of compassionate leave on the club’s part, or a granting of the player’s request for time off to sort out his affairs. It may even have been an attempt to allow the scandal, or near-scandal, to blow over. But, like his mother Sarah, who had not abandoned him in 1867, Fred did the right thing.
Throughout his life Maurice’s date of birth was wrongly listed as 28th April 1895, rather than 30th May. It was a mistake which, had anybody bothered to investigate, would have made him appear to have been born out of wedlock. There is the possibility that the birth certificate was forged to hide such a fact, but this is unlikely, and certainly unprovable. And, if the family had gone to such lengths to avoid disgrace, why would they then mention the earlier date? It is most strange.
Maurice was baptised on 25th August, in Preston parish, a quiet area then on the outskirts of Brighton. No godparents were listed as present. It was all rather low-key for a well-known sportsman and the daughter of a prominent family.
The baby’s middle name William was a Tate tradition. Conveniently, it was also Gertrude’s father’s name. The forename Maurice was after Fred’s vicar friend and mentor FLP Maurice. It derives from the word ‘Moorish’, the European description of the African Muslims who ruled much of Spain for more than 700 years during the Middle Ages. Its meaning is ‘dark-skinned’, one of the physical characteristics for which the perma-tanned Maurice, exposed to more sunshine than most, later became known.
The Anglo-Scottish surname Tate comes from the Old Norse word ‘teitr’, meaning ‘glad’ or ‘cheerful’. The Tates, fittingly for believers in nominative determinism, were outwardly happy folk, Fred never one to complain about his lot, at least in public. The deferential nature of the gentleman-player system of the time precluded too much moaning, and he was, after all, getting paid for doing a fulfilling, in its own way rather glamorous, job. It was certainly better than the workhouse.
County professionals of the late 19th century were not well remunerated, but they earned more than manual and even skilled labourers. Warleigh Road was one of the elegant, recently built streets full of spacious terraced houses constructed in what were then the outskirts of a rapidly expanding Brighton and Hove. The population had increased by more than half between 1861 and 1891, going from 88,361 to 136,419.
A fading plaque still commemorates number 28’s once-famous connection. It seems like a comfortable place to be born. Yet Fred was not the owner. That role fell to William Leppard, who offered lodgings, the name of the building being Arundel House. It was a relatively anonymous setting for young parents who did not wish to be seen by friends and neighbours. Leppard probably made a living out of being discreet.
Young Maurice’s time in Brighton was short as, replete with the takings of a record Sussex benefit of £1,051 in 1901, Fred bought the Burrell Arms in Haywards Heath. He and Gertrude became publicans, part of a long tradition of playing ‘mine host’ among sportsmen. Just opposite the railway station, the pub was a good location for a journeyman cricketer to complete the many trips expected of him during a summer when two three-day games were played on most weeks. It must have been quite a grind travelling around in third-class carriages with heavy bags full of bats, pads and clothing.
The Burrell Arms, which keeps its name to this day, was a couple of minutes’ walk from a recreation ground, where the boy Maurice was to spend much of his time. Growing up in and around an expanding commuter and market town, he was always to maintain his soft Sussex burr, an accent these days all but disappeared as the South East of England becomes one large linguistic adjunct of London.
Probably funded by grandfather Beach, Maurice attended a small private day school, called Belvedere, in Haywards Heath. Another, later, alumnus was “Young” Jim Parks, the Sussex and England wicketkeeper-batsman of the 1950s and 1960s. During Maurice’s youth several other stalwarts of the county game lived in the area and he mixed freely in the company of cricketers, with whom he always felt at home. There were social trips to Hove and other Sussex grounds.
A photograph shows Fred and Maurice standing on the large common at Lindfield, a picturesque village just outside Haywards Heath, in 1900. It bears the punning caption “Tête-à-Tête”. They were probably there for a Sunday cricket match. The upstanding father, wearing his whites and blazer, rests his hand on his shy-looking son’s shoulder in a picture of respectability.
Yet, as his rushed wedding showed, Fred had a lot of ‘lead in his pencil’. Eventually he fathered ten children and his financial woes continued, with ever more mouths to feed. In the 1901 census, Maurice is listed as living in Wivelsfield with grandfather and grandmother Beach, along with three uncles and an aunt. Fred, by this time, had four children, three of whom lived with him, his wife, and his now 64-year-old mother. It seems he could not afford to keep his entire family and had to farm out offspring to the Beaches. By 1911 he had nine children, four of whom were listed as living with the grandparents, and five with Fred and Gertrude. The Tates were not good with money. They never had much with which to be good.
Unlike those of many great sportsmen, Maurice’s childhood was conspicuous for a near-total lack of success at cricket. He often told the story of how he was unable to break into the team at little Belvedere School, even if he offered bribes to the captain. The teachers were discouraging too. The tales were always recounted in a humorous, ironic way, but rejection as a child is never easy to handle and Maurice was not good at hiding resentment. Despite his obvious enthusiasm, “at school the headmaster did not consider me good enough to play regularly”, so he took part in only a “few” school matches.
A gangling, unathletic-looking youth, he did better at football early on, but cricket meant more. As the eldest of the Tate brood, Maurice was seven when his father’s disastrous Test appearance happened. Fellow pupils are not noted for their sensitivity when a family member is publicly humiliated. It is not difficult to imagine a fair bit of ribbing coming Maurice’s way. He would have been made acutely aware of what had happened to Fred during his most formative years.
And what of Fred’s alleged assertion that his son would one day right the sins of the father by becoming a successful Test match player? Here, as elsewhere, much of Maurice’s life story is contradictory and confusing. He always maintained that his father had not coached him or offered any advice on how to play the game. However, the newspaperman John Marshall, who knew Maurice well, reported a slightly, but significantly, different version of what Fred Tate had told Len Braund on that famous train journey back from the Old Trafford Test: “I’ve got a little kid at home who’ll make it up to me [my italics].” ‘To’ Fred, not ‘for’ Fred. Helping a man more sinned against than sinning. Perhaps this was nearer to Fred’s true feelings. He had been wronged and humiliated in 1902. Maybe he, rather than England’s fans, players and officials, required recompense.
A fascinating article appeared in the Adelaide Mail in November 1929, appearing to contradict Fred’s image as a laissez-faire figure. Maurice was quoted as saying: “The story of that [1902] match was one of the favourites of mine when I was a boy small enough to sit on my father’s knee. More than once, as he finished the story, he said to me: ‘I couldn’t make the winning hit for England that day; but one day you must help England to win.’ Possibly, nay, probably, that story inspired in me the desire to play cricket for England.”
Two years later, he elaborated in Reynold’s Illustrated News: “When I was still a toddler, he used to say: ‘One day you will make up for that missed catch of mine.’” However, Maurice stuck to the story that Fred had offered him no coaching, that he was a “natural bowler”.
Despite all the outward bonhomie and contentment which became Maurice’s trademark during his years of fame and success, his childhood might not have been the easiest. His father’s expectations, even if not manifested in actual coaching, were definitely present. Combined with failure to gain a place in the school team, this must have caused a sense of frustration and failure. Maurice felt he had been a “disappointment” to his father as a youth.
In 1905, Fred, aged 38, ended his cricket career. He later sold the pub and moved the family to Oundle, the well-known public school in the East Midlands, where he became a coach. The assignment did not last and, within a few years, the family followed Fred to jobs at the Royal Engineers’ Ground in Gillingham, Kent, and at the Woolwich Academy in south-east London.
Signs of the boy’s future greatness were few. At the beginning of 1925 a reporter for the Chatham, Rochester and Gillingham News visited the Wesleyan School, in Gillingham, which Maurice had attended. The headmaster, JH Salmon, had no idea of the connection. After some research, the records showed that Maurice had enrolled in 1906, aged ten. Salmon was delighted, adding: “But sport was little encouraged in those days, and there were no school teams to speak of.”
In fact, hardly anyone seemed to remember Maurice. Mr Turner, who had been sports master during Maurice’s time there, said: “I thought [rival school] Napier Road claimed him as an old pupil, but they all do when anyone achieves fame.”
Finally, the reporter came across someone aware of the famous former pupil. Mr A Evans, who ran a small shop across the road from the Royal Engineers’ Ground, reminisced: “He was a pale-faced boy, rather delicate-looking, with prominent front teeth, and dark, straight hair. Tall and lank, he was a characteristic figure in his cream knickers and woollen sweater. He was a saucy lad, full of devilment, and often received a clip under the ear for his cheeky manners.” Metaphorically at least, the same behaviour and treatment continued throughout Maurice’s life. He was not an out-and-out rebel, but stayed less than totally deferential towards the many authority figures with whom he had dealings.
Sometimes being away from home breeds a stronger emotional attachment, and Maurice Tate was always a Sussex boy at heart. He described his restless father as a “regular rolling stone”. This was not a compliment. Sussex was his county and he wanted to be there.
Sir Home Gordon, the waspish Sussex County Cricket Club chronicler, gave Fred a mixed posthumous pen portrait in his book on the club in 1950: “Fred Tate may not altogether have been satisfactory as a man, though invariably smiling, but as a bowler he was utterly indefatigable and willing.” His judgement on Fred’s moral fibre was biting, licensed somewhat by the Old Trafford debacle, and maybe a gossipy knowledge of his pre-marital activities. Sir Home also became Maurice’s greatest critic, at least within the Sussex club.
When he left school, 14-year-old Maurice was apprenticed to be a gas fitter, a respectable trade but not very exciting. Then, for no good apparent reason, Fred received a letter in early 1910 asking his son to take part in a fortnight’s trial at “The Nursery”, the respected finishing school for cricketers at Sussex’s headquarters at Hove. In his case, though, it was more of a starting school. For, although he had spent many hours on the recreation ground at Haywards Heath, and observing his father at work, he had achieved little and received even less in the way of direct coaching.
Maurice was later to suggest that there had been “probably a considerable element of sympathy” for his father in the offer. Fred’s life had not been hugely successful since leaving the game but, given Sussex’s often terrible treatment of its professional players, then and later, any sense of pity is unlikely to have provoked such a response from the committee. Someone, somewhere, had seen qualities in Maurice which Fred had exhibited. It was worth a punt.