1946–51
‘My last day at school will be one of misery.’
Colin Cowdrey
A FRIEND of mine, in fact the subject of my first book, was in bed with flu sometime in 1965. As he was a former opening bowler for Worcestershire, you will be unsurprised to hear that George Chesterton’s choice of reading while recovering was The Cricketer. He turned the page and lighted upon a competition, the first prize being a holiday for two in Corfu. Sending his wife to fetch the relevant editions of Wisden, he set to work to answer the questions. After an hour or so of the requisite research, he felt he had done as well as he could, put the form in an envelope and sent it off to the magazine’s address.
A month or two later, he was astonished to learn by letter that he had won the first prize. ‘There were scores of people who came second,’ he told me, ‘but all of them had got one question wrong. I hadn’t.’ My curiosity knew no bounds. ‘The question that had flummoxed them all,’ he continued, ‘was which international cricketer never watched a first XI game when he was at school?’ Colin Cowdrey. ‘Wrong! It was D.J. Knight, who played for Surrey, opening the batting with Jack Hobbs and who later played for England. He never watched a first XI match at school because he was playing, even as a new boy.’
It has to be said, for this particular question, George had a bit of an unfair advantage. D.J. Knight went to Malvern College, where George had been educated too and where he had spent 32 years of his life as a teacher. I thought it was Cowdrey. ‘So did everybody else. But Cowdrey wasn’t picked for Tonbridge’s first XI until the second game.’ I ought to record as a postscript to this little story that Mr and Mrs Chesterton thoroughly enjoyed their holiday in Corfu.
Whether it was the first game or the second of Tonbridge’s 1946 season mattered little for the school had already been tipped the wink before Colin had ever set foot in the place. Sometime during the early months of the year, his father had taken him for a coaching session at the famous Alf Gover Indoor School in Wandsworth, south London. My father had done much the same thing for me, and I remember being disappointed that it was not Peter May supervising my net but only Kenny Barrington. The presumptuousness of youth.
Supervising Colin’s net that day was Andy Sandham, the same Andy Sandham who had played against Ernest Cowdrey for MCC v Europeans in Madras back in 1927. Somehow, I doubt the young Cowdrey engaged the old pro in airy conversation about their fixed point of historical connection as he effortlessly reeled off a succession of perfect cover drives. This was 1946, an altogether more deferential age. Besides, Colin was shy and had been brought up – strictly – to speak only when spoken to. However, he was aware of sudden interest and whispered comments from nearby onlookers as he played his shots.
The flurry of adult attention brought home to him, for the first time, that perhaps he was rather good at this game. Sandham’s enthusiasm was so much aroused that he immediately contacted the professional at Tonbridge to keep an eye out for a youngster headed his way. And the name of the pro? None other than Ewart Astill, another of that MCC team who had played against Ernest some 20 years previously.
It is not difficult to imagine the scene. It was the first net session of the term and the new boy, drawn irresistibly to the practice area, would have been watching with a mixture of excitement and nervousness the older boys going through their paces. Suddenly, the cricket professional, resplendent in his MCC sweater, would have noticed the small, chubby lad watching closely from behind the nets. Probably, he had been looking out for him.
Calling him over, he asked the boy whether he fancied bowling an over or two. Yes and no would have been Colin’s unspoken response. Yes, because he was desperate to get involved. No, because he was a junior and this was definitely not his place. He wasn’t even changed; he was wearing his grey flannels and all the other boys were in whites. His fearfulness at appearing to overstep the mark would have turned to sheer terror as a Master in an adjoining net noticed him and loudly instructed him to clear off. Astill tried to intervene but in the hierarchical environment that obtained at the time, his explanations were brushed aside and the boy was duly banished.
Astill was not to be so easily denied however. Having served his apprenticeship – for all of one game – in the Colts, Colin found himself in the first XI for the match against the Free Foresters, a team of adults, it must be remembered. He was batting at ten, picked primarily, if not exclusively, as a bowler. For it was as a leg-spinner of some flight and prodigious turn that he was turning heads at this stage.
What is it about young leg-spinners with precocious talent who seem to fade with the onset of adolescence? It is a shame but in this country, few, all too few, survive in the world of professional cricket. It was the same with Colin. As he grew, his effectiveness diminished and he bowled less and less. However, he had another string to his bow. It seemed to knowledgeable onlookers that his batting was nothing short of heaven-sent. It was not long before another coach at the school, Maurice Tate, who, would you believe, had also been in that MCC team that had played against Ernest in Madras, was confidently predicting that he had unearthed a future England player.
But that was for the future. For the present, the young Colin was not at all assured that he would play against the Free Foresters, even though his name was down on the team sheet. In some of the public schools of the time, having a first year boy in the first XI was unconscionable. Peter May, in a similar position at Charterhouse, had been made to wait before being selected. At Malvern, there was a more pragmatic approach; if a boy was good enough, he was old enough. I point to the example of Ian (now Lord) MacLaurin – who knew Colin well, both on the cricket pitch and in the corridors of power – who played in the Malvern XI for five years and he was much the same size as Colin in his first year. The point was that his technique and temperament were up to scratch and he survived, prospered even. MacLaurin always said that he was desperate to play in the first XI. It meant he was excused fagging duties. Tonbridge took a similarly practical view. Colin, with the headmaster’s approval, was cleared to play.
Mind you, he had a kindly housemaster looking out for him, as all good housemasters should. It is a fact that nobody who has been to boarding school ever forgets his housemaster, whether remembered fondly or with hostility, so significant is his influence at a formative stage of life. Colin remembered his with nothing but affection. Although he sensed that James McNeill, a rugby player of some repute himself, was ‘on his side’, he perhaps did not realise quite how much. Not until much later, that is. McNeill did good things by stealth.
We know this because we have first-hand testimony of one who was in that Tonbridge XI in 1946, barely one year older than Colin, who took the small boy under his wing and remained a loyal friend right up until Colin’s death. David Kemp was opening the batting that day. He returned to Tonbridge as a teacher and remained there pretty much for the rest of his life and is regarded – fondly – as a sort of Mr Chips character. I prefer to think of him as ‘Mr Tonbridge’, assistant master, housemaster, second master, acting headmaster and president of the old boys’ society. There is very little that he doesn’t know about the school and that includes his years with Colin Cowdrey. His views on the development of the future England captain are insightful and invaluable.
Kemp believed that McNeill was very good for Colin. ‘Colin’s father had been, for one reason or another, largely absent from his childhood,’ he told me. ‘He had had a very good grounding at Homefield from Charles Walford but Walford was a tough taskmaster and a bit stern. On his own admission, when Colin came to Tonbridge, he had done all he could for him. There was nothing left he could teach him. That was why McNeill was so good for him now. Colin arrived, a small boy and very nervous and McNeill – a lovely man, very fatherly – was great with him. “Keep an eye on young Cowdrey,” he told me.’
And did you? ‘I certainly did,’ grinned Kemp. ‘I shaped his future! I’m joking, of course. In point of fact, Colin didn’t need much in the way of protection. He was so modest and polite. Nobody had a bad word to say about him. He was never bullied or pushed around or anything. And everybody could see the potential in him, even though he was so small.’
Small he may have been but the stir he caused that day was anything but. He later confessed to nothing but acute embarrassment when, batting at ten, he was out for a duck and the crowd just melted away. In the side for his bowling, he was also wicketless and probably thought that was that; a swift return to the Colts awaited him. In the Free Foresters team, incidentally, was Gubby Allen, a former captain of England who had just finished his war service, retiring from the army as a lieutenant-colonel.
Allen, as a Test selector, would play an important role in Colin’s fledgling international career not more than a few years later and their paths would cross at frequent intervals after that. It would have been interesting to speculate what he thought of the diminutive fellow playing on the opposing side and whether he had intimations of future greatness but there is no record of any comment he made at the time.
Despite his unpromising start in the school first XI, Colin was not dropped. His captain assured him he would be playing in the next game against Malvern and Colin rewarded him for his faith by scoring ten and taking four wickets. For the next five years, he remained a fixture. Slowly, he made his way up the order to three, where he stayed. ‘In truth, we were not a very strong side,’ admitted Kemp. ‘We can’t have been with a 13-year-old batting at three, no matter how promising he was. And I am proud to say,’ he added with a smile, ‘that I finished above the great Colin Cowdrey in both the batting and bowling averages. But only for one year!’
The climax of the season was the annual fixture against Clifton at Lord’s. Kemp recalled that Clifton were particularly strong that year. He remembered their captain, Rodney Exton, a fine batsman and off-spinner, who later that summer made his first-class debut for Hampshire. Sadly, he contracted polio soon after, which put paid to his cricket career, but he went into the world of teaching, mainly at Eton, before becoming headmaster of Reed’s School.
‘He was a formidable schoolboy cricketer,’ Kemp said, an opinion underlined by his performance in the Lord’s match. Exton took 14 wickets in the two Tonbridge innings, which should have had him named as Man of the Match, had such vulgar traditions existed at the headquarters of cricket. That he was not so remembered was because a small, round boy of 13 stole the headlines. Literally.
For a start, Colin was the youngest player ever to appear at Lord’s, a fact swiftly taken up by the press. Kemp remembered the game as if it were yesterday. ‘We lost a wicket fairly early on and out came Colin at three and we managed to put on a decent stand. He played Exton as if he had been playing top-class off-spinners all his life. Then I got out, wickets started to tumble but Colin held the innings together.’ Correct. Colin was last out, top-scoring with 75 out of a total of 156, Exton taking 6-64.
And then David Kemp started to laugh. ‘Do you know what The Times wrote about him? They said it was like looking at Cyril Washbrook through the wrong end of a telescope!’ As he made his way back to the pavilion after being dismissed, Colin looked up at the stands, well-populated for a school match, sighed with relief and knew, there and then, where the rest of his life was headed.
The match was a thriller. Tonbridge kept Clifton down to a manageable lead of 48, Colin taking three wickets, but when he and Kemp were dismissed, both scoring 44, the Tonbridge second innings collapsed, leaving Clifton a mere 117 runs to win. Kemp takes up the story, which is just as well for alarm and confusion reigned in the scorebox, judging by the gaps in the scorebook. Panic took over the Clifton batsmen when Colin came on to bowl. ‘They were going well but when Colin came on, they went to pieces,’ said Kemp. ‘As they got closer and closer to the target, the question was whether we should keep Colin on. The decision was made by the captain to keep going, a shrewd move, so The Times said. Rubbish! Our captain was in a blind panic and did nothing. We bowled ’em out just two short! It was a thrilling match.’ Colin had taken 5-59.
One of the many spectators that day was a keenly interested Brian Johnstone. In his book Another Slice of Johnners, he wrote, ‘On the 30th July, I went to Lord’s to sit in the sun and watch some schoolboy cricket. The previous day, in the Clifton v Tonbridge match, a 13-year old playing for Tonbridge had made 75 out of 156 and taken 3 wickets with teasing leg breaks. Michael Cowdrey the press called him and he was said to be the youngest player ever to play at Lord’s. I thought I would have a look at this infant prodigy. I was rewarded by seeing him make 44 in his second innings and then win the match for Tonbridge by taking 5-59 with his highly tossed leg breaks. Three times he enticed the batsmen down the pitch and was rewarded with three stumpings. He was small but already had a slightly rotund figure.’
Of course, the press were eager to buttonhole this ‘infant prodigy’ after the match, feeling they had their story for the papers the following day. According to Kemp, Colin was horrified. ‘He ran past them as fast as he could and escaped on the Tube.’ He caught the train down to Cornwall for the summer holidays, staying with an aunt. Presumably, his parents had returned to India. In any case, he was now used to his peripatetic life. During the journey, he read about his exploits on the back page of the newspaper being read by a fellow passenger opposite. Much as he hated the fuss, the spotlight was now upon him and would bathe him in its harsh beam for the remainder of his days.
Much was expected of Colin the following season at Tonbridge but in fact it was, if not a torrid time, then certainly something of an anti-climax. He was despondent and felt that his cricket career, hitherto on a continuous upward trajectory, had somehow stalled. But perhaps this was no bad thing. Cricket is never an easy game, even for the most gifted, and once you allow yourself the luxury of believing it is, it will bite back.
Besides, let us not forget that the boy was still only 14. He maintained his place in the first XI but that, I suspect, owed more to the fact that the side was weak and there was nobody else pushing him aside. However, even though he struggled for runs and wickets, he would have been learning much, mixing and playing with older boys, and his enthusiasm and desire to improve never wavered.
But there was more to school than cricket. There were two other terms besides the summer one. Lessons had to be attended, work had to be done, exams had to be passed. And there was limitless opportunity to play games. ‘He played them all, you know,’ David Kemp told me. ‘Rugby, hockey, tennis, squash, rackets, fives, even footie in the yard. He was good at all of them. He had a natural eye for the ball and was a shrewd tactician, a games player’s brain, with keen anticipation. And beneath that affable exterior, he was a fierce competitor. He hated to lose – at anything.’
It surprised me to hear that Colin was a good rugby player. As a youngster, he was so small and when he grew, he never had the classical sportsman’s physique, lean, strong and athletic. ‘Ah, but he was surprisingly nimble on his feet,’ said Kemp, ‘He played fly-half for the first XV. His kicking was exceptionally accurate. He used to practise and practise his goal kicking.’
That Colin was good at games has always been a given in any account of his life. But I wanted to know how well he integrated into school life in all other respects. What was he like academically? Kemp smiled. ‘Let no one say that Colin Cowdrey was a thick games player. He wasn’t. He was intelligent, he was hard-working, he passed all his exams and he got into Oxford by right.’
That was unequivocal enough. I went back to the large plastic boxes handed over to me by Jeremy Cowdrey, full of his father’s papers, and started to delve, burrow and excavate. One thing was immediately obvious. Colin Cowdrey wrote voluminously and kept everything. One box was filled with scores of old, blue, air mail letters, addressed to his parents in India, now faded and occasionally smudged, the tiny handwriting covering every nook and cranny of available space. Mention has already been made of Colin’s predilection to put pen to paper.
Here was clear evidence that the habit was early ingrained. It would have needed an office staff of great patience and efficient magnifying glasses to decipher them. From what I could ascertain, much of the news being imparted by a breathless voice concerned the scores and details of countless cricket matches.
I decided to be more discriminating in my research. I lighted upon his school reports and read them eagerly, hoping to uncover one of those historic misjudgements of character as to be found in one of Winston Churchill’s, ‘He has no ambition.’ Alas, no such bloomers were in evidence, no prediction that Cowdrey would never make a cricketer. In fact, Colin’s teachers were pretty well switched-on in their assessments of him, particularly his housemaster.
David was quite right; McNeill was good for Colin. A perusal of his housemaster’s reports reveal a wise, sympathetic and supportive man. What’s more, he praises, so unlike Colin’s earlier mentor, Charles Walford, without ever lapsing into sycophancy or cliché. Subject reports are meant to comment on a pupil’s progress in the classroom; a housemaster should have the overall picture in mind, academically and pastorally. For example, would Colin’s success on the games fields beget arrogance or a swollen head? It appears not. ‘The excellence of his manners is not the least of his good qualities,’ he writes. And again, ‘His conduct in the House continues to be entirely excellent.’
This about a boy now in his teens, at an age when it is not unknown for mistakes to be made, trouble to be got into and traces to be kicked over. Son Christopher laughed when I read this to him. ‘Like father, like son,’ he observed, tongue in cheek. No, it seemed that Colin was not one to rock the boat. What impressed McNeill about the lad in his charge was not so much his athletic prowess and steady academic progress but his willingness to get involved in everything and always to give of his best. ‘He has represented the school or house in some match every day for a fortnight.’
How Colin found the time to do any work is a marvel but work he did. His subject reports are crowded with phrases like, ‘keen’; ‘willing’; ‘full of promise’; ‘conscientious’1; ‘a hard worker’; ‘pleasing progress’; ‘always gives of his best’; ‘interested and involved’. One or two of the comments made me laugh out loud. ‘V so-so,’ says his Latin teacher. ‘Fair,’ says his history teacher. Imagine spending large amounts of money (expensive even in those far-off days) to have your son educated at one of England’s premier public schools and receiving that from a Master who couldn’t be bothered to write any more.
And there was the odd, witty put-down, that if Ernest Cowdrey had had a sense of humour – which Colin always averred he did – would have brought a smile to his face. ‘Some of his oral utterances,’ observes another Latin teacher, ‘would have been better unuttered.’ And here is another remark that resonates with me down the years. I pick this out not only because I was an English teacher myself. ‘It is impossible to place him fairly,’ bemoans Colin’s English teacher, ‘as he has missed two-thirds of the periods playing cricket.’ Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.
I remember the same bitter complaints being made to me as a housemaster, that far too many Saturday periods were being missed because of cricket matches. He’ll never pass his exams unless he gives up cricket, I was told. All I could say was that there must have been an inordinate amount of deeply inspiring lessons being taught throughout the school on a Saturday morning. ‘Why does cricket have to last all day?’ grumbled one Master to me. ‘Why can’t it be all over in 90 minutes, like football?’ There are some conundrums in life that do not lend themselves to obvious answers.
McNeill seemed unconcerned by Colin’s frequent absences away on active service. And neither was his headmaster, Mr E.E.A. Whitworth. Indeed, he appeared to be more exercised about when next he could spare the time to take on Colin at rackets. ‘What an advance in two years!’ was all he had to say about things beyond the rackets court.
However, it was not all good news. Hints emerge from time to time that Colin struggled sometimes with examinations. This can partly be ascribed to the fact that, as he made his way up the school, he also got promoted into higher forms, where I guess the standard of response expected was higher. But there was another reason, which McNeill, with characteristic shrewdness, puts his finger on. ‘He is a plodder really,’ he writes, ‘and seems to get rattled if the continuity of his work is disturbed.’
The continuity of Colin’s work was frequently disturbed, and not always by his sporting commitments, as we shall see shortly. The reports reveal someone who takes his work seriously and who worries about failing to understand and falling behind. Throughout his cricket career, mention was made of the fact that he sometimes – inexplicably – would go into his shell at the crease, becoming absorbed by the technical challenge and failing to dominate the bowling, as he was more than capable of doing. It was as if suddenly he doubted himself and his touch would desert him.
Was the charge of ‘plodder’ an early manifestation of a lack of self-confidence that he occasionally had to battle with later on in his life? By no stretch of the imagination could Colin Cowdrey be described as a ‘plodder’ with a bat in his hand but there were times when he appeared to plod.
Time to talk about rackets – the game – that Colin loved, was very good at and which he believed helped his cricket immeasurably. As the fastest ball game in the world, it takes enormously quick reactions and exceptionally developed hand-eye coordination even to lay a racket on the ball, so swiftly does it move.
Actually, what I have just claimed is not quite true. The fastest ball game in the world, so claim the scientists and technicians, is pelota. But pelota is only played in the Basque region and thus not well known. Neither is rackets I suppose, confined as it is to 14 public schools and a handful of clubs dotted around England, as well as one or two outposts in North America. Its exclusivity is a great pity for it truly is a wonderfully exciting game that demands a high level of skill and no little bravery.
Its history and development is an interesting story in itself. It was the game of choice of the inmates of debtors’ prisons Fleet and King’s Bench in London during the 18th century. They hit a hard ball against the prison wall with a racket. The game spread to the schools, first using walls then inside purpose-built, four-wall courts. The fact that only the public schools took up the game would seem to suggest that the debtors who first played it were of a higher class, it could be said.
Colin took to the game immediately and spent countless hours in the courts, that is, when he wasn’t playing rugby or squash, which is incidentally derived from rackets, the courts being ‘squashed’ in size and the ball squashy, rather than hard. Daily, it seemed, he would be engaged in a practice foursome or involved in house matches and school fixtures, not forgetting the annual singles and doubles competitions held at the Queen’s Club in West Kensington. Not only did his constant practice and match play improve his eye for the ball and his mobility around the court, it also gave his self-confidence a shot in the arm, because he became very good at it – and it is not an easy game to master – and what’s more, very successful on the school circuit.
He won the under-16s singles competition at Queen’s. Also at Queen’s, partnered by J.F. Campbell, he reached the final of the public schools doubles, losing to Winchester by four games to two. He continued to play at Oxford and beyond, with some success, whenever his cricket commitments allowed, which wasn’t very often. For the time being, he availed himself of ample opportunity to play during his time at Tonbridge. If there was a first XI cricket match at home, he would always go on court and hit a few balls before going in to bat. He believed it sharpened up his reflexes, made him watch the ball, loosened him up and mentally prepared him for his innings.
The year 1947 is remembered for some exceptionally severe weather. England was blanketed in snow for large parts of the months of January, February and March, with temperatures rarely rising above freezing. And then, later on that summer, the sun shone from cloudless blue skies as Compton and Edrich made hay in the county championship, scoring 3,816 and 3,539 runs respectively. Almost casually, while on a salvage operation of his father’s effects in the loft of his home, Jeremy Cowdrey handed me Colin’s diary. A quick glance confirmed that the author had kept it assiduously, day by day, in that minuscule handwriting of his. ‘I shouldn’t get too excited,’ Jeremy warned me. ‘It’s all a bit boring.’ Maybe, but commonplace observations on daily life from even the most reserved and incurious diarist can shed light on a life. With closer inspection, so it proved.
First, I was struck by the slang and informal expressions of the day. Entries are littered with words such as ‘ridiculous’, ‘wizard’, ‘rattlingly good’ or ‘rattlingly bad’, ‘dreadful’, ‘colossal’, ‘stinking’, ‘beat up’, ‘not brilliant’, ‘blow up’, all used to describe a chapel, a lesson, an innings, an exam or even the weather. For example, one day in February 1947, ‘Big freeze. No rugger yet. Played squash. Ridiculous Maths test. Won’t get a mark. Corps cancelled much to everybody’s delight. More snow. Tons of it. Feeling ill. Off exercise which is a blooming nuisance.’
Secondly, the entries are circumscribed by the narrow world in which he lived. The only reference to national events was this bland observation, ‘Slack morning. Princess Elizabeth is engaged. My cricket bat is repaired. Do stinking Corps. Go to Grubber.’ But you could hardly expect much else. Not many boys keep diaries. Fewer keep them up religiously. And life in a boarding school environment is all-consuming.
A busy boy – and Colin was fanatically busy – rarely raises his head above the parapet to observe and debate the metaphysical so it is no wonder that he simply recorded all the things he got up to, mainly sport and school work. Even within the confines of Tonbridge School, there is very little gossip or tittle-tattle on display. There is a vague reference to ‘that shocking business’ in another house but that is as far as it goes. He mentions ‘a hell of a blow up with the coach’ but does not identify the coach nor give us a clue as to the nature of the argument. He rarely talks about other boys, apart from the occasional observation, ‘Kemp is playing well,’ or ‘Orchard has just about had it.’
I was alarmed at how many times he had to go to the ‘Head’, for that usually meant only one thing – trouble – before I put two and two together. The ‘Head’ was not the headmaster’s study but the first XI cricket pitch. Of course he went there a lot. He practically lived over there. In any case, it would have been a shock to hear that he had been summoned by the head to have his fortune read. Colin was a good boy and rarely put a foot wrong. He does make this admission, but only once, ‘Skipped a music lesson and got into trouble.’ I almost cheered when I stumbled upon this entry. The boy is human after all.
Boring? He wasn’t bored. He was having a whale of a time and I can imagine Ernest, hearing nothing but good about his son, would have considered that the fees was money well spent. Colin was happy, he was playing ‘tons’ of sport and he was working hard. What more could any reasonable parent want?
The weather may have been wizard that summer but Tonbridge’s cricket, much to Colin’s disgust, was anything but. ‘Dreadful loss against Haileybury,’ he says, immediately followed, as if it was divine punishment, by, ‘Dreadful sermon.’ He talks about the match against Bedford School, a four-innings affair, which gives a little insight into travel to away matches, always by train, before the days of motorways and luxury coaches. ‘7.40 Tonbridge 9.15 St Pancras 10.50 Bedford Play at 12.30. Lose match. Scores of 59 & 91 v 53 & 54. Unlucky. Dreadful pitch.’ Hard to disagree with that report. The highest score on either side in both innings was David Kemp’s 24. ‘I may have been last man out,’ mused Kemp, with a little twinkle in his eye.
Although Colin was excited to be back at Lord’s for the annual Clifton match, one year after his triumphant debut, the whole experience was a disappointing let-down. ‘Wonderful being at Lord’s again but Tonbridge have a dreadful day.’ He should say so. Clifton amassed 240 (Cowdrey 2-57) and Tonbridge were dismissed for 75 (Cowdrey 14). Before close of play, they faced the ignominy of following on and when stumps were drawn, they had lost another wicket for 39 runs. However, Kemp and Cowdrey were not out overnight and were ready to effect a heroic rescue act the next morning. Alas, no. ‘They polished us off by an innings and 38. Worst defeat so far.’ And that was that. The rest of the summer was spent on the sun-drenched beaches of Cornwall.
As he made his way from home to home of grandmother, uncle and aunts, it might be easy to assume that Colin led a rather comfortable and privileged existence. In many ways he did. There was lots of swimming and golf and tennis and squash as well as periodic trips into town to catch a show and dine at a nice restaurant.
But he also went up to Market Harborough in Leicestershire, where his uncle had a farm. Far from idling his time away, he was set to work doing jobs around the farm – potato planting, threshing oats, cutting hay, milking, driving the tractor, working the combine harvester, with a spot of hunting and shooting thrown in, and perhaps a goose for dinner – and from his comments, it would appear that he thoroughly enjoyed the experience.
How about this for a day full of incident down on the ranch, ‘We have the bull out today and it goes for Joe – goes wild. We eventually get him to the cowshed.’ I presume he is referring to the bull and not to Joe. He found time to go to watch Leicester Tigers and Leicester City and spent long evenings ‘playing ping-pong’. It was a healthy environment and he was kept busy, with thoughts of the home that he didn’t have and the parents who lived far away pushed to one side.
Farming’s loss was cricket’s gain and he returned to Tonbridge for the new school year much restored in body and mind. Rackets was beginning to take over from rugby as his game of choice and rarely did a day pass without a visit to the courts. His account of his triumph at Queen’s in the under-16s singles competition is unconsciously amusing. ‘I have an easy task against a Marlborough bloke.’ Next round, ‘I have a colossal tough fight against Coulman of Winchester. I beat him 3-0.’ And to the final, ‘I beat Thompson easily but I crack my fingers against the wall.’ There is no self-congratulation, no crowing, no expressions of pride or pleasure, no description even of the awarding of the cup, just a bald statement of the facts, and no false modesty. Then back to school and, ‘I do a lot of hard work.’ He often wrote this. It must be true. His teachers agree. Occasionally, his self-discipline slips. ‘I try to work all day but it completely fails so I play cricket in the changing room.’ Which of us has not been there?
Confidence re-established, he had a much better time of it during the 1948 cricket season. Comments such as, ‘I get 6-60, the best I’ve bowled for a long time’ and ‘I get 41 not out against MCC and batted the best for a long time’ give credence to the widely held view that here was emerging a schoolboy of rare talent. Kent sniffed the breeze and made sure that the prodigy in their back yard was not going to waste the summer playing club cricket. They organised for him to play in their youth team (in those days they were called Young Amateurs; today they would be known as the Academy XI) and this is where he first made his mark, playing with and against the best of his age group.
There was first disappointment again at Lord’s, Tonbridge suffering another thumping defeat, by 138 runs, at the hands of Clifton. I nearly missed it in my cursory glance at the scorecard but there, batting at seven for Tonbridge, was a J.H. Eckersley. Surely not. It couldn’t be, could it? A swift telephone call confirmed that indeed the J.H. Eckersley was a friend of mine, Jeremy, who lives nearby and with whom, some years ago now, I used to play tennis and rackets. A respected orthopaedic surgeon, he is now retired and spends more time on the golf courses of Herefordshire these days than on any court.
Hotfoot, I crossed the Malvern Hills and sought him out. ‘Yes, I remember Colin very well,’ he said over coffee. ‘We weren’t close friends because he and I were in different age groups and different Houses. But we played in the same team and my impression was that he was a delightful and modest young man. A brilliant rackets player too, which was surprising really because he had flat feet, you know. But he had supreme timing. He never seemed to whack it, a cricket or rackets ball, but it flew.’
How was he regarded by others in the team? And in the school? ‘He was two years younger than me but everybody looked up to him. Fortunately, he was not one to throw his weight around and we all liked him.’ Did you enjoy your time at Tonbridge? ‘Loved every minute of it.’ I get the impression from Colin’s diary that he felt the same. ‘I’m not surprised. There was an excellent rapport between Masters and boys and it was significant that Tonbridgeans who went on to university seemed to be more mature and better equipped for adult life. And of course, there was all that sport.’
He was getting quite wistful. I pressed him for any memories of a particular Cowdrey innings. His brow furrowed. ‘Oh dear, it was such a long time ago. I do remember a masterful century he scored against Lancing. Nobody else got runs. And then he bowled them out with his leggies. I also remember him hitting a six at Lord’s, which was no mean feat.’ You lost, didn’t you, in spite of that six. ‘Ah, but I wasn’t playing. Never played at Lord’s. I was 12th man, though.’ Yes you did! You scored four and three. ‘Did I? Not very memorable therefore, was it?’
The summer holidays followed a familiar pattern. From Cornwall, Colin moved up to the farm in Leicestershire and found himself playing a lot of club cricket. Though he was not very successful, playing in the same team as grown men added to his cricketing and personal development and he hugely enjoyed the experience. He was invited to play a few games for Kent Young Amateurs and herein lay a strange twist of fate.
The previous season, almost out of the blue, he had been asked to play a couple of matches for Surrey Young Amateurs. It was an experience he had not enjoyed. For the first time, he was playing with people he did not know and he was still a shy young boy. He felt out of place and inadequate. He failed with the bat and got hammered to all parts of The Oval when he bowled. Had he played well and caught the eye of the Surrey coaches, he might have played the rest of his career in a brown cap rather than blue. One can almost hear a horrified intake of breath by a generation of Kent supporters at the very thought. But it was Kent, not Surrey, who came calling.
He had a much better time of it this time round. Listen to the breathless excitement as he comments on one innings, ‘Play Sussex YA. I am 97 not out at close of play. Will I?’ Oh, the unbearable tension endured overnight. Next day, ‘I complete my century and go on to make 159.’
Playing for Sussex was Jim Parks, whose cricket career ran pretty much parallel with Colin’s, both in opposition and in the same England team. I know Jim. His son, Bobby, and I used to play together at Hampshire. Jim was a frequent supporter at matches, a cheerful presence without ever overdoing the role of fond father. One thing that struck us all about him was that he had an excellent memory.
I chanced my arm and rang him. ‘Oh yes,’ he laughed, ’I remember that innings very well. He made a big hundred against us.’ Was it obvious that he was a future Test batsman? ‘Well, let’s just put it this way,’ he replied with characteristic understatement. ‘He looked a pretty good player to me.’ He and Colin became the best of friends and remained so to the day Colin died. ‘Do you know,’ he said wistfully, ‘one day he rang me up. It was in the morning and I was out. When I got back home, my wife asked me breathlessly whether I had heard the news. What news? It’s been on the radio, she said, Colin Cowdrey had just died. So I never knew what he wanted to talk to me about. I often wonder.’ Conversations with Jim about my subject were going to be fascinating and fruitful, I thought.
For the time being, Colin was in a rich vein of form. The following day’s entry reads, ‘1st day’s play at Oval v Surrey YA. Rain stops play when I’m 79 not out.’ Will he? Sadly, no. ‘Play called off before we can start.’ Never mind. Although he was probably unaware of it, his card had been marked by onlookers on the Kent committee.
As he returned to Tonbridge for the new school year, he could have been forgiven for thinking that life was pretty good; all was set fair and a brisk following wind filled the sails of the good ship Cowdrey. However, reading the diary, it slowly becomes apparent, as it must have to Colin himself, that all was not well. Something was afoot, if you will pardon the pun.
For some time, he had been aware of a problem with his feet, specifically with his toe joints. Kicking a football became painful and a full toss on the foot left him hobbling for longer than it ought. But being a teenager who loved his sport, he ignored it, shaking off the discomfort, except when it became too bad and then not taking the medical advice when given. Here is a typical entry in the diary, ‘I am off exercise because of the doctor but I very forgetfully play rackets.’ Or, if there were other subterfuges to be engaged, he brought to bear all the time-honoured excuses, ‘Corps and once again I get away with no uniform because it is at the cleaners.’
However, the condition worsened and it could no longer be ignored. ‘See doctor and he says see specialist.’ But that does not mean he’s off games. Certainly not. ‘Told I am to be playing in 1st XV. Oh dear! It’s against Dulwich College and I am very nervous.’ Despite his pre-match nerves, he plays well – at fly-half – and thoroughly enjoys the occasion. ‘We win 16-3. Marvellous fun. 1,000 watching.’ Imagine that. One thousand spectators at a school rugby match.
The specialist to whom he was referred, John Mayer, diagnosed a severe case of hallus rigididus, basically arthritis in the toe joints. Though a not uncommon condition in the elderly, the doctor was amazed to find it in one so young and was thus hesitant to operate and insert artificial joints, putting at risk a burgeoning cricket career. Hot wax foot baths, with electrical treatment, were prescribed, which meant regular visits to Pembury Hospital nearby. Colin found this tedious but at least he could carry on playing rugby and rackets.
He believes in his diary, rather fancifully perhaps, that the course of treatment is ‘doing a little good’ but more importantly ‘I come back for rugger’ but finds, to his chagrin, that in his absence, he has been dropped from the team. ‘I am not wanted. Billy is playing. Oh dear. I am very disappointed.’ Life was not all success and sunshine, even for one as gifted as he; it was a hard lesson but one that would stand him in good stead as he was soon to face a setback far more serious than being dropped from the XV. ‘I’m told I am going to play v Uppingham tomorrow. Poor Billy is injured.’ That concern for the feelings of others was fast becoming a noteworthy feature of his personality. His last hurrah before the delivery of the bad news was the following day’s match, the last of the term. ‘We just lose 11-15. What a game!’
His next appointment with Mr Mayer is described thus, ‘Have to go to Pembury to show my toes to orthopaedic surgeon. They really are in a shocking state. I have got to have them operated on and probably in bed for 12 weeks next term.’
The dismay can be well imagined. For an active boy to be bedridden for any length of time is purgatory; for one whose life is defined by his sport, the news must have been a hammer blow. But Colin being Colin, he decided that no time was to be wasted and, seeing as the operation was not scheduled until after Christmas and the New Year, there was absolutely no reason why he should miss the Public Schools Rackets Singles Handicap competition for which he had been entered. He nearly won it too, losing in the final 3-2 ‘to a nice bloke from Eton’.
On his return to school in January 1949, he was straightaway informed that he had been appointed captain of cricket. It was an obvious choice really but he was hugely honoured and even more determined, if that were possible, to recover quickly from the operation in order to be fit for the forthcoming season. Perhaps it was just as well that he was ignorant of the fact that it was by no means certain that the surgical procedure would permit that. Mr Mayer kept his private doubts away from his patient. He wasn’t even certain that Colin would recover sufficiently to play cricket again – ever. It was that tricky. But how about this for a touch of equanimity in the face of adversity? ‘I am told I have to go to Pembury Hospital tomorrow. I play rackets v Jennings.’ Sir Francis Drake would have been proud of the boy’s insouciance in the teeth of impending crisis.
There is something intrinsically odd about walking into a hospital, climbing the stairs to your ward, being told to undress and put on a surgical gown and put to bed when you feel perfectly well. It is not as if you have been in a car accident or suffered a heart attack, when you are clearly very ill and hospital is where you want to be. Presumably, you have every hope and expectation that you will feel much better when you leave than when you came in.
For an operation like Colin’s, in keeping with many sporting injuries requiring surgery, you feel fine but know that shortly you will feel anything but. Colin was put to bed at 10am and his operation was not scheduled until the next day. Unsurprisingly, he was bored. ‘But I do learn all about the hospital lift,’ he observes, before adding a little cryptically, ‘Awful!’
All he could remember about the events of the following day was that he was ‘wheeled into the theatre in the presence of a howling baby.’ Either his pre-op medication was working too well or the porters had taken him to the wrong theatre. He was awoken at 4.30am ‘and a full English breakfast at 7.15. Very boring indeed. I’ve got plaster on both legs and it is very uncomfortable indeed.’
Uncomfortable and bored, he was to remain for the next three months. To his relief, he was soon moved from hospital back to the school sanatorium, closer to friends and staff, but there was no hurrying the healing process. He had a steady stream of visitors and some work was brought for him to do, but the tedium was unalleviated. There were no reports written on him for this term; there was little point, for he was only able to have a distant relationship with the syllabus.
In his diary, he did his best to keep up his spirits but there is little to report except the dull routine of the day. You can sense his frustration and impatience as life at Tonbridge, especially on the playing fields, seems to be slipping past him. There are moments of unconscious humour, ‘Valentine’s Day. Matron comes to see me. She is very nice.’
At last the moment of truth dawns. It is the last day of March, ‘My D Day. A very good result. Mr Mayer decides to take off the plaster. I have a walking iron on.’ Colin was not the only one nervous of what he would find when the plaster was removed. But Mr Mayer professed himself satisfied with his handiwork and the process of rehabilitation commenced for his patient.
Colin was taken back to Ferox Hall but his movements were strictly limited. No stealing away for an unauthorised game of rackets. It would have been impossible anyway. His feet swelled alarmingly just as he was about to go home for the Easter holidays, though where home was at this time, he does not record. He had to go for daily physiotherapy at Pembury, so Mr and Mrs McNeill, with unwonted kindness and generosity – something Colin never forgot – looked after him and treated him as one of their own during the holidays. Even when the school reopened for the summer term, he was nowhere near fit.
He was the captain and he was resolved to set a good example, in the nets and at fielding practice, so much so that he had to be warned to take it easy. The support of a special type of shoe, which he wore for the rest of his playing career, helped as did the best healer of all – time – so when the first match of the season came along, against Lancing College in mid-May, he felt fit and ready for the fray, albeit confessing to some pre-match nerves. He need not have worried. ‘A grand win to us,’ he writes. ‘I got my maiden century, 119 run out, and 5-28.’
Jeremy Eckersley, who was playing in that match, remembers the innings vividly. ‘It was a tremendous knock. Nobody else scored very many. I think it was out of a total of 200 odd. He had all the shots and his timing was immaculate.’ And this performance from a young man who had spent most of the previous three months in bed. That he was tired afterwards was no surprise. ‘I have a complete rest from cricket,’ he mentions the following day but adds, once again with complete lack of irony, ‘but I do some Colts coaching.’
And so ends the saga of the feet, if for the time being. He may have been forgiven for believing that the worst was behind him but it wasn’t. The feet stood up well enough to the rigours of continual first-class and Test cricket but the ramifications were going to dog him in years to come.
A sportsman’s body occasionally lets him down. And if this sportsman is a household name then that particular part of the body becomes newsworthy. Think of Ollie Milburn’s eye, Henry Cooper’s eyebrows, Shane Warne’s shoulder, Michael Atherton’s back, Denis Compton’s knee, David Beckham’s metatarsal. To this list can be added Colin Cowdrey’s feet and Colin, an intensely shy man in his youth, found the press interest and the opprobrium it stirred, profoundly upsetting. All that lay in the future.
In my years as a housemaster, I was closely associated with boys who had to, for one reason or another, deal with personal and physical misfortune and I was always in admiration of their resilience and cheerfulness in the face of adversity. Colin was no different. His housemaster and headmaster recognised as such and made comment of it in their reports. ‘I am sure he will face with his usual balance and wisdom the bad luck that has come his way,’ wrote McNeill. ‘He has the sympathy of us all during this period of inactivity which he must now face,’ said his headmaster, before adding, typically, ‘And how I shall miss him on the rackets court next term.’
It would have been good if these observations from people in positions of authority had been released into the public domain when the controversy over ‘Cowdrey’s feet’ was stirred five years later but of course that would have been impossible; they were private. In the meantime, all Colin had to think about was long summer days on the Head.
It was as if the shackles, both mental and physical, had been cast off. He scored over 800 runs for the school and continued to take wickets, 49 of them, with his leg breaks. He broke a 40-year-old Tonbridge record for an individual score with 181 not out against the Buccaneers, 123 against Haileybury, 140 against the Old Boys and 72 not out against Dulwich, not forgetting the century against Lancing earlier that summer. Fair stood the wind for Lord’s and the annual fixture against Clifton but once again Old Father Time witnessed a Tonbridge capitulation. ‘Lord’s. Clifton 248, 119 (28) and 8-1. A tragic day!’ he writes in his diary. The second day was no better. ‘More tragic than ever! We lose by an innings and 17.’
Disappointment may well have been acute but it was not the end of his season, for representative matches were to follow, of a more testing standard and he was not to be found wanting. But as he reflected on the term’s cricket, he was satisfied with his personal performances and had thoroughly enjoyed the responsibilities of captaincy. He was beginning to immerse himself in the technicalities of the game and the challenges of leadership.
Frequently, he discusses in his letters and diary the pros and cons of batting first or second on a this pitch or that, the conundrums of selection, whether to press on for victory or to shut up shop, the setting of fields and the changes of bowling – all these tactical facets of the game fascinated him. Dealing with people, getting the best out of his team, how to read personality and character and everything that went with being captain of a cricket team, he found intellectually rewarding. In short, he was beginning to grow up.
There was no fleeing on the Tube away from Lord’s for a holiday in Cornwall; the rest of the summer stretched out in front of him and it was to be filled exclusively with cricket. He was playing almost every day now and loving it. Selection for the Southern Schools versus The Rest swiftly followed. Team-mates were Mike Bushby, Dennis Silk and Robin Marlar, all of whom he was going to encounter later in Varsity matches. Colin top-scored in the first innings with 85 and took 4-44 in the Rest’s second innings. He was eight not out when his team completed a seven-wicket victory. He was a shoo-in for the Public Schools against the Combined Services. He did not set the world alight in this two-day match but one interesting statistic screams from the scorecard: P.B.H. May c&b Cowdrey 12. Fast forward seven years and picture the scene as Colin and his best man, Peter May, exchange nervous pleasantries in the church before the arrival of the bride:
‘Peter?’
‘Yes, Colin.’
‘Have you remembered the ring?’
‘Yes, Colin.’
‘Do you remember 9 August 1949 at Lord’s?’
‘Yes, Colin.’
‘P.B.H. May c&b Cowdrey 12?’
‘Hmm.’
‘Fancy getting out like that to a schoolboy!’
‘If I were you, Colin, I’d shut up about that. Remember, the best man’s speech is yet to come.’
‘Peter?’
‘Yes, Colin.’
‘She will turn up, won’t she?’
‘If I know her father, she will.’
The step up from school cricket, let alone club, to professional level is hefty and much more challenging than is often imagined. I have seen many a gaudily coloured school cap, proudly worn by some ingénue, ruthlessly targeted by a county fast bowler. All right, this was in the days before helmets, but I am sure that a school first XI sweater has the same energising effect. Some sink without trace. Others learn to survive. It is a bit of a bear pit but it does separate the boys from the men, so to speak.
Colin survived. For that he was grateful for he still, inexplicably in many people’s opinion, suffered from a lack of self-confidence, not at all sure that he belonged at this level. Take the game against Norfolk, for example. Colin scored 35, no mean feat against experienced bowling of that class. The highest score in the innings was 62. He was perhaps overawed by an innings of 170 not out by one of the famous Edrich brothers, Eric, who struck the ball far and wide. Imagine Colin’s wide-eyed wonderment as he sat with his pads on, slated to come in at five against Wiltshire, while the first-wicket pair put on 158 and the second 257, before the captain declared. So for most of the first of a two-day game, Colin did nothing except watch other people bat. Such things just did not happen in schoolboy cricket.
But it was to school that he returned that September. The usual routine was re-established and life proceeded gently and agreeably. There was a great deal of rackets and squash, he was playing rugby for the first XV and his feet were fine. He was working hard too, as witnessed by the comments of his teachers in his reports, ‘He has written a number of exceptionally interesting things in his essays’; ‘The examination paper was a remarkable achievement of accurate translation; he must have put in an enormous amount of work’; ‘His application has been commendable’. The comments of his housemaster tell a familiar tale but are worth repeating for all that, ‘His work is going ahead rapidly. He also finds time – I don’t know how – to coach juniors in the House for which they and I are extremely grateful.’
There was now a new headmaster at the school, Rev. L.H. Waddy, and, as is often the case, he was a completely different kettle of fish to his predecessor. According to David Kemp and Jeremy Eckersley, Mr E.E.A. Whitworth was popular with the boys. ‘A splendid chap,’ said Kemp. ‘Oh, a lovely man,’ agreed Eckersley. You will remember that his headmaster’s reports on Colin had been totally complimentary. Waddy’s first impressions of Colin are more heedful and reflective, ‘It is hard to know where to start writing of so many-sided a boy so I shall only say that it is a very great thing for the school when a boy much in the public eye is so unselfish and sincere in all that he does, and he does a wonderful amount.’
There is a telling little entry in Colin’s diary at this time. At an annual dinner of the Buccaneers Cricket Club, he met a number of eminent figures from the world of cricket. ‘Superb result! GO Allen, RWV Robins, John Arlott, Neville Cardus!!’ The double exclamation mark says it all. In later years, Colin became a by-word for social networking. Some saw this as a great strength, especially in view of the inherent shyness he had to overcome; others saw it, perhaps jealously, as social climbing. The debate will concern us later. But the point is that, as he happened to be there, he made the effort to chat to them. They cannot have been unimpressed with his amiability and courtesy. Everybody who met him, even at this tender age, thought so too.
Though there is little evidence in his letters, diaries and school reports that Colin was ever naughty or rebelled or overindulged socially – indeed, in his biography, he wrote, ‘My whole life was a narrow corridor surrounded by cricket. My needs were few. I did not smoke, drank little and had no hankering after new clothes and pop records’ – I do not think it would be fair to label him a ‘hearty’, as games players of limited intelligence were called. Colin was no narrow-minded hearty: he had a hinterland. He interested himself in music, art and drama, albeit not terribly successfully, and he was mindful of the rich variety of experiences he was exposed to at Tonbridge.
His love was always cricket, however; it was what defined him and his pulse quickened as the 1950 season came round. Now a senior at school and captain of cricket, he was ready to step on to the stage and take ownership of it. His unspoken ambition was to score 1,000 runs in the term, a tall order but not an impossible one for one of his hunger and talent. No team is a one-man band, no matter what Brian Lara may have thought, for someone has to bat at the other end, someone has to share the bowling duties and others have to catch the catches and field the ball.
Tonbridge without Cowdrey were a very limited team; with him, they could take on all-comers. It was a successful season and Colin was in such a rich vein of form that he seemed to score runs whenever he walked to the wicket. He scored his perennial century against Lancing, 175 not out against Christ’s Hospital, 109 not out against the Old Boys, 95 against Dulwich, and 116 against Band of Brothers, as well as other useful scores.
Morale and confidence were rocketing and characteristically, Colin lays the credit for this firmly at the door of their new cricket professional, Maurice Tate. In the 1920s and 1930s, Tate had been England’s stalwart all-rounder, who single-handedly, it seemed, led the bowling attack before the arrival of Larwood and Voce, a tireless seam bowler, perhaps the first of its kind. After a sudden and bitter departure from his home county Sussex, he took up as a pub landlord, with the odd coaching duties, such as this at Tonbridge, to augment his meagre income.
He died in straitened circumstances, largely forgotten and ignored. Colin and all the boys who came under his wing at Tonbridge would have been shocked at this; there was no one more popular at the school and his cheerful grin and infectious good humour did much to make the cricket term so much fun. He was in his element among the boys, Colin would later say, for he was no more than an overgrown schoolboy himself. There is a good story about Tate that I unearthed among Colin’s papers. It was net practice. Tate asked the senior boys, ‘Who is that chap with curly hair in the far net? He looks a seriously good bowler.’ Colin’s mirth chortles down the years. ‘It was our new headmaster, Rev. L.H. Waddy!’
And so to Lord’s, for the fifth and, as it transpired, the final time – as a schoolboy. Colin’s form with the toss had been in inverse proportion to that with the bat and predictably he lost it, with Clifton taking first strike. The total of 201 was handy (Cowdrey 4-59) but by no means unassailable. However, the curse of Lord’s resurfaced and Tonbridge were dismissed for a meagre 128, Cowdrey top-scoring with 31. The next day, it all changed as Tonbridge fought back well, bowling Clifton out for 102 (Cowdrey 3-28), which left them a target of 176 to win.
There were two motives driving the captain on as he took guard after a wicket had fallen in the second over: to win the game and finish off the season in fine style, which he publicly espoused, and to reach his personal milestone of 1,000 runs for the season, which he kept to himself. He knew the magic number was 63 but he did not know that everybody else knew too. When he passed 63, he puffed out his cheeks in silent thanks and was flabbergasted when a great roar went up from the Tonbridge contingent of the crowd. He was moved when the Clifton fielders, once they knew what was going on, came up to congratulate him and to shake his hand.
All that was to do now was to complete his century and finish the game. Alas, he was bowled for 97 trying to hit the four to win. The difference between 97 and 100 is only three runs but to a batsman it is the difference between raising your bat to acknowledge the applause and smashing it through the dressing room window. Colin of course was far too restrained to have done that, though some have, even at Lord’s, but his annoyance would have been acute. No matter. Tonbridge secured their victory soon after, by four wickets.
A single entry in the diary offers a frustratingly brief suggestion of what it all meant for him, ‘PARTY!!’ His statistics for the season, incidentally, were 1,033 runs at 79.00 and 49 wickets at 14.00. A one-man band? Almost. He would never have said it but others did. Dennis Silk, an opponent both at school (Christ’s Hospital) and at university (Cambridge) and later a much-respected Warden of Radley College, said this about his old friend, ‘The whole idea was to get Colin out. If we did that early, we won. If we didn’t, we may just as well have given up.’
Selection for the Southern Schools against the Rest a few days later was a formality; being asked to captain the side was not. Captaining a team of handpicked representatives from other schools is not like being in charge of your mates. He would have recognised faces from opposing teams or from previous years but it is difficult to forge a team spirit in two days. But he seemed to take it in his stride, as he did when asked to captain the full Public Schools XI against the Combined Services.
It certainly did not affect his batting. He scored 126 not out and 55. He said later that these innings put him on the map, so to speak. This was not a century against schoolboys but battle-hardened men, county pros on National Service some of them, and those MCC members sitting in the pavilion watched, took note and nodded their heads in approval.
Two of Colin’s team caught my eye. John May was the Charterhouse captain and a glittering career was predicted for him along much the same lines as his elder brother, Peter. These predictions were not entirely wrong for he made his name as a liquidator in the City, though he had by no means an undistinguished career as a minor county player for Berkshire. Micky Stewart, from Alleyns School in south London, needs no introduction. His and Colin’s careers ran side by side for pretty well all of their playing days, one for Surrey, one for Kent, though they did share the same dressing room on half a dozen occasions for England.
It is not unheard of for a cricketer to make his first-class debut while still at school but it is still something of a rarity and a notable talking point, especially for the local newspaper. The Kentish Gazette took more than a passing interest in the ‘young prodigy’ when it was announced that the 17-year-old schoolboy, Colin Cowdrey, was going to make his debut for Kent against Derbyshire later on in that August of 1950. In truth, had Colin been at any one of the bigger and more successful clubs, such as Yorkshire, Surrey, Lancashire, Warwickshire or Middlesex, he would have had to wait considerably longer to break into the first team but Kent, at that time, were a struggling side. Many had had their careers curtailed by the war and probably their best years were behind them.
Their captain was the legendary Les Ames but he was now 45, having made his debut for the county way back in 1926. Imagine how the young lad must have felt as he took a look around his team-mates, some of whom he had never met, and searched for an inconspicuous place to lay down his bag. He was spared this ordeal because he was immediately shown into the amateurs’ dressing room, which proved to be even more of an embarrassment. He was the only amateur in the team. He had no idea that such distinctions existed.
To spare his blushes, Ames picked up his bag and moved in with him. It was obvious that the senior man was intent on looking after the debutant. He had already dined with him the night before. Just as well too; Colin had to ask him about the their opponents’ opening bowlers, the feared pair of Gladwin and Jackson. Not how to play them but which was which.
Colin did settle down to watch Ames bat – he would have been a fool not to for Ames was the foremost wicketkeeper-batsman of the pre-war era and was enjoying something of an Indian summer in 1950. But no sooner had Colin settled down to watch the great man bat than he was swiftly up again, in both innings. Ames bagged a pair. When his captain returned to the pavilion after his second dismissal, Colin made his first acquaintance with the sort of tomfoolery that went on in county dressing rooms the length and breadth of the country. One of the team donned a giant pair of spectacles to welcome their returning hero, to general amusement, including, it has to be said, the object of their fun, who was not averse to a bit of leg-pulling himself.
Colin’s diary entry rather blandly gives a brief summary – ‘Lost toss and they get 300. I get my first wicket and first maiden’ – but he later confessed to considerable nerves. Not surprising really – who isn’t nervous on his fast-class debut? But oddly he was more worried about his fielding than his batting. He was petrified that he would drop a catch and let down the bowler and the team. In fact, he had little need to worry. He missed nothing and even caught Charlie Elliott (whom he came to know well when Elliott became an umpire), a swirling steepler off the bowling of the leg-spinner, Doug Wright. And his first victim? Paul Vaulkhard, the Derbyshire captain. No, I have never heard of him either but he was a regular for Nottinghamshire before the war.
Like other counties in the post-war period, Derbyshire struggled to find an amateur prepared to commit to the captaincy full-time so Vaulkhard accepted the offer and apparently did a reasonable job. They came fifth in the county championship that year. Mind you, with an attack of Gladwin and Jackson, augmented with the leg spin of Dusty Rhodes, Derbyshire would have been formidable opponents with a Frenchman in charge.
Colin felt that he acquitted himself reasonably well with the bat, making 15 (out of 96) and 26 (out of 151), hardly exceptional scores but on both occasions, only one Kent batsman bettered them. He was dismissed twice by Gladwin but it was Les Jackson who left the more lasting impression. Colin was surprised by a bouncer. Now, in school cricket and club games, there is no such thing as a bouncer. Not a real bouncer. Some bowlers might be able to bang it in short and make the ball balloon harmlessly over the batsman’s head but a true bouncer, a vicious delivery that rears at the throat off not that short of a length, can only be delivered by a bowler with genuine pace. Jackson certainly had that. He was hostile, especially on uncovered pitches, and could have considered himself unlucky to play in the same era as Trueman, Statham and Tyson, otherwise he would surely have exceeded his two caps for England. His first had been gained the year before, in 1949. Oddly, he was to wait until 1961 for his second, at the age of 40, probably well past his best.
That he should have tested the young Cowdrey with a short ball would have come as no surprise to anybody who knew him. It certainly came as a surprise to Colin, who was forced to jerk his head backwards, out of harm’s way. Hmm, he pondered, I’m going to have to learn how to play this short stuff if I am going to survive at this level. That he did, by adapting his back foot play, is the stuff of legend. Kent lost by an innings and 98 runs, a fair thumping in anybody’s book. In Colin’s book, it was described as ‘a hopeless mess’.
Dover to Derby – 215 miles. Derby to Dover the next day – still 215 miles. Such were the vagaries of the fixture list that both teams had to pack their bags and travel down to the south coast side by side, or in crocodile line for all I know, for the return fixture on the following day. Nowadays, when such a bewildering Horlicks of the championship schedule is uncovered, blame is put squarely on the computer. In 1950 computers were in their infancy and were certainly not in evidence in any office of MCC. So one can only assume that the person organising the itinerary must have had a mordant sense of humour. No motorways, let us not forget.
But at least the weather was on Kent’s side, or else the groundsman deliberately on purpose had left the hose on, for the wicket was wet and favoured their spinners more than the Derbyshire seamers and Kent had their revenge by nine wickets. Colin scored four. He fared better against Nottinghamshire in the following game, also at Dover, scoring 27 and two. Batting cannot have been easy on this pitch either. Only two batsmen from either side exceeded 50 in both innings. Twice, he was dismissed by Arthur Jepson, another future umpire on the county circuit. In later years, Colin must have got sick and tired of umpires reminding him that they had played against him when they were a lot younger. And got him out on one or two occasions, they might have added.
As August slipped into September, the West Indians were in town, with a side including Roy Marshall, Clyde Walcott, Everton Weekes and Alf Valentine. Once again, Colin looked the part without building an innings of substance but to be fair to the young man – and there were those in the know at Kent who were trying to be very fair – there were not many others in the team pulling up trees either. At least he had youth on his side, and class, which would surely tell in the end, they no doubt told each other, nodding their heads. For Colin’s part, he recognised how much he needed to improve to cut the mustard as a county player. Representing England must have been a pipe dream.
Understandably, his diary falls silent during this summer. The life of a first-class cricketer, playing every day, is a full-on existence. The routine is relentless. There may be periods of longueur during the match itself – rather more than you would wish for if you are a batsman and going through a bad patch – but there is very little time to relax and it would be a brave man, certainly one more brave than a 17-year-old schoolboy, to bring out his diary to start scribbling down his impressions of the day’s play and the personal habits of his team-mates round about.
But the diary resumes once the season has finished. On 22 September, ‘Daddy takes me back to school. Mother has a tooth out.’ As if to underline the familiar routine of life back at Tonbridge, he notes on the following day, ‘Read the lesson in the first service of the term.’ David Kemp said that Colin was religious at school and became increasingly so when he went to Oxford. ‘Christianity was important to Colin,’ he said. ‘He even flirted with the idea of going into the Church at one stage but was convinced that he could do a better job in its service by being a good man and a principled example to others in his role as an international cricketer. He read the Sunday lesson in whatever church he found himself on his travels.’ That is certainly true. He took guard in as many pulpits as cricket grounds. And this commitment took root at Tonbridge.
Sometimes a diary tells you more by what it doesn’t say than what it does. Nowhere can I find reference to the fact that Colin had been appointed head boy. It was an honour no doubt fully deserved and one that he was mighty proud to accept so it could be expected that he would have made mention of it in his private ruminations. But no. We have no idea when he was told, what was his initial reaction and what, if any, were the misgivings he had about accepting such a privileged position. For head boy in a boarding school is no sinecure.
Later, he likened it to the role of a chairman of the board and you can take it as read that he took his responsibilities, as he did everything else in his life, very seriously indeed. It helped form his philosophy on captaincy. Man management it would be called today. He was firmly of the school that believed in a collegiate style of leadership, quite at odds with the more autocratic approach of someone like, say, Raymond Illingworth.
With a career in cricket beckoning, he was loath to play rugby this term, worried that his feet would not stand up to the pummelling. But his surgeon, Mr Mayer, convinced him that as he had withstood the rigours of a full season of cricket, there was no reason not to go ahead and play. So he did and was promptly made captain of the first XV. ‘He was a tactical stand-off,’ David Kemp told me. ‘He was a very good kicker and could read a game well.’
That Colin enjoyed the mental tussles is undisputed but he relished the physical struggle as well, which surprised me a little. Not being a rugby player myself, I was always of the uninformed opinion that fly-halves kept themselves well away from trouble. Clearly, Colin did not spare himself. ‘Get really tired,’ he writes and ‘deadbeat at the end of it’ and the day after, ‘have a day of rest’ or ‘my leg is really stiff after the game yesterday.’
My faith in my judgement of the ball-playing backs is restored by a comment, ‘Play whole rugger game with forwards against the backs. It was really miserable.’ No doubt because they were playing with ‘a filthy wet ball’. His observations on, not so much the quality of the opposition, but their manners and behaviour, made me hoot with laughter. Haileybury, admittedly in the rain, was ‘a miserable place’. Another school that met with his disapproval was Sevenoaks. ‘We win 27-9. They have dreadful manners at tea!’ Harrow is ‘a grand place – very good food’.
I searched in vain for any suggestion that he had a social life in the sense that we would understand today. As he said himself, his needs were few and he was busy enough immersing himself in the routine of the school day. There is a certain wry touch to his comment, ‘I go to summer dance – as gatekeeper!’ but that is as far as it goes with any reference to the fairer sex, other than sisters of friends and cousins, with whom he usually played tennis or went bathing. I suppose we should not be greatly surprised. It was a more protected and innocent age and he was still at school and the concept of co-educational boarding schools was in its infancy. And public schools in the 1940s, whatever else they were, could not be classified as progressive. It is likely that the only women the boys at Tonbridge encountered were housemasters’ wives and matrons.
Another smile was evinced by his references to a certain Master. With this one exception, Colin’s comments about adults were uniformly respectful. ‘Slimey’ did not get away so easily, ‘Slimey is away so we have a double free’; ‘Busy doing Slimey’s essay’; ‘Slimey does a very amusing sermon.’
Who was Slimey and why was he so called? I sought clarification from my two inside sources and both Jeremy Eckersley and David Kemp answered with a simultaneous guffaw, even though they live at different ends of the country. ‘Slimey Somerville!’ they cried. ‘A Tonbridge legend.’ I wonder if you could be a bit more specific. ‘Slimey was a lovely chap, a real character,’ said Eckersley. Kemp agreed. ‘He was a brilliant teacher, a most erudite man who knew an enormous amount about his subject, history. But he was what you might call a true eccentric. If he didn’t feel like teaching you, he’d tell you to get on with some work and then just sit there at his desk reading the paper. But he got away with it because he was so charismatic.’
So why was he called ‘Slimey’? ‘Because he sort of...slithered around the place,’ said Eckersley, after giving the matter some thought. ‘He was tall and thin,’ Kemp assented, ‘and he did walk in a sort of...odd manner.’ So the sobriquet was sympathetically bestowed? Both were in total accord. ‘Absolutely.’ Do not forget that public schools practically invented the nickname. It would have been the mark of blandness and insipidity not to have one.
Colin’s diary is full of snow, if you see what I mean. ‘It did seem to snow a lot more in those days,’ said Kemp. ‘Sometimes it was a foot deep. Jolly cold too.’ Played havoc with the games programme. ‘The rackets courts were often covered in it,’ remembered Eckersley, ‘and as the roof was glass and there was no lighting, it would be pitch black in there with no natural light. Play would be impossible so we went off and played squash. Which Colin was very good at,’ he reminded me. ‘Funny really, because he wasn’t terribly quick around the court because of the problems with his feet but he didn’t need to be. He always seemed to be there even before you hit it. Anticipation, I suppose, a quick brain.’
If Colin were alive, he would love to hear you say that. Both agreed that during the two winter terms, before and after Christmas, there were days and days when it snowed heavily. ‘Tons of it,’ wrote Colin. ‘Heaps of it.’
Exactly when the discussions took place about the next stage of Colin’s education is not clear but what is certain is that he seemed to be heading for Oxford as he was entered for a scholarship – and missed it. But the point is that he was entered at all. The school must have thought his going for it was worth the gamble, even if it failed. He may have missed the scholarship but he was good enough to fulfil the entry requirements.
As Kemp took pains to stress, Colin was no mug academically and he worked hard. Once he was awarded the Heath Harrison Exhibition to Brasenose College, his immediate future was settled. It should be pointed out that an exhibition is an award in the gift of the college and is usually granted to someone with potential, not necessarily but neither exclusively, outside the lecture halls. This was still an age when sporting prowess was not seen as an obstacle to entry into Oxbridge. Times were changing, it has to be said, from the generations when excellence at games was almost a key to the front gate of a college but in 1950 it cannot have done Colin’s chances any harm.
And now Ernest Cowdrey makes another, crucial appearance on the stage. Over once more from India, he persuaded his son, no doubt with a wink and a nod from the powers-that-be at Kent, that he should leave Tonbridge at Easter 1951 and spend the summer playing county cricket before going up to Oxford. So once again, Ernest wrong-footed the school authorities and robbed them of their star player for one last triumphant season. It had happened at Homefield and now he did it to Tonbridge.
What Colin thought of the idea is not recorded. No doubt he was torn; it would have been nice to remain and smash all school records but on the other hand, to play county cricket was all that he had dreamed about. It was a dilemma and when the decision was made, it was a wrench to leave. But before we judge Papa Cowdrey too harshly, it is well to consider his reasoning. He thought that the extra term at Homefield would do Colin’s cricket no good, and in this he was probably right.
The same rationale lay at the heart of this decision. Probably Colin would score buckets of runs but would his cricket improve? He believed it was time for him to move on and face the challenges of learning the game at first-class level. And who was to say he was not right on this occasion too?
In a letter to his father, Colin expresses no resentment for the decision; in fact he gives every indication that he agrees. He even starts to consider his career at Tonbridge in terms of a valete:
‘And so I feel I ought to take this opportunity to thank you very very much for sending me to Tonbridge, for at no other school would I have had such (not only enjoyment) a great time in every way...But it is not the games I enjoy so much but the grand, friendly atmosphere and it makes one feel honoured that one day one will be an OT. And so I thank you for what you have done for me. My last day at school will be a day of misery.
‘Now, about what I am going to do. If they really think me good enough to play for Kent then I would like to spend a lot of time between 20 and 30 playing seriously, and as a schoolmaster NO CAN DO.
‘I must add a brief account of my plans and I want to hear your views and criticisms:
1. Fail the army
2. Pass Higher Cert
3. Take another Jupp Scholarship in Feb 1951
4. Stay on for summer ’51
5. Go to BNC (Brasenose College) in Oct ’51
6. Read a subject on which to schoolmaster
7. Hope a good job comes my way leaving me plenty of time so that I can play whole of season
8. Have a degree and ability to start teaching at 30 when July, August, September cricket will be quite sufficient probably.’
We have no need to imagine Ernest’s advice. In fact we know it. ‘Play cricket, son, for as long as you can.’ Which he did.
The die was cast and Colin departed Tonbridge quietly, without any fuss or fanfare, at the end of the Easter term. His last appearance as a pupil on the school’s playing fields was somewhat incongruously at sports day. His departure may have been low-key but he had been captain of cricket, captain of rugby and head of school and his housemaster paid this tribute to him in his final report. ‘I have been very proud of his achievements as Captain of Cricket and his success as Head Boy.’
His headmaster was even more fulsome and his wise and generous farewell is worth quoting in full:
‘Things that seem small to other people matter to him and this thoughtfulness, as well as his success, make him a much-loved leader, which is better than pearls or rubies, or even centuries and scholarships.’
Colin may have been wistful as he boarded the train from Tonbridge station to London but he cannot have been downcast with those words ringing in his ears. He makes no mention of his feelings in his diary but we can read between the lines. There is a single, bare entry:
‘THE END’
And there the diary, together with his childhood, comes to a close.