‘THE EFFECT OF the Second World War on native German cricket could be likened to the fate of a precious vase in a china shop through which something far more violent than the proverbial bull had passed,’ wrote the authors of the Story of Continental Cricket. The sport had been devastated: Berlin’s sports grounds were in a terrible condition; a generation of players had been killed; its senior players had reached an age when it was time to hang up their pads; and getting hold of equipment presented ‘almost insuperable difficulties’.

On top of all that, chaos reigned in post-war Berlin as the city tried to haul itself from its knees while the four Allied powers – Britain, the USA, the Soviet Union and France – wrestled for control behind a brittle facade of cooperation. Crime rocketed, the people were in thrall to a growing black market, and the Soviet grip on the city grew tighter. With its American, British and French zones, West Berlin became an enclave surrounded by Soviet-run, communist East Germany. The Soviets had the greater military presence and controlled almost all routes in, which meant they administered the city’s supply of food. Stalin’s ambition was to subsume the entire city in the Soviet bloc by forcing the other Allies out. These tensions culminated in the Berlin Blockade of 1948/49, when the Russians prevented food from being imported into the western sectors of Berlin by rail, river or road. In response the Allies airlifted millions of tons of food into the city to stop the residents starving. The plan worked. Its success humiliated the Soviets into lifting the blockade and paved the way for the formal division of the city.

But West Berlin remained a small, free island in a vast communist sea. These were not the sort of conditions in which businessmen could prosper, unless they were willing to bend the law or grease the palm of officialdom, particularly communist leaders in the East. While millions flocked into the city after expulsion from parts of Germany under Soviet control, a significant number decided to leave Berlin and head west in search of work and business, or simply out of fear that Stalin would seize total control. Among these emigrants was Felix Menzel.

Though he was in his mid fifties, retiring or winding down was not an option. Like many Germans he needed to work to survive. The post-war trade in Berlin was not to his liking so he moved to Frankfurt, Germany’s fifth largest city. We can only speculate why he moved there. Originally it had been chosen as West Germany’s political capital, though that decision was changed in 1949 and Bonn was given the honour. It quickly emerged as Germany’s main financial centre in the wake of Berlin’s division. Frankfurt airport also became the nation’s busiest transport hub. There was money to be made there by legal means.

But there was no culture of cricket in Frankfurt. For the early part of the summer Felix satisfied his craving by reading FuWo religiously to see how his old friends and teammates were getting on, keeping the cuttings for future reference. Every August he took a month off work and rode the train across East Germany to Berlin to play with them.

Gradually, in his absence, the Berlin cricket scene was finding its feet. The role of leader had passed from Felix to Kurt Rietz, who had played with little distinction in the series against the Gents. Rietz’s enthusiasm for the game almost matched Felix’s fanaticism. Before the war he had been a promising football player for the BSV club and had been selected to play for a Berlin representative side. But the match was on a Sunday, when Rietz usually played cricket for Amateure. He mentioned this fixture clash to the selectors. They were aghast. How could he turn down the chance to play for his city in favour of a strange game few of them had heard of? Rietz would not yield. ‘On Sunday, I play cricket!’ he vowed, and withdrew from the match.

One Sunday shortly after the war Rietz was travelling on a streetcar with his cricket bag on his lap. He was on his way to meet some friends for a practice on one of the few available patches of spare ground amid the rubble. He could sense the man sitting next to him in civilian clothes was itching to speak. Finally he did – in English.

‘Excuse me, sir,’ he said, glancing down at the bag, ‘but do you play this game here?’

Rietz, an Anglophile like Menzel, spoke some English. He smiled. ‘Of course. It is cricket.’

‘I work for the control commission,’ the man explained. ‘I would love to play cricket with you.’

They arranged to play a friendly the following Sunday. Rietz managed to gather together a team featuring members of the old brigade such as Franz Hustan, those like him who had survived combat such as Gustav Parnemann, and some younger men who were new to the game. Remarkably, they won. More significantly, from then on they played regular matches against British troops and bureaucrats. Buoyed by this, Rietz restarted the Viktoria 89 cricket team, once again with Hustan; BSV, Germania and Preussen, complete with a visiting Felix Menzel, also rose from the ashes. By the early 1950s the Berlin Cricket League was reborn. A team of the city’s best players also played in a league founded by the British Army of the Rhine, filled with teams of troops. The Berliners even managed to win the title on three occasions.

The league’s existence drew the attention of the News Chronicle’s Berlin correspondent, Bruce Rothwell. He covered the presentation of the league trophy – a bat signed by the 1952 India and 1953 Australia touring teams, as well as the autographs of the England, Middlesex, Warwickshire and Lancashire sides – by British commandant Major General W. P. Oliver. Rietz, the ‘Cricket-pioneer’ according to Rothwell, admired the bat and told Rothwell, ‘We all follow with great interest the Test matches and English county games. All the famous names of English cricket are well known to us.’ And what did he think of Len Hutton? ‘We think he is the greatest player in the world. We would all love the chance of seeing him playing cricket in his homeland. Perhaps, if we can defeat several more of your local British teams, we will be invited over to play in England.’ And hopefully allowed access to The Oval pavilion, he failed to add.

Such a trip never materialized. The Berlin League flourished for a few more years but the decision to increase the length of the domestic football season dealt it a fatal blow. Rather than having two or three months to play cricket, the off-season lasted little more than a month and many players chose to train or rest rather than play cricket. At the same time the Cold War chill forced more players to follow Felix Menzel’s example and leave Berlin for West Germany. Writing in the Cricket Society Journal in 1956, E. B. ‘Crash’ Abbots, a cricket-loving serviceman in Berlin, regarded the long-term prospects for the game in the city as bleak. Too many of its most important players had passed the veteran stage and were on the verge of becoming geriatric. ‘The senior representative team still includes regularly at least one player who is well over sixty years of age – he still runs the hundred metres in little over fourteen seconds! – and the average age of the team is consistently above the fifty mark.’

There were only three players who could have been more than sixty in 1956: Felix and Guido Menzel and Alfred Ladwig. Moreover, given that Ladwig had almost lost his feet in the Great War we can assume the sprightly sexagenarian Abbots refers to was one of the Menzel brothers. He also praised Kurt Rietz’s dedication to the cause. ‘Herr Rietz . . . is working very hard behind the scenes in an attempt to get cricket encouraged in the Berlin schools. If he succeeds, and his persistence certainly merits reward, the future of Berlin cricket will be assured for at least another generation.’

He was unsuccessful. The Berlin Cricket League played its last matches in 1959. A year later the Wall divided the city and the only cricket available to Berliners was the occasional match against British troops. Rietz struggled manfully on, and even managed to coax some players who had defected from East to West to play for his team, but they played on the Maifeld at the Olympic Stadium, occupied by the British Army and off limits for ordinary Berliners. Inevitably, with no cricket to watch and even less to play, the locals drifted away from the game and soon Rietz, by now into his sixties himself, was the sole German in a side of British, Indian and Pakistani expats.

By the end of the war the Major was sixty years old and his playing days were over. But he could still be found on a cricket pitch every now and then: for several years after the war he umpired the Worcestershire v. Combined Services match. He also owned and raced horses at local point-to-point meetings. But his main home was still Worcestershire CC and New Road, where there was no shortage of people willing to stand him a whisky and soda and listen to his stories. He chaired the selection committee for several years before being asked to become the club’s president, a role he fulfilled between 1950 and 1955.

The 1950s were the last full decade of the amateur and professional divide in the English game and as always, and despite being very much the amateur, the Major had the respect of the county’s pros. He also earned their gratitude: professionals were expected to pay their own costs from their wages, but Young Maurice had opened a dry-cleaning business and the Major negotiated for them a half-price discount to have their kit cleaned.

To his great satisfaction, the Major had the pleasure of watching a successful Worcestershire side in his dotage. From being one of the county game’s whipping boys between the wars the side grew in strength and won their first county championship in 1964. Before his death in 1978 at the age of ninety-two the Major was able to witness two further titles, in 1965 and 1974. His passing brought many warm words from cricket lovers across the country, most praising his dedication and persistence between the wars which had saved the club from extinction. Gilbert Ashton, a friend and former teammate, delivered the eulogy at the Major’s memorial service at Upton Church. ‘And I shall always remember from our cricketing days together the endearing and somewhat quizzical look on Maurice’s face when he was giving you just a hint of reproof, or better still, a pat on the back; both always done in the kindliest way.’

The committee room at New Road was well trodden by the Gents. The Major’s successor as president was Geoffrey Tomkinson, by now Sir Geoffrey for his services to British industry. He had ‘retired’ from playing at some stage in his mid sixties, but in name only: whenever Kidderminster were a player short he filled in. The same applied with rugby: he filled in at full-back for Kidderminster RFC at the age of sixty-three. The competitive urge never faded. In 1954 the Kidderminster Shuttle reported how Tomkinson was strolling through town when he chanced across a sports day hosted by local carpet companies. He stopped to watch and saw there was a 100 yards sprint for the over fifties, so he entered. Each competitor was given a yard start for each year he was over fifty. Sir Geoffrey won by 15 yards. He was seventy-three. ‘I could have won from scratch,’ he told the newspaper.

He remained an imposing figure until his death in 1963. Brian Gittins, Kidderminster’s historian, remembers him visiting the club shortly before he died to see the new pavilion. One of its attractions was a fruit machine but, in anticipation of Sir Geoffrey’s disapproval, it had been unplugged and hidden before his visit (though this austere image is rather difficult to reconcile with the Gent who liked a tour and a drink and enjoyed the entertainments at places such as Haus Vaterland). Sir Geoffrey was the only member of the Gents team to become a published author. He wrote three books, the last of which was on cricket, the self-explanatory Memorable Cricket Matches.fn1

C. S. Anton succeeded Sir Geoffrey as the county club’s president to make a hat-trick of former Gents from the 1937 touring side. Cyril Smith also held the role between 1970 and 1972. Smith travelled to Berlin after the war on business. While there he tried to find the doctor who had diagnosed his pneumonia and saved his life. He was upset to learn the doctor had not survived the conflict. Len Pitcher, who was on the Somerset Wanderers tour of 1938, told a similarly poignant story of how the war had devastated the city he knew. Immediately after the war ended he was in Berlin on Army business and tried to trace some of the cricketers he’d played against but couldn’t find any. They had all moved or been killed. The only landmark he recognized in the ruins was a tobacconist’s where he and his teammates had stocked up on cigarettes. Remarkably, when he walked in the proprietor’s wife remembered him immediately. But she warned him not to stay. The shop was in the Russian sector and he wasn’t safe there.

Both Cyril Smith and Charles Anton lived long and fruitful lives, as did William Deeley, who dedicated much of his time to Barnt Green where he is still remembered fondly. He died in 1977. Captain Robert Berkeley had a decent innings too: he survived the war, continued to tend his beloved gardens at Berkeley and Spetchley, and remained Joint Master of the Berkeley Hunt until his death in 1969 at the age of seventy-one. Dickie Williams, as we know, was known to turn up to watch at Stourbridge until his death in 1982. Henry Foley, who withdrew from the touring party for reasons unknown, served as a Temporary Captain in the Rifle Brigade (Prince Consort’s Own) during the war, survived the conflict, and died in 1959. Michael Mallinson, who was forced to miss the tour through illness, injury or family commitment, reached the rank of Major in the Essex Regiment and was killed in action near Orsogna in Italy in April 1944. He was twenty-four.

The younger members of the side who survived the war were blessed with longevity. Young Maurice played a few matches without great success for Worcestershire seconds after the war before going into business. He died in January 2005. Peter Terry worked for the family firm, spent a year as High Sheriff of North Yorkshire, and also continued to play with great success for the Yorkshire Gentlemen; he was Vice President right up until his death in February 2006. In an obituary his friend and fellow Gent Roger Hinchcliffe wrote: ‘He will be remembered for his sportsmanship, the modesty with which he viewed his own sporting achievements, his charming manner, his undivided attention given in equal measure whether it be to the most humble or the most noble, and not least he will be remembered for his most infectious laugh.’

Peter Robinson died in September 2006. He had gone into industry, moved to the North-west and sat on the magistrates bench. According to his sons he never played a serious game of cricket again. The highlight of his career remained his trip to Berlin, which means his lifetime career statistics are Innings: 4, Runs: 6, Not Outs: 1, Highest score: 2, Average: 1.25.

In 1995 a German TV crew interviewed Kurt Rietz at his home on Rothariweg in the Tempelhof district of Berlin. He was in his nineties, and rather cruelly they had made him dress in cricket gear for the interview, including a pair of batting gloves. Rietz spoke lucidly and compellingly about his undying love for cricket. Perhaps he had one eye on a comeback. At the end he remarked, ‘You can play cricket until you are a hundred. If you are fit.’

At another point he said, ‘We had some beautiful matches.’ ‘Name some!’ I shouted at the screen. ‘Tell me about Felix Menzel! Tell me about the matches against the Gents! Tell me about trying to play cricket under the swastika! Tell me about the war and the men who didn’t come back! Tell me how you revived the game and how it died again!’ But none of those subjects were discussed, only the story of how he met a British cricket lover on a streetcar in Berlin after the war and arranged a friendly.

The interview, and the warm words offered by Rolf Schwiete, the late president of the German Cricket Association, belied a myth that grew around Rietz in the 1970s and 1980s. It was said that not only had he retired, depriving the Berlin team of its last German-born player, but that he had then withdrawn from all sporting circles and spent his final years alone, surrounded by a vast amount of memorabilia accrued over several decades, reliving the days of his life.

Rietz died in 1996. I tracked down some old acquaintances who punctured this myth. They confirmed he owned a vast archive of papers, programmes and equipment. No one seems to know what has happened to it. His wife Frieda died before him, in 1994, and they had no children. There was a rumour that the archive had been passed to his carer, a woman named Sabine Döring, but I was unable to find her. I did find Rietz’s grave in the Friedhof cemetery, where he’s buried beside Frieda, and managed to resist the urge to start digging and see if his memorabilia is buried with them.

Those elusive papers offer the best chance to find out what happened to the members of the Berlin side that played the Gents. Alfred Ladwig lived until his late eighties, as did Franz Hustan. But Felix Menzel was last heard of shuttling between Frankfurt and Berlin in 1956, still desperate to get a game.

fn1 The other two were an entertaining self-published history of his family, Those Damned Tomkinsons!, and a slightly less entertaining and rather long-windedly titled A Select Bibliography of the Principal Modern Presses, Public and Private, in Great Britain and Ireland.