May 22, 1859
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - what will come to your mind when you hear this name? Surely the world famous detective character Sherlock Holmes. Well Sir Arthur Conan was much more than the creator of Sherlock Holmes. He had other faces too, and one of them was a deep connection with the Gentleman’s Game.
Most people think that writers are introverts, they are stay-at-home type. They just loves to write all the day. They do not have special interest in sports. But this assumption is not universally true. There were many popular writers in the world who played cricket regularly. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, was one of them.
Born on 22 May 1859 at 11 Picardy Place, Edinburgh, Scotland, Sir Doyle played for the Third XXII, Second XXI team of his school at the age of 14 in 1873 and he once featured in a match for the Second XI against the First XI. He opened the innings and carried his bat throughout the team's innings, remaining unbeaten on 7. He always tried to break into the first XI but never got a chance and this was the first and last instance of him playing for the second XI. He did not get any more chance. Sir Doyale studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh Medical School, where, while studying, he also played cricket for the Second XI team of the University in 1879.
Almost each one of us have read Sherlock Holmes at some point of time. But do you know how Sherlock got his name? It is said that the former Nottinghamshire players Shacklock (Fast Bowler) and Sherwin (WK), inspired Doyle with the Christian name of his famous character Sherlock Holmes (amalgam of Mordecai Sherwin and Frank Shacklock). Shacklock later played for Derbyshire where his fellow fast bowler was William Mycroft, after whom Sir Doyle named the brother of Sherlock —Mycroft Holmes. The last name 'Holmes' was borrowed from an American physician and poet, Oliver Wendell Holmes, who was admired by Sir Doyle's mother, Mary Conan Doyle.
Soon after writing his first feature of Sherlock, Doyle started to play cricket for an interestingly named team, Allahakbarries C.C.(named after an African word meaning 'Heaven Help Us') founded by 'Peter Pan' writer JM Barrie, also featuring the evergreen writer P.G. Wodehouse. The club would play against the various villages in the Home Counties. Later, Sir Doyle was rewarded with a spot in the first team to tour the Holland in 1891.
He soon made his first class debut for Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1900. In all, the creator of Sherlock played 10 first class matches, 8 of them at Lord’s. As per Wisden Cricketers' Almanack Doyle was never a famous cricketer, he could hit hard and bowl slows with a puzzling flight. For MCC v Cambridgeshire at Lord's, in 1899, he took seven wickets for 61 runs (although this match was not recognized as a professional match) and on the same ground two years later carried out his bat for 32 against Leicestershire, who had Woodcock, Geeson and King to bowl for them.
Coming to the most celebrated aspect of his cricket career, it happened mysteriously. He has taken just one wicket in his entire career for MCC. But the important of that wicket was invaluable!
The incident took place on August 25, 1900. The legend WG Grace was batting for London County at Crystal Palace Park. He was unbeaten on 110 then. Sir Doyle at the bowling end. And Grace, who would have dispatched that ball easily, top-edged it to the keeper Bill Storer. That's it! Doyle got his only first-class wicket. It still continues to be one of Sherlock's unsolved cases!
Except that, Doyle made his career best of 43 runs in that match. In all, he scored 231 runs in 10 matches at an average of 19.25. Batting hard and fooling batsmen in flight; That's all for Doyle's ordinary cricket career.
When the 'Author's Club' was established in Scotland in 1905, Sir Doyle was appointed captain of the cricket team there. He played at the club until the First World War as a opening batsman and scored a century for the Authors XI against the Press.
There was another funny incident in 1903. Sir Doyle batted alongside Grace while playing for MCC against Kent at Lord’s. They were facing Bill Bradley, the Kent and England fast bowler. What happened next? Doyle recalled in 'Memories and Adventures': "His first delivery I hardly saw, and it landed with a terrific thud upon my thigh. A little occasional pain is one of the chances of cricket, and one takes it as cheerfully as one can, but on this occasion it suddenly became sharp to an unbearable degree. I clapped my hand to the spot, and found to my amazement I was on fire. The ball had landed straight on a small tin vesta box in my trousers pocket, had splintered the box, and set the matches ablaze." W.G. was greatly amused and cried in a high voice "Couldn’t get you out – had to set you on fire!"
Doyle remained addicted to the game throughout his life. Even three days prior to his wedding (with Louise Hawkins in 1885), he had played cricket at Stonyhurst against his former school and Immediately after the wedding ceremony, he toured Ireland with Stonyhurst Wanderers (an Old Boy’s Team) to play Cricket. What would you say? a 'Cricket Honeymoon'?
Even though he wrote a lot about cricket but for some unknown reason, he mentioned cricket only twice in the 56 short stories and 4 novels of Sherlock Holmes.
There is the cricket cap in 'The Adventure of the Priory School', and in 'The Adventure of the Three Students' one of the three young men plays for his college. Apart from these two instances, in 'Sign of Four', Toby the “ugly long haired, lop-eared creature… brown and white in colour, with a very clumsy waddling gait” dog leads Holmes and Watson to Kennington Lane on the east of The Oval, but the characters didn't enter inside the historical ground.
Sir Doyle's other contribution to cricket was the depiction of a French officer during a prisoner of war in one of his classic 'Brigadier Gerard' stories.
Doyle gave a vivid description of the game in the 38th volume of Strand Magazine: "I have only once felt smaller, and that was when I was bowled by A. P. Lucas, by the most singular ball that I have ever received. He propelled it like a quoit into the air to a height of at least thirty feet, and it fell straight and true on to the top of the bails. I have often wondered what a good batsman would have made of that ball. To play it one would have needed to turn the blade of the bat straight up, and could hardly fail to give a chance. I tried to cut it off my stumps, with the result that I knocked down my wicket and broke my bat, while the ball fell in the midst of this general chaos. I spent the rest of the day wondering gloomily what I ought to have done—and I am wondering yet."
SirDoyle bowled out by A P Lucas, illustration
Two years before he passed away, he penned down 'The Story of Spedegue's Dropper', a short story on lob bowling. (Tom Spedegue was an asthmatic schoolmaster and a avid cricket fan suffering from a weak heart.) Spedegue develops an underarm delivery to counter the Aussies and won a famous test match for England against their oldest rival. It was published as one of the 'other stories' with 'The Maracot Deep' in October 1928, about two decades after lob bowling had disappeared from cricket.
Sir Doyle was so pleased to get the wicket of Sir W.G. Grace that he penned down a poem titled 'A Reminiscence of Cricket':
Once in my heyday of cricket,
One day I shall ever recall!
I captured that glorious wicket,
The greatest, the grandest of all.
Before me he stands like a vision,
Bearded and burly and brown,
A smile of good humoured derision
As he waits for the first to come down.
A statue from Thebes or from Knossos,
A Hercules shrouded in white,
Assyrian bull-like colossus,
He stands in his might.
With the beard of a Goth or a Vandal,
His bat hanging ready and free,
His great hairy hands on the handle,
And his menacing eyes upon me.
And I – I had tricks for the rabbits,
The feeble of mind or eye,
I could see all the duffer’s bad habits
And where his ruin might lie.
The capture of such might elate one,
But it seemed like one horrible jest
That I should serve tosh to the great one,
Who had broken the hearts of the best.
Well, here goes! Good Lord, what a rotter!
Such a sitter as never was dreamt;
It was clay in the hands of the potter,
But he tapped it with quiet contempt.
The second was better – a leetle;
It was low, but was nearly long-hop;
As the housemaid comes down on the beetle
So down came the bat with a chop.
He was sizing me up with some wonder,
My broken-kneed action and ways;
I could see the grim menace from under
The striped peak that shaded his gaze.
The third was a gift or it looked it-
A foot off the wicket or so;
His huge figure swooped as he hooked it,
His great body swung to the blow.
Still when my dreams are night-marish,
I picture that terrible smite,
It was meant for a neighboring parish,
Or any place out of sight.
But – yes, there’s a but to the story –
The blade swished a trifle too low;
Oh wonder, and vision of glory!
It was up like a shaft from a bow.
Up, up like a towering game bird,
Up, up to a speck in the blue,
And then coming down like the same bird,
Dead straight on the line that it flew.
Good Lord, it was mine! Such a soarer
Would call for a safe pair of hands;
None safer than Derbyshire Storer,
And there, face uplifted, he stands
Wicket keep Storer, the knowing,
Wary and steady of nerve,
Watching it falling and growing
Marking the pace and curve.
I stood with my two eyes fixed on it,
Paralysed, helpless, inert;
There was ‘plunk’ as the gloves shut upon it,
And he cuddled it up to his shirt.
Out – beyond question or wrangle!
Homeward he lurched to his lunch!
His bat was tucked up at an angle,
His great shoulders curved to a hunch.
Walking he rumbled and grumbled,
Scolding himself and not me;
One glove was off, and he fumbled,
Twisting the other hand free
Did I give Storer the credit
The thanks he so splendidly earned?
It was mere empty talk if I said it,
For Grace had already returned.
However, Conan Doyle had many ideas about cricket. One can wonder that with such imagination how good a captain he could have been had he pursued his cricketing career more seriously. Although not all of his ideas were sound. Like, he once said that left-handed batsman should not be allowed to play since they slow down the game.
Not only cricket, Sir Doyle also played football as a goalkeeper under the pseudonym 'AC Smith' in the Portsmouth FC team. Above all he played golf the best. He was also the captain of Sussex's Crowborough Beacon Golf Club in 1910. He continued to play golf till the end of his life. He also had knowledge of architecture and designed several garden houses. He has also done law business as a hobby and won two cases!
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle passed away at 71 on July 7, 1930 in Crowborough.
We pay our tribute to this legendary writer and cricket enthusiastic on his 161st birth anniversary!
✍️ Subham Dey
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