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Sporting War and Sporting Peace 1914-1919 - Colin Blythe’s journey from Kent to War
In the latest part of Peter Bloor’s series, he reflects on the exploits of Kent bowler Colin Blythe following his retirement from international cricket and his death in 1917 in the First World War.
Retirement from international cricket
The specialist who in 1909 had diagnosed that Colin Blythe “suffers severely in a peculiar way from the strain on the nervous system caused by playing in a Test Match” that “does not exist in the case of County matches” was proved entirely correct in 1910.
After playing two of the five Tests in South Africa during the winter – taking 10 for 104 in the last – Colin was obliged to retire from international cricket, but went on to take 149 wickets for Kent as the county won its third County Championship that summer. He was, according to The Times, “as good as ever, the best bowler of his type in England, with innumerable tricks of flight, change of pace etc. at his command”, as he was again when Kent won their fourth title in 1913 being, ‘On sticky wickets, with Blythe at his best, no doubt the strongest side.’
“Blythe in his best form”
Colin took 159 wickets for Kent that season – having taken 138 in 1911 and 178 in 1912 - to which he added another 159 in 1914. These included 7 for 15 against Northamptonshire in June - on a drying pitch he “bowled at the top of his form, keeping a perfect length and making the ball turn sharply” - 8 for 55 against Yorkshire and 7 for 26 against Middlesex in July, and then another 7, for 20, against Worcestershire in August.
“County cricketers join the colours”
Following the Worcestershire match Kent played another three before the Great War brought a slightly premature end to the season, but as soon as he was able, in October 1914 Colin joined the Kent Fortress Royal Engineers. With him were David Jennings, also of Kent, their former team-mate Harry Preston and Northamptonshire’s Claud Woolley - whose wicket was one of the 7 Colin had taken in June - Bill Fairservice adding to the Kent cricket contingent when he was recruited by Colin at Christmas.
“Military at Cricket”
The Fortress Engineers’ cricket team was, of course, a strong one, and during the summer of 1916 Colin continued to take wickets for it as he had for Kent, including 13 for 85 against Chatham Garrison and 7 for 24 against the Artists Rifles Officer Training Corps in a match they lost by 1 run despite fielding the three Kent players and Woolley. In 1917 Colin played for the East Anglian Royal Engineers, again with Jennings and Woolley, taking 36 wickets at a cost of 139 runs in five matches - including 7 for 13 in 4.4 overs against a 12-man Royal Naval Division side - and made his final appearances at Lord’s.
“Blythe not at his best” before a last handshake
In neither match was he at his best, taking 1 wicket for an English Army XI against an Australian Imperial Force XI in July and 1 for 54 for an Army and Navy XI against an Australian and South African Forces team in August. He explained to an enquirer that he was very out of practice and did not expect to do well but his Kent Chairman Lord Harris was more concerned to speak with Colin than he was with his performance, having attended very much wanting “to see him trip up to the wicket once again and to give him a farewell handshake, hoping it might not, but fearing it might be, the last.”
‘A German shell has done its fell work’
It was indeed to be the last handshake. Having insisted upon being sent to the Western Front Colin crossed the Channel on September 25th to reinforce the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and on arrival he joined its 12th Battalion, then engaged in the Battle of Passchendaele. This was a Pioneer Battalion of trained infantrymen who would also perform construction and maintenance work, and it was while working on the Forest Hall, Bedlington, Gravenstafel and Pommern Castle Light Railway that 49296 Serjeant Colin Blythe was killed by shrapnel from a bursting shell on November 8th 1917.
The Battalion War Diary – a wholly practical document – recorded the death of the finest slow bowler in England with the stark words “3 OR [Other Ranks] killed, 6 wounded, 1 missing.” By contrast a former county cricketer using the pseudonym “Ranger” writing in The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News reflected upon the loss to cricket of “one of the most gifted slow left-handed bowlers the game ever saw”, recognising that “we shall all miss that perky, thin figure with the cap cocked on one side of its head and…even more the sight of him having a duel with some great batsman.” There was of course another loss to consider, that to Colin’s widow Gertrude, who would play a leading role in the remembrance of her late husband in Kent and Belgium.
Remembering also:
540499 2nd Corporal David Jennings, then of the Royal Engineers, who died of gas poisoning and double pneumonia in Tunbridge Wells on August 6th 1918. David is buried in Marlborough Old Cemetery, Wiltshire.
Claud Woolley, Harry Preston and Bill Fairservice all survived the war.
References
The quotes and other information in this article are taken from The Times, The Sportsman, The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, The Tonbridge Free Press and local newspapers 1909-1920, and the 12th King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry War Diary, The National Archives reference WO95/2353/1
Images – Colin Blythe (black and white) Gallaher 1926 and (colour) Wills 1908, Claud Woolley Wills 1929, and George Robert Canning Harris 4th Baron Harris by Walter Stoneman 1918 © National Portrait Gallery Photographs Collection NPG x168151. Banner image Wills 1929
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