Lord Frederick Beauclerk's Two Centuries — First Batsman to Score Two in a Season, 1805

Centuries were rare in early-1800s cricket. Pitches were rough, bats were narrow, and bowling — though underarm — produced shooters and unpredictable bounce. Most batsmen averaged under 20 in major matches. Beauclerk's career batting figures (over 4,000 runs in 100-odd matches at an average of around 30) put him at the top of the table for the entire underarm era.

Beauclerk had scored heavily through the 1803 and 1804 seasons but had not previously made two hundreds in one summer. The 1805 season produced two unusually flat pitches at Lord's — one in early July, one in mid-August — and Beauclerk took advantage of both.

Beauclerk, fourth son of the 5th Duke of St Albans and a direct descendant of Charles II and Nell Gwynn, was already the dominant amateur batsman in English cricket. He had been playing major matches since 1791 and ran the MCC committee in all but name. The 1805 season produced his finest sustained batting. On 1-3 July he made 129 not out for Hampshire (a side raised in name only — most of his team-mates were MCC men) against an England eleven at Lord's Old Ground in Dorset Square. On a rough pitch where the next-highest score in his innings was barely 30, he batted through to remain undefeated. Six weeks later, in an England v Surrey match at the same ground in August, he made 102 in the first innings, again on a difficult surface. No other batsman had been recorded with two centuries in a single English summer; the previous benchmark for amateur batting had been a single high score per career. Beauclerk's record stood until 1817, when William Lambert scored two centuries in the same match for Sussex against Epsom. By that time Beauclerk was the leading figure in the cricket establishment and his 1805 feat was part of the case for his pre-eminence.

“Lord Frederick Beauclerk heads the career batting averages of all those who played from Hambledon days to the period when over-arm was legalised.”

Beauclerk continued to dominate amateur batting through the next decade. He was the leading batsman in the inaugural Gentlemen v Players match of 1806 and ran the MCC's affairs from his pew at Lord's. The 1805 season is generally regarded as his finest with the bat.