In late August 1846 the Nottinghamshire lob-bowler William Clarke, then a 48-year-old professional working as the practice bowler at Lord's, gathered eleven of England's leading professional cricketers and founded the All-England Eleven. The travelling side that resulted would, over the next two decades, take first-class standard cricket to every corner of the British Isles and create the commercial template for professional touring.
First-class cricket in 1846 was concentrated in a handful of London and southern grounds. Outside London, opportunities for leading professionals were sparse; outside the south, opportunities to see them play were almost non-existent. Clarke had the contacts (from Lord's), the venue management experience (from Trent Bridge), and the financial nous to bridge the gap.
Through the summer of 1846 Clarke wrote to professional cricketers and to provincial ground proprietors, sounding out availability and gate receipts. By August he had a roster and a fixture promise from the Sheffield ground.
Clarke was an unlikely impresario. Born at Nottingham in 1798, he had lost the sight of his right eye in a fives-court accident as a young man and bowled slow underarm 'lobs' that swung in the air and broke off the pitch. He had married Mary Chapman, the widow of the proprietor of the Trent Bridge Inn, in 1837, and had laid out the Trent Bridge cricket ground behind the inn the following year. Engaged as practice bowler at Lord's in 1846 at the age of 47, Clarke saw at first hand both the appetite for top-class cricket outside London and the financial squeeze on professional players, who relied on a small handful of fixtures each summer. His response was the All-England Eleven: a permanent travelling side of the best dozen professionals in the country, contracted to him personally, that would tour against local 18s and 22s for guaranteed match fees. The first AEE side, taking the field for the first time at Sheffield's Hyde Park ground on 31 August 1846 against a Twenty of Sheffield, included Clarke himself, Pilch, Felix, Joseph Guy, William Martingell, Tom Sewell senior, Vincent Hillyer and George Butler. Clarke paid each man £4 to £6 per match plus expenses, retained the gate as promoter, and acted as captain and chief bowler. Within three years the AEE was the central institution of professional English cricket.
1837: Clarke marries Mary Chapman, widow of the proprietor of the Trent Bridge Inn
1838: Clarke lays out the Trent Bridge cricket ground
1846: Clarke engaged as practice bowler at Lord's
Summer 1846: Clarke recruits leading professionals to a travelling eleven
31 Aug 1846: First AEE match at Sheffield's Hyde Park ground vs Twenty of Sheffield
Players paid £4-£6 per match plus expenses; Clarke retains gate
1798
William Clarke born at Nottingham
1837
Clarke marries Mary Chapman of the Trent Bridge Inn
1838
Trent Bridge cricket ground laid out
1846
Clarke engaged as practice bowler at Lord's
31 Aug 1846
First All-England Eleven match at Sheffield
“Clarke is the cleverest manager I ever saw, and the cleverest bowler too, in his way.”
The AEE played eight matches in its first season, expanded to a fuller schedule in 1847 and dominated professional cricket for the next ten years. Clarke himself died in 1856 and was succeeded by George Parr; a breakaway United All-England Eleven, founded in 1852 by John Wisden and James Dean over Clarke's autocratic management, ran in parallel. By 1860 the two travelling elevens between them were the principal source of income for English professional cricketers.
The single most important commercial innovation in nineteenth-century cricket — and the seed of every touring eleven, every county professional contract and every spectator-driven cricket business that followed.
Clarke's All-England Eleven is now recognised as the commercial foundation of professional cricket. The model — a roster of contracted professionals, gate-receipt economics, country-wide fixtures against local odds — was copied by every touring side of the next half-century, including Stephenson and Parr's Australian tours of the 1860s. Without Clarke's promotional instinct, the spread of cricket from the Home Counties to Manchester, Bristol, Leeds and the country towns would have been a generation slower.
Yorkshire v Essex
1932-06-16
On 15-16 June 1932 Herbert Sutcliffe (313) and Percy Holmes (224*) put on 555 for the first wicket against Essex at Leyton, breaking the world first-class record for any wicket and adding a layer of folklore — including a scoreboard that read 554 for several minutes and a hastily reversed declaration — that has clung to the partnership ever since.
Australia v England
1933-02-14
With the fate of the Bodyline series in the balance and England 216 for 6 chasing 340, Eddie Paynter checked himself out of a Brisbane hospital where he was being treated for acute tonsillitis, taxied to the Gabba in pyjamas and a dressing gown, and batted for nearly four hours to score 83. England drew level on first innings, won the Test by six wickets and the series 4-1.
Australia
1934-09-25
Days after the 1934 Oval Test, Bradman fell seriously ill with appendicitis that progressed to peritonitis. With antibiotics not yet available, he was given little chance of survival; his wife Jessie left Adelaide on a sea voyage to England prepared for the worst. He recovered after weeks of intensive nursing in a London nursing home and returned to first-class cricket the following Australian summer.