1766 English cricket season
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The 1766 English cricket season is a season about which little is known.
On Thurs 6 February, Robert Bartholomew died [1]. He had played for Surrey in the 1750s and may well have been related to the Bartholomews who played for Chertsey in the 1770s. He was the master of the Angel Inn at Islington and also of White Conduit House.
Perhaps another nail in the coffin of the Artillery Ground when its latest keeper Mr Read died on Thurs 25 September [1]. Like George Smith before him, he was also the landlord of the Pyed Horse Inn.
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[edit] Australia and New Zealand
It was in 1766 that the Royal Society commissioned Captain James Cook (1728 – 1779) to lead an astronomical expedition to the Pacific Ocean for the primary purpose of charting a transit of Venus. He had a second purpose which was to search for a southern continent called Terra Australis, and to establish if this had a connection with the lands visited by Abel Tasman in the 1640s.
Captain Cook left England in 1768. He sailed south and around Cape Horn to reach Tahiti in April 1769, where the astronomical survey was concluded. He then sailed west to try and find New Zealand. He did so and, apart from a few minor errors, mapped the complete coastline. He discovered the Cook Strait between the two main islands, which Tasman had missed.
In April 1770, the expedition sailed westward from New Zealand and they became the first Europeans to reach the east coast of Australia at a place called Point Hicks on the coast of Victoria. Cook sailed northwards, following the coast, and charted some famous landmarks including Botany Bay, which would soon earn notoriety. In June, he encountered, rather than found, the Great Barrier Reef when his ship, HM Bark Endeavour, ran aground on one of its shoals. During repairs near modern Cooktown, his men made contact with Aboriginals and saw kangaroos. Cook continued the voyage around the northeast coast and through the Torres Strait to Batavia before returning to England in 1771.
Cook’s voyages were a highly significant precursor to the worldwide spread of cricket. It was to be some years before colonisation of Australia (from 1788) and New Zealand (after 1800) began but cricket soon arrived there too and the first definite references to the sport in Australia is in 1804 and in New Zealand is in 1832. Incidentally, the first cricket reference in the West Indies (Barbados to be exact) is in 1806 and in South Africa it is in 1808. The game had already been introduced to India and North America.
[edit] Honours
[edit] Matches
| Date | Match Title | Venue | Result | |
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| c.19 June (Th) | Sussex v Hampshire [4] | venue unknown | Hampshire won | |
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This is the earliest reference to Hampshire as an individual county team. Whether the Hambledon Club was involved is unrecorded but presumably it was. Some historians believe it was at about this time that the club, as distinct from a parish organisation, was founded. After the first innings the odds were 40 to 1 against Hampshire. Another source has recorded Tues 17 June as the date and has surmised that Goodwood was the venue but all that can be said for certain is that the Hampshire team won [5]. |
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| 29 September (M) | Bourne v Dartford [6] | Bishopsbourne Paddock | result unknown | |
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No details are known of the game apart from a mention in the Kentish Weekly Post. |
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| 8 October (W) | Chertsey v Hambledon [6] | Dartford Brent | result unknown | |
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The choice of Dartford Brent as the venue for the Chertsey v Hambledon match seems strange as it was neutral. |
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[edit] References
- ^ a b G B Buckley, Fresh Light on Pre-Victorian Cricket, Cotterell, 1937
- ^ An unofficial seasonal title proclaimed by media or historians prior to December 1889 when the official County Championship was constituted
- ^ Champion counties from 1728
- ^ H T Waghorn, Cricket Scores, Notes, etc. (1730-1773), Blackwood, 1899
- ^ Ashley Mote, The Glory Days of Cricket, Robson, 1997
- ^ a b Cricket Quarterly edited by Rowland Bowen
[edit] External sources
[edit] Further reading
- H S Altham, A History of Cricket, Volume 1 (to 1914), George Allen & Unwin, 1962
- Derek Birley, A Social History of English Cricket, Aurum, 1999
- Rowland Bowen, Cricket: A History of its Growth and Development, Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1970
- Ashley Mote, The Glory Days of Cricket, Robson, 1997
- David Underdown, Start of Play, Allen Lane, 2000
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