Memories of Box Cricket
Clive Banks Photos courtesy Clive Banks March 2020 This year is the 150th anniversary of the formation of Box Cricket Club. I thought that I would try to commemorate this important milestone in the club's history in a small way by writing a short article about some personal memories of my association with it. I hope that my little anecdotes will be of interest or amusement and will bring back happy days to some people. Much of it happened a long time ago so, if any of it is faulty, I can only apologise. Early Years One evening in April 1870 a group of young Box men met in the house of my great uncle James Vezey, the Chequers Inn, with the purpose of founding a cricket club in Box. One of those present was my great grandfather John Vezey. Nearly one hundred years later James's grandson Don Bradfield wrote a history of the club entitled A Century of Village Cricket. From this fine little book, I was able to determine the continuing connection of my family with the club. I discovered that members had held the offices of treasurer, secretary and more importantly club captain on many occasions as well as being prominent players. |
Don tells the story of how my grandfather Ben Vezey, who was captain for twelve years, once caused a match to be abandoned when an opposition clerical gentleman refused to leave the pitch when given out hit wicket. My uncle, another Ben Vezey, a strong batsman, was captain either side of the Second World War. Two great uncles, Ted Vezey and Harry Milsom, were prominent bowlers in their time.
My father Sid Banks also was an opening batsman and wicket-keeper during the 1930s. He met my mother at a cricket dance. Dad used to delight in telling me that an old Box resident once told him that the only reason that he came to Box cricket was to watch Dad keep wicket! The headline photo is of dad walking out to open the innings for Box against Knowle at the impressive Imperial ground, Bristol, in August 1933 accompanied by Phil Lambert. At the time neither knew that they were about to break the record for an opening partnership for Box of 170 and that dad would score a century. The scorecard read S Banks 106 retired, P Lambert 54 retired, extras 10, Total for 0 wickets 170.[1] The innings was celebrated at the club’s Annual General Meeting with the notables of the pre-war club: A Shaw-Mellor (vice-president), TH Lambert, DR Ponting, J Browning, F Ford, S Burrow, A Benjamin, P Lambert, R Vivash and S McIlwraith.[2] Many years later I had the honour as a young teenager of opening the innings for Box second eleven with Phil and sharing an opening partnership of 50 with him against Bitton. I was very conscious of the heritage involved.
Dad told me the story of how he was once keeping wicket with his brother-in-law Ben Vezey beside him at first slip. The batsman edged a ball in the slips direction. Dad turned expecting to see Ben having taken the catch only to see him prone on the ground with glazed eyes. The ball had struck him in the forehead and he was unconscious. However, he soon recovered and was able to continue. Probably he had been admiring the scenery of the surrounding hills rather than watching the play!
Dad told me the story of how he was once keeping wicket with his brother-in-law Ben Vezey beside him at first slip. The batsman edged a ball in the slips direction. Dad turned expecting to see Ben having taken the catch only to see him prone on the ground with glazed eyes. The ball had struck him in the forehead and he was unconscious. However, he soon recovered and was able to continue. Probably he had been admiring the scenery of the surrounding hills rather than watching the play!
Commemorating Post-war Players
As a boy I often watched cricket at Box and sometimes helped to man the scoreboard which was by the old pavilion in the south east corner of the field. Later I often attended Friday evening practice. One day the second eleven were short and I was asked to play. I turned out wearing my dad's old white boots and managed to not start my cricket career with a duck! Len Weeks and Pete Milsom ran the second eleven. They were not the greatest cricketers but were keen and willing. Much of the team at the time was made up of veteran, ex-first team players who seemed happy to play second fiddle. Alec Benjamin and Bunno Sawyer had been club captains and were joined by Jack Tottle, my uncle Pete Ody and Phil Lambert. They had all played with my father before the war and took me very much under their wing.
I loved to watch Bunno bowling. He had a fairly long curved run up, but on reaching the wicket he virtually stopped and rolled the ball out of the back of his hand. Very little spin seemed to be imparted. But it was not all bluff. He would quickly sum up the opposing batsman and craftily vary the flight, length and pace of his very slow balls. Many batsmen were bamboozled by him and he got lots of wickets.
I gave up the chance to play for my school in Bath, preferring to be in an adult environment, enjoy an under-age pint in the pub followed by a singsong in the team coach afterwards. It was Herbie Hancock who often led the singing of bawdy rugby songs. Something was lost when we switched to private cars soon after. In his book Don Bradfield states how old Box cricketers tended to remember stories of the local derbies against Corsham when much else had been forgotten. He quotes from Henry V's speech before Agincourt.
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day
I will never forget the joy in the Methuen Arms among our veterans when the second eleven, boosted by a new crop of us young newcomers, managed to gain the first victory over Corsham seconds for many years. I can't remember exactly which younger members played in that game. They may have included Roger Sumner, Alan Peacock, Brian Boulton, Mike Gibbons and Gordon Hall. But strangely I can vividly recall a perfectly timed drive through mid-wicket for four runs which I played that day.
A couple of years later, through a misunderstanding, I got left behind in Malmesbury on a Friday night after attending a dance there. I was forced to spend half the night walking the 17 miles back to Box. After very little sleep, I had to stand in the field at Corsham while the opposition compiled an unassailable total of over 200 runs. We had no option but to try and bat through to 7.30pm to salvage a draw. I opened the batting and managed to carry my bat through to close of play, making around 70 runs. I had been on the field all day. It was this innings that probably got me promoted to the first team. Whilst still in the second team I got a small amount of success with my slow off break bowling. This all ended when Laurie Chappell became captain. A medium pace bowler himself he did not trust my slow lobs. However, as vice-captain I was occasionally able to indulge in giving myself a couple of overs when he was absent!
Sometime after moving up to the first team a vacancy occurred for an opening batsman, I think because the star cricketer of his generation, Ken Boulton, had moved away. The wise old guru of the club, Nigel Bence, proposed that, as I played as straight as anybody, I was the man for the job. I knew that I could never emulate Ken but I was confident that I could play fast bowlers ok and could try to see them off before some of the more forceful batsmen like Alan Peacock and the Bence brothers followed me. I usually opened with John Harris. We got on well together but from what I recall we seldom managed long opening partnerships. Either I got out early or occasionally he did. John had a habit of trying to get off the mark with a very firm front foot drive to cover in which he continued his forward motion to run to my end. I had to scamper as fast as I could to make my ground and avoid being run out.
Nigel Bence was a fine cricketer. Despite middle-age spread, there was an element of class about everything he did on the field. The left-handed batting style of his brother Geoff Bence was not so elegant but he also seemed to manage to acquire many runs. He once told me that as a boy he used to bat right-handed with his hands the wrong way around. When someone told him to turn around the other way everything fell into place for him. One day I was batting with Nigel when uncharacteristically I hit a big six which landed on the Queens Head car park wall. Nigel looked a bit startled and said Gosh Clive, have you gone mad? Praise from Nigel was hard earned and I felt very pleased with myself when he complimented my shot play after what was a relatively quick 70 odd against Trowbridge. But then came the sting in the tail: You should have got a hundred. You had plenty of time. He was right. With a little more patience and application, I might have done it. Sadly, I never again managed to get myself into the situation where I could benefit from that experience.
Ups and Downs in Cricket
Another day I found myself at the Imperial Ground, the site of dad's century, opening the innings with a colleague who had a very solid technique but who was not renowned for his backlift and follow through. As I was not a particularly fast scorer myself, this combination did not bode well and so it proved. A pattern developed whereby I might get a single off the first ball of an over and my partner would block the next five. The rather grand scoreboard moved very slowly but, somehow, I managed to get fifty runs against my name. I did not expect a standing ovation but I did think that I might get the customary smattering of polite applause. But glancing towards the pavilion I saw nobody. I thought that it was time to have a slog and was soon caught out. I returned to the pavilion passing empty chairs. Inside I found the whole team gathered around a fruit machine. Nobody looked up but as I passed Nigel muttered simply What took you so long? Obviously, the possibility of getting the jackpot was more exciting than our batting!
Another rather humiliating batting situation occurred at Chippenham. I was facing a very good Wiltshire county bowler whose name I think was Marshall. It was a very humid, overcast day and he was making a shiny new ball swing in the air very late. I was finding it very difficult to lay a bat on the ball; in fact, often I was not even good enough to get an edge from which I might have been caught. Also, he did not seem able to hit the stumps which would have put me out of my misery. Finally, he bowled a full toss outside my leg stump. At last here was my opportunity to break out of the stranglehold I thought. But it was not to be. The ball swung in and took my leg stump and I was out without getting into double figures. Soon after that the clouds cleared away and the ball ceased to swing. Our subsequent batsmen had no trouble. I was pretty disappointed with what I saw as my incompetence against class bowling. This was relieved somewhat when I read a few days later that the same bowler, playing for the minor counties against the Pakistan test touring team had taken 6 wickets for 50 runs. These world class players had found him as unplayable as I had.
Cricket sometimes throws up little contests within a game. One day I was batting against a bowler who was reputed to be the fastest to be found locally, although he could be rather wild. However, on this day he bowled an over at me of which every ball was fast, deadly and accurate. I had to apply every ounce of concentration and technique I possessed to preserve my wicket. I managed to push a single off the last ball. As I ran to his end giving him, I hope, a sporting nod of approval, I heard him say to the umpire That is the best over I have ever bowled. To a distant spectator that might have seemed a rather uneventful over but we two contestants both knew that we had done something special. It is a great game.
At one annual general meeting of the club, discussion arose concerning a vacancy for club captain which had arisen. There seemed to be no obvious candidate. During the discussion Phil Lambert proposed me for the job. I was not really prepared for this but thinking on my feet I quickly realised that, as I was living and working in Swindon at the time, I would not have been in a position to do the job properly. It is with some regret that I was never able to follow the family tradition in that area. In the subsequent discussion Joe Hope, an art lecturer, made a short speech outlining the qualities which a potential captain should have. It became apparent to the meeting that Joe was a person who possessed all the qualities he was describing and he was unanimously elected to the post!
As a boy I often watched cricket at Box and sometimes helped to man the scoreboard which was by the old pavilion in the south east corner of the field. Later I often attended Friday evening practice. One day the second eleven were short and I was asked to play. I turned out wearing my dad's old white boots and managed to not start my cricket career with a duck! Len Weeks and Pete Milsom ran the second eleven. They were not the greatest cricketers but were keen and willing. Much of the team at the time was made up of veteran, ex-first team players who seemed happy to play second fiddle. Alec Benjamin and Bunno Sawyer had been club captains and were joined by Jack Tottle, my uncle Pete Ody and Phil Lambert. They had all played with my father before the war and took me very much under their wing.
I loved to watch Bunno bowling. He had a fairly long curved run up, but on reaching the wicket he virtually stopped and rolled the ball out of the back of his hand. Very little spin seemed to be imparted. But it was not all bluff. He would quickly sum up the opposing batsman and craftily vary the flight, length and pace of his very slow balls. Many batsmen were bamboozled by him and he got lots of wickets.
I gave up the chance to play for my school in Bath, preferring to be in an adult environment, enjoy an under-age pint in the pub followed by a singsong in the team coach afterwards. It was Herbie Hancock who often led the singing of bawdy rugby songs. Something was lost when we switched to private cars soon after. In his book Don Bradfield states how old Box cricketers tended to remember stories of the local derbies against Corsham when much else had been forgotten. He quotes from Henry V's speech before Agincourt.
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day
I will never forget the joy in the Methuen Arms among our veterans when the second eleven, boosted by a new crop of us young newcomers, managed to gain the first victory over Corsham seconds for many years. I can't remember exactly which younger members played in that game. They may have included Roger Sumner, Alan Peacock, Brian Boulton, Mike Gibbons and Gordon Hall. But strangely I can vividly recall a perfectly timed drive through mid-wicket for four runs which I played that day.
A couple of years later, through a misunderstanding, I got left behind in Malmesbury on a Friday night after attending a dance there. I was forced to spend half the night walking the 17 miles back to Box. After very little sleep, I had to stand in the field at Corsham while the opposition compiled an unassailable total of over 200 runs. We had no option but to try and bat through to 7.30pm to salvage a draw. I opened the batting and managed to carry my bat through to close of play, making around 70 runs. I had been on the field all day. It was this innings that probably got me promoted to the first team. Whilst still in the second team I got a small amount of success with my slow off break bowling. This all ended when Laurie Chappell became captain. A medium pace bowler himself he did not trust my slow lobs. However, as vice-captain I was occasionally able to indulge in giving myself a couple of overs when he was absent!
Sometime after moving up to the first team a vacancy occurred for an opening batsman, I think because the star cricketer of his generation, Ken Boulton, had moved away. The wise old guru of the club, Nigel Bence, proposed that, as I played as straight as anybody, I was the man for the job. I knew that I could never emulate Ken but I was confident that I could play fast bowlers ok and could try to see them off before some of the more forceful batsmen like Alan Peacock and the Bence brothers followed me. I usually opened with John Harris. We got on well together but from what I recall we seldom managed long opening partnerships. Either I got out early or occasionally he did. John had a habit of trying to get off the mark with a very firm front foot drive to cover in which he continued his forward motion to run to my end. I had to scamper as fast as I could to make my ground and avoid being run out.
Nigel Bence was a fine cricketer. Despite middle-age spread, there was an element of class about everything he did on the field. The left-handed batting style of his brother Geoff Bence was not so elegant but he also seemed to manage to acquire many runs. He once told me that as a boy he used to bat right-handed with his hands the wrong way around. When someone told him to turn around the other way everything fell into place for him. One day I was batting with Nigel when uncharacteristically I hit a big six which landed on the Queens Head car park wall. Nigel looked a bit startled and said Gosh Clive, have you gone mad? Praise from Nigel was hard earned and I felt very pleased with myself when he complimented my shot play after what was a relatively quick 70 odd against Trowbridge. But then came the sting in the tail: You should have got a hundred. You had plenty of time. He was right. With a little more patience and application, I might have done it. Sadly, I never again managed to get myself into the situation where I could benefit from that experience.
Ups and Downs in Cricket
Another day I found myself at the Imperial Ground, the site of dad's century, opening the innings with a colleague who had a very solid technique but who was not renowned for his backlift and follow through. As I was not a particularly fast scorer myself, this combination did not bode well and so it proved. A pattern developed whereby I might get a single off the first ball of an over and my partner would block the next five. The rather grand scoreboard moved very slowly but, somehow, I managed to get fifty runs against my name. I did not expect a standing ovation but I did think that I might get the customary smattering of polite applause. But glancing towards the pavilion I saw nobody. I thought that it was time to have a slog and was soon caught out. I returned to the pavilion passing empty chairs. Inside I found the whole team gathered around a fruit machine. Nobody looked up but as I passed Nigel muttered simply What took you so long? Obviously, the possibility of getting the jackpot was more exciting than our batting!
Another rather humiliating batting situation occurred at Chippenham. I was facing a very good Wiltshire county bowler whose name I think was Marshall. It was a very humid, overcast day and he was making a shiny new ball swing in the air very late. I was finding it very difficult to lay a bat on the ball; in fact, often I was not even good enough to get an edge from which I might have been caught. Also, he did not seem able to hit the stumps which would have put me out of my misery. Finally, he bowled a full toss outside my leg stump. At last here was my opportunity to break out of the stranglehold I thought. But it was not to be. The ball swung in and took my leg stump and I was out without getting into double figures. Soon after that the clouds cleared away and the ball ceased to swing. Our subsequent batsmen had no trouble. I was pretty disappointed with what I saw as my incompetence against class bowling. This was relieved somewhat when I read a few days later that the same bowler, playing for the minor counties against the Pakistan test touring team had taken 6 wickets for 50 runs. These world class players had found him as unplayable as I had.
Cricket sometimes throws up little contests within a game. One day I was batting against a bowler who was reputed to be the fastest to be found locally, although he could be rather wild. However, on this day he bowled an over at me of which every ball was fast, deadly and accurate. I had to apply every ounce of concentration and technique I possessed to preserve my wicket. I managed to push a single off the last ball. As I ran to his end giving him, I hope, a sporting nod of approval, I heard him say to the umpire That is the best over I have ever bowled. To a distant spectator that might have seemed a rather uneventful over but we two contestants both knew that we had done something special. It is a great game.
At one annual general meeting of the club, discussion arose concerning a vacancy for club captain which had arisen. There seemed to be no obvious candidate. During the discussion Phil Lambert proposed me for the job. I was not really prepared for this but thinking on my feet I quickly realised that, as I was living and working in Swindon at the time, I would not have been in a position to do the job properly. It is with some regret that I was never able to follow the family tradition in that area. In the subsequent discussion Joe Hope, an art lecturer, made a short speech outlining the qualities which a potential captain should have. It became apparent to the meeting that Joe was a person who possessed all the qualities he was describing and he was unanimously elected to the post!
It is funny how small incidents which are slightly out of the ordinary can come into the memory. I was fielding late one evening at the Farm Mead boundary. The evening sun was in my eyes. The opposition needed one run to win. A West Indian player who was batting hit a skyer up and up into the darkening sky. I was somewhere under it. I tried to judge where it was going to land and get beneath it. I ran towards the spot. I judged it fairly well and, after what seemed an eternity, I took the catch. I looked up to see whether I might be getting some acknowledgement. All I saw was distant figures making their way towards the pavilion. Some were almost inside, eager to get to the pub. I was left to make my lonely way across the field carrying the match ball home.
My job took me away from the local area and playing for Box became more difficult. I did however keep up my cricket playing for various teams, sometimes skippering them, often in the evenings. Family commitments also took over. I recall on one occasion at Box my little daughter Emily toddled onto the pitch to join me and I had to carry her back to her mother. A few years after I ceased playing for Box, I met up with Mike Warren who was then captaining the second eleven. We agreed that it would be ok for me to make a one-off guest appearance for the club. I turned out and luckily managed to make a few runs for him. This was the last time I played for Box.
I am now 78 years old and living nearby in Larkhall. I am still fairly fit so, if the club is ever short of players, I am still available although I haven't played for over 20 years. It is rather a shock to realise that I have now been alive for the greater part of the club's 150 years!
My job took me away from the local area and playing for Box became more difficult. I did however keep up my cricket playing for various teams, sometimes skippering them, often in the evenings. Family commitments also took over. I recall on one occasion at Box my little daughter Emily toddled onto the pitch to join me and I had to carry her back to her mother. A few years after I ceased playing for Box, I met up with Mike Warren who was then captaining the second eleven. We agreed that it would be ok for me to make a one-off guest appearance for the club. I turned out and luckily managed to make a few runs for him. This was the last time I played for Box.
I am now 78 years old and living nearby in Larkhall. I am still fairly fit so, if the club is ever short of players, I am still available although I haven't played for over 20 years. It is rather a shock to realise that I have now been alive for the greater part of the club's 150 years!
References
[1] Courtesy Margaret Wakefield
[2] Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette, 25 November 1933
[1] Courtesy Margaret Wakefield
[2] Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette, 25 November 1933