I love this old photo of the Whitefriars Press Cricket team for the 1919 Season. I'm not sure where they played, probably on the Sportsground park. I have no connection with any of the men. But I still love the picture which captures just a split second in time but speaks to us 93 years later. I wonder how many of these proud men had served in the First World War, how many of their friends and family had paid the ultimate price. People in old group photos are often serious looking as I suppose it's hard to hold a smile indefintely but I think this group of men had a special reason to feel this way after what they'd been through. I wonder what they were thinking at the precise moment that the shutter was released. Probably something like "Hurry up so we can get on with the game!" but maybe their thoughts were wandering to deeper matters. The young lads in the front row were probably too young to have served in the war but many of the men behind would have come through it, relieved, possibly angry, certainly changed for ever. Some of the faces look strangley familiar to me. Perhaps some of their grandsons and great grandsons have visited my shop at some point as their names, faces and spirits live on in their descendants. Mr. Authers (Hon. Sec.) was clearly not concentrating on the photographer as he seems to have been distracted at the crucial moment. I'm probably totally wrong on this but, I like to think, Mr. C D'Arcy (Umpire) was a right rogue, a smart-arsed joker who fancied himself with the ladies and wasn't put off by the many rebuttals! C. Boorman is, most probably, related to the Boorman family who are well known in Tonbridge. H.E. Simmons looks like someone straight out of The Great Gatsby and was probably the inspiration for Clark Gable's movie appearance! And Captain W. May looks like the serious sort who led by example and was, by the look of his lean lanky frame a good all rounder in the Frank Woolley mold. T Wickenden (Tommy) the young lad sitting at the front, was the grandfather of the old lady who brought in the photograph. Hard to imagine him as a grand father, great grandfather and probably great great grandfather but it's true. Not an ounce of fat on any of them which is probably a good advert for getting back to basic home made cooking and clean living. I really could study this picture for hours. I'll never know much about any of these men, least of all what they might have been thinking but it's great fun guessing. Please get in touch if you know any more about any of them and we'll try to build up a complete profile of the team....
5 comments:
An interesting old photo TB, but there must be hundreds, if not thousands of similar photo's in existence up and down the country.
What would have been interesting, from an historic perspective, would be to have a photo of the same team taken say in 1914, just prior to the outbreak of hostilities on the Western Front, and then compare it to the latter one in your possession. I'm certain it would confirm all we know to be true about a conflict that saw the senseless slaughter of the flower of English youth, in a very poignant way.
Actually, looking at that photograph, most of those men seem to be in their late thirties or early forties, so maybe it is confirmation of that "senseless slaughter of the English youth", in itself, without the comparison of and earlier, pre-war picture...
I think you're right sebfox, although older men were also sent to the front, particularly after conscription was introduced in 1916.
37,508,686
Is the grand total, I believe.
Dead, that is...
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