The arrest of Walter Gilbert, cousin of WG, EM, GF Grace

Walter Gilbert, cousin of the Grace brothers, was no mean cricketer himself. He rubbed shoulders with the brothers for Gloucestershire and WG Grace’s own Gentlemen of the South XI, and had a respectable, if not excellent, career of his own. Unfortunately, he did not always enjoy the best of financial statuses, which made him resort to desperate means, culminating in his arrest on June 5, 1886. Abhishek Mukherjee looks back.

Before we embark upon the story, it is essential for us to have an idea of the members of the Grace family. Henry Mills and Martha (Pocock) Grace had eight children: Henry, Anne, Fanny, Alfred, Edward Mills (EM), Alice, Elizabeth Blanche, William Gilbert (WG), and George Frederick (GF or, at times, Fred).

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Of them, WG need no introduction. Neither does EM, who was probably the greatest cricketer till WG usurped that honour. GF played a solitary Test too (he died at 29), the first on English soil, alongside his two illustrious brothers. Henry played First-Class cricket, too, and it was probably his passion that made the Graces the First Family of English cricket.

Henry Mills, the father, played for several Gloucestershire teams as well — though never at First-Class level. Neither did Alfred Grace or David Edward, husband of Alice and brother-in-law of the brothers, or Alfred.

There is an excellent story of EM trying to trick his brothers in an 1864 match between Hanham and Bitton. We have discussed that in detail in these pages.

But cricket was not limited to the Grace surname, either. Alfred Pocock, brother of Martha, did not play First-Class cricket either — though few contributed as much towards training WG (and GF) in cricket. He also taught them to hunt small birds and rabbits, but let us not get into that. William Pocock, a Grace cousin, played First-Class cricket for New South Wales (NSW) and Canterbury.

We will not move to the next generation in this piece. However, it is worth a mention that Martha’s sister married William Lee Rees, who played for Victoria and Auckland. His son William Gilbert is, of course, remembered as the founder of Queenstown. William Gilbert Rees played once for NSW.

And finally, there was Rose Rachel, sister of Martha, who married George Mowbray Gilbert. They had two sons, George Henry Bailey and Walter Raleigh (though, according to some sources, George Jr was George’s son from a previous marriage). In the early 1850s, George Jr and William Gilbert Rees set sail for the youngest continent. George Jr, a former Middlesex player, also played for NSW.

Our story, however, revolves around Walter Raleigh Gilbert.

The man and the cricketer

Whether he was named after Sir Walter Raleigh is not known. It may actually be the case. Whatever it was, he spent some of his early days at Downend, a pilgrimage as iconic as Bowral among cricket aficionados. Obviously, that meant rubbing shoulders with the Grace brothers and ‘Uncle Pocock’.

Three years younger to GF and five years to WG, he gelled well with the brothers. He was never in the league of EM, WG, or GF, but then, who was? Gilbert was a decent cricketer of his own accord.

Perhaps owing to his proximity to the Graces, Gilbert was solid with bat, looking to score big when he strode out. He was also a slow round-arm right-hand bowler and a good fielder. Wisden wrote that “his fielding at deep-leg to W. G. Grace’s bowling was always excellent, for he covered much ground and was a sure catch.”

There is not much to argue with 5,290 runs at 19 and 295 wickets at 18; and this is only First-Class cricket I am talking about. He played for Middlesex (he was born in Strand, London) and later for Gloucestershire, and was good enough to be selected to play for Gentlemen against Players 4 times.

He also toured Australia in 1873-74, though that side was led and organised by WG. Gilbert did not make it big on the field, but was one of the popular men in the side. Among other things, he went kangaroo-hunting with WG.

Gilbert’s greatest season was 1876, when he scored 907 runs at 36 and picked up 28 wickets at 20. This included a match for an England XI against Cambridge, where he carried his bat (both WG and GF played) with 205 in a total of 383. “He batted for about seven hours without a mistake and carried his bat through,” reported Wisden.

Unfortunately, this was also the season when WG played like nobody had before that, and is unlikely to in future. Few have come remotely close to a season tally of 2,622 runs at 62 (including the first 2 triple-hundreds), 130 wickets at 19, and 46 catches. This does not include minor matches (he scored 400 not out in one of them).

Just like everyone else, Gilbert was overshadowed by WG. However, if one uses a 750-run cut-off, and Gilbert averaged more than anyone else. Unfortunately, his rise was not destined to happen: his career faded away thereafter.

The event that ripped them apart

1880. GF was supposed to play a benefit match at Winchester a week after playing the only Test of his career. In between, he played a match at Stroud against a local XXII. He took 6 wickets and got 44 in the second innings — but ended up catching a cold during the process.

Things worsened on the day of the Winchester match. GF never made it. He cooped up at the Red Lion Hotel on September 15. Diagnosis revealed that the right lung had been damaged: he had pneumonia.

Dr Charles Webbe immediately wrote to the entire family across the country. Martha and Gilbert rushed from Downend, Henry from Kingswood (remember, this was a family of doctors). Upon arrival and inspection, Henry was convinced that there was nothing to be afraid of. EM and WG, both out of station, were duly informed. This was on the 18th.

Gilbert stayed back at GF’s bedside, nursing him. He wired the brothers on the 19th that GF “was going on very well.” When Henry paid his brother another visit on the 20th, there were signs of deterioration, but no immediate mortal threat. Gilbert wired again on the 21st: all was well.

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At about 4 in the morning GF’s conditions worsened abruptly. Gilbert informed everyone, but none of them made it on time. EM and WG were at Bradford-on-Avon for the connecting train when GF breathed his last, at 1.15 PM. Gilbert was the only family member around him.

As the cricket fraternity was ripped apart, a rumour surfaced that sleeping in the damp bed of the Red Lion was responsible for his death. Gilbert, the only family member to have witnessed those last minutes, responded on The Telegraph: “He had a bad cold before he left home, and on my arrival at Basingstoke he told me that he had received another chill whilst waiting at Reading Station. By inserting this you will greatly oblige me, and also do justice to the members of a family whose attention and kindness to my cousin all through his illness could not have been surpassed had he been at home.”

Meeting ends

Lesser families would have crumbled, but not the Graces. WG would go on to play for over another three decades. EM did not quit cricket either. And neither did Gilbert, he was appointed manager of WG’s Gentlemen of the South.

This was not a simple case of appointing a random family member. Unlike the Graces (who trained to become doctors), Gilbert never enjoyed financial affluence. The manager’s job was a paid one, which resolved things — at least for the time.

Unfortunately, this was also the era when English cricket became more structured. William Clarke’s All-England Eleven had been immensely successful because roving cricket teams were the norm of the day. With counties playing each other more often, travelling teams (like Gentlemen of the South) lost relevance.

Financial losses started showing up, and as manager Gilbert was obviously responsible. He was even taken to court in 1882 for not being able to pay “a professional cricketer”.

Amidst all this, Gilbert played some decent cricket in the 1880s. He averaged more than 20 in each of 1883, 1884, and 1885, impressive numbers for the era (he also got those wickets, remember?).

When Gloucestershire was asked to follow-on by Yorkshire in 1885, Gilbert opened batting and scored 102 in a total of 222 against Ted Peate, Bobby Peel, Tom Emmett, and Willie Bates. He was still good at it.

Then everything went wrong.

Build-up

Before we delve into the proceedings of that day in June 1886, we need to go back to the previous summer, or more specifically, July 3, 1885, two weeks before his hundred against Yorkshire.

WG, no less, proposed Gilbert got “enhanced expenses for the new season” (Anthony Meredith, W. G. Grace: In the Steps of a Legend). However, the great man was not present at the meeting himself.

The proposal got declined. “The Committee cannot accede to Mr WR Gilbert’s request to be paid an additional sum per match,” ran the verdict.

By summer 1886 Gilbert was desperate. The only option left to him was to ‘relegate’ himself to the status of a professional cricketer. Gloucestershire was paying him a “thinly disguised appearance fee” (Simon Rae, W. G. Grace: A Life), but that was barely adequate.

He announced that he would go ahead with his decision. However, with EM no longer around and WG past his halcyon days (he would, however, have a splendid summer in 1895), Gloucestershire were no longer the team they were. As a result, the question of being paid substantial bonuses for wins was unlikely, and the professionals were not really paid enough for Gilbert to change status.

Why, then, the sudden decision? Rae has a theory: “One possibility is that he threatened to make the change hoping that family pride would force [WG] Grace to push harder for the increased fee.”

Whatever the reason was, the Gloucestershire committee seemed to be somewhat supportive at this stage: “That if Mr WR Gilbert plays in all the Gloucestershire matches in 1886 the sum of £25 extra be given to him as a Donation at the end of the season. But this is conditional on Mr WR Gilbert treating this as a strictly private conversation…” why, one wonders: did WG muscle his way to coax the committee for preferential treatment?

Thus Gilbert became a professional. He also signed up a professional for East Gloucestershire Club. One must remember that the amateur-turned-professional act was not the commonest in English cricket of that era (Rae refers to it as “almost unprecedented”).

He appeared at The Oval for the Surrey match. He scored 3 and 0 but took 3 for 30 in the first innings (including Bobby Abel) in what turned out to be his final First-Class match. Gloucestershire lost the match.

Rae makes an interesting observation. Edwin Diver of Surrey had also changed his status from amateur to professional in the same match, which resulted the removal of his prefix (Mr.) from the official scorecard.

The eventful day

East Gloucestershire were playing Stroud at Charlton Park Ground that weekend. Stroud batted first, and the first day — a Friday — passed by without much incident. If anything, Gilbert had a good day at work, doing a good job with the ball.

He arrived at the ground on Saturday “at about noon”. Little did he know that a trap awaited him. Cricketers had reported theft in the dressing-room. Gilbert was a prime suspect, given his monetary status and the fact that he was one of the new men in the side. However, what they needed was evidence.

Captain Harry Willes, a retired army officer, and Lieutenant Barrington Piers, a subaltern with Bombay Staff Corps, had planned it out well. The dressing-room was left empty. The cricketers had already changed into their cricket outfits and left.

The two men set up Gilbert nicely: “The changing room was empty; trousers, coats and waistcoats were left invitingly on their hooks, and in one of them was a marked half sovereign. There was also a detective standing by.”

Gilbert never suspected a thing. He waited till when he thought the coast was clear. Then, once he was sure that there was no danger, he rummaged through his the pockets. He found a few coins — among which was the marked sovereign. That was all the detectives needed.

Gilbert did not try to defend himself. Perhaps he had realised how futile it would have been after getting caught red-handed with the money (two half sovereigns — one of which was marked — and a shilling). He confessed immediately, not only to that day’s act but also to several similar incidents in the dressing-room earlier that year.

He pleaded to be forgiven instead. “His characteristic cheerful swagger evaporated. He broke down, again abjectly crying for mercy, but there was to be none,” wrote Meredith.

He even vowed to leave the country for good, as was often the norm for criminals of the era, but Willes and Piers did not relent. Gilbert was taken into custody (“quietly conveyed in a cab,” reported Gloucestershire Citizen) where he spent the Sunday before being presented in the court on Monday.

Some reports say that WG had rushed to Cheltenham. That was possible, since the match for Gentlemen of England against the Australians had got over the previous day. However, he did not stay back: on Monday he was leading Gloucestershire at Hove, where he top-scored in each innings and took 5 of the 10 Sussex wickets.

However, “at least five other regulars” (including EM, and obviously Gilbert) did not play for Gloucestershire in the Sussex match. “They felt they should not be down at Hove, distancing themselves from a troubled friend,” wrote Meredith. WG had to fill in the numbers with Alfie, son of elder brother Alfred. Charles Margrett, who had previously played for Gloucestershire but was at this point a baker in Cheltenham, was also summoned. Margrett never played another First-Class match.

Irrelevant trivia: Alfie Grace took a wicket with his first ball in First-Class cricket, in this match.

The trial did not go well for Gilbert, whose appearance, complete with a recently-grown heavy beard (apparently to disguise erysipelas, a skin ailment) did not make a good impression.

Presented as witness, Willes declared that occurrences of theft from the dressing-room had been an ongoing thing for three years. Gilbert pleaded not guilty at this, insisting he had not stolen money before the current summer.

However, Gilbert pleaded guilty for the rest of the accusations, though his advocate probably got him off on medical grounds. Here is how Gloucestershire Citizen had reported Gilbert’s statement: “He had been under the doctor for a severe attack of erysipelas in the head, and he had hardly been able to control himself. He did not know what he was doing; he had some irresistible impulse at the time to act as he did … He only took two half-sovereigns out of a larger amount of money. If he had been actuated by the feelings of a common thief he would have taken more.”

Note: The same Gloucestershire Citizen report then heaped somewhat lavish praise on Gilbert’s cricket career in intricate details, mentioning about the “painful feeling of regret” that was caused by the arrest of a man “held in such high general esteem”.

Once again Gilbert requested to be allowed to leave country — to Australia, specifically. It did not work, and in the end the Bench’s chairman sentenced him to twenty-eight days of hard labour (he was, to quote Rae, “breaking rocks with a shackle round his leg”).

The Grace brothers (Henry, EM, and WG) had decided on Gilbert’s face during the latter’s month-long tenure at the prison: he had to leave England as soon as possible.

However, Australia had to be ruled out. As mentioned above, Gilbert had been the part of the WG’s squad that had toured Australia in 1873-74. The local press were not pleased by the demeanour of the Englishmen on that tour. The Doctor had no doubt that they would not be kind to his cousin.

It was almost anticipated, too. The Cheltenham Looker-On, among others, made it quite clear: “The announcement of his extended emigration, on the expiration of his sentence, is felt to be the only course open to him.” The Times went another step ahead, announcing that “if they would forgive him he would go to Australia.”

Gilbert settled down in Calgary, Canada. It was not easy, for several Canadian newspapers had been reprinting the allegations from the British newspapers. To his credit, Gilbert worked for the Land Titles Office and led an honest and peaceful life.

“No breath of scandal or disgrace ever attached to Gilbert’s thirty-eight years of exile, nor was there found to be even one square inch missing from the Land Titles Office when Gilbert finally retired from it,” wrote Benny Green in A History of Cricket.

WG remained in touch with Gilbert. In Amazing Grace: The Man Who was W. G., Richard Tomlinson cited a letter from Arthur Shrewsbury to Gilbert in Montreal when the latter had asked Shrewsbury for a new bat: “Am sending you a Bat through Dr Grace and hope you will get a lot of scores with it, don’t blame the bat if you don’t.”

He also played cricket, though not at a level where he was used to (“he kept up the game in the Dominion and made hundreds in both Halifax and Montreal”, reported Wisden). He died at 70.

An unfortunate mark

As for the match, East Gloucestershire took field with ten men, but something more sinister was noticed in the newspapers that reported the match. Every single mention of Gilbert on the Stroud scorecard (he had bowled well, remember?) was replaced by the name Smith.

Obviously, Gilbert did not bat. The last row in the East Gloucestershire simply read Mr E. L. Even did not bat.

George Orwell was not even born.

Things did not remain confined to the match report. James Lillywhite’s Cricketers’ Annual “noted his loss without comment” (Rae). Wisden, on the other hand, did not mention his name but left with the line “… about whose subsequent disappearance from cricket there is no need to speak.”

Note: This was not the last time that Wisden would abstain from mentioning the name of a person but merely describing him. They announced four Cricketers of the Year in 2011 (instead of the usual five), with Scyld Berry announcing that “If (the player in question) were exonerated, then it would be possible to reconsider the position. That’s why I didn’t pick anyone else instead. But as things stand, we don’t feel we can choose him. It’s all very sad.” The reference was to Mohammed Aamer, who had been accused of spot-fixing.

There was another curious aspect, as Green pointed out. He was mentioned as Gilbert, W. R. in the Births and Deaths section of Wisden, as was the case with professionals, till he lived. He would still be classified as a professional after his death, but his name got listed as Mr W. R. Gilbert, an honour reserved only for amateurs. A decade after his death he got re-enlisted as an amateur.

Wisden was also quite kind in the obituary, taking care to omit the 1886 incident: “At the beginning of 1886 he became a professional, and the season was not far advanced before his career in first-class cricket ended abruptly. He then left England for Canada.” It was as if the theft never happened.