Francis Thompson (1859-1907) was born in Preston, half a dozen miles from where Third Man now lives. You’ll probably know he wrote a famous cricket poem, ‘At Lord’s’. You may not know that he studied medicine in Manchester, but never practised, instead moving to London to try to become a writer, became an opium addict and a vagrant before being saved by a prostitute. His poem begins:
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though my own red roses there may blow;
It is little I repair to the matches of the Southron folk,
Though the red roses crest the caps, I know.
For the field is full of shades as I near a shadowy coast,
And a ghostly batsman plays to the bowling of a ghost,
And I look through my tears on a soundless-clapping host
As the run stealers flicker to and fro,
To and fro:
O my Hornby and my Barlow long ago !
Partnerships are not just important for today’s score they are the way cricket is perceived and enjoyed through time. Everyone has a pair of Hornby and Barlows. They come when you begin watching County Cricket and, as Thompson warns us, they haunt us forever.
Third Man’s run stealers, flickering to and fro, were Roy Marshall and Jimmy Gray of the Hampshire team that won the County Championship for the first time in 1961.
Who were yours?
Is this process of the etching of the imagination by watching cricket one of the most important part of our enjoyment? Cricket is not something that inhabits only the ‘now’. Memory turns the players of our earlier times into the ghosts of our present. Memory permeates our appreciation of the game and enriches our lives.
When we watch one match do we watch again every match we have ever seen? We immediately liken the new cap Flynn to old warhourse Fraser and are transported to the 1980s. How we wonder would Richards have played this bowling?
Unless it is your very first match, there are more than 15 people on the field when we watch a game of cricket. There are the ghosts.
O my Marshall and my Jimmy Gray long ago !
Down At Third Man 
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This is all very true. I think my Hornby and Barlow were Colin Milburn and Roger Prideaux – Northants opening pair in the late sixties – though I don’t remember Milburn doing much flickering to and fro.
I believe, incidentally, that Thompson never actually made it to Lord’s. A friend had given him some tickets to go to watch Middlesex v Lancs, in a bid to get him out of the house, but when the time came he decided it would make him too emotional, so he wrote the poem instead.
Excellent to see another cricket blog, by the way. As they say, I shall follow it with interest.
Dear Backwatersman,
Ah, yes. What a good choice. Would you have time to pen a recollection?
Thank you for leaving a comment.
TM
I’ll certainly have a go when I get a moment. My memory isn’t what it was, I’m afraid.
Barber and Pullar have to be mine. As a pedantic aside, you quote the author of “At Lords” as Francis Thomas when of course it should read Francis Thompson.
Not pedantic at all, Longstop. Thank you for pointing it out. In a hurry to get the ball back in. Long barrier must be used in future on this tricky outfield.
Pullar was the first England opening batsman that TM can recall so has a special place in the memory. Straight and solid. They met at a party in Tatton in ’98. A naturally warm, welcoming and inclusive person. He had his Engineer with him.
There is a delightful story about Barber and Boycott which will be posted tomorrow.
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I know hardly anything about cricket.I saw this poem on The Tube in London.I think it could be about an old cricket lover,a Lancastrian,frail and nearing death.So evocative. I know nothing of Hornby or Barlow and will look them up. Nothing of Francis Thompson either.Will look him up too. what a wonderful thing a poem can be.
Harry Pilling and Clive Lloyd for Lancashire in 1971. Little and large. What a fantastic introduction to the game for a young American.
Great post. Enjoyed reading it while watching Lancashire play At Lords today! Pilling and Lloyd, great choice, and I had the same thought.
Thank you for getting in touch Guy. TM
Thanks for including that beautiful poem, TM. It echoes my own lifelong feelings about the game.
https://paulspradbery.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07/time-travel-to-trent-bridge_32.html
Thank you Paul.
Perhaps, given events in Cape Town, today is an especially good day to be reminded of it.
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As a rather elderly cricket lover I can recall queueing at 6.30 a.m at Old Trafford as a boy of 10 to see the Australians and Bradman in 1948.
In that period my partnership heroes were Hutton and Washbrook.
Heady days spent sitting all day on the grass area with one’s boyhood friends.
In later years Boycott became my hero.
Two Yorkshire heroes for a Lancastrian which becomes 3 when I throw in Trueman and Statham
Thank you so much George for contributing your memories.
Found this page via a Google search for the poem. Thanks for the memories! I grew up in Norfolk in the 1960s, and other than watching my dad turning his arm on the village green, didn’t see any live cricket until I went to uni in south London and started attending The Oval regularly. My Hornby and Barlow from the mid-70s were John Edrich (also from Norfolk), Robin Jackman (whose South African links later caused abandonment of a Test), Intikhab, Younis, and Geoff Howarth, later Kiwi captain. From TV Tests, it would have to be the Chappells, good old Dolly, Gavaskar, Viv Richards, Greenidge and Haynes (greatest opening partnership ever?) … some of whom I did watch live in later years. And two more, just quickly, who barely got to play Test cricket – what a waste – Barry Richards and Graeme Pollock. Thank you for indulging me 🙂
Claire how lovely to hear from you – Hope you still pop along to the Oval?
Thank you! But no, I now live in Australia. I’ve been on the SCG waitlist for eight years … so far!
i too recall queuing from six o’clock to see Bradman in ’48, but at the Oval. my father took me, aged nine, down from Grimsby to King’s Cross to see the greatest of all batsmen. we stayed with aunts in Primrose Hill, getting a taxi to the ground where i recall we stood all day. The Don was applauded all the way to the wicket. before he faced, Yardley called for ‘Three cheers for the Don!’ As the world knows he was out second ball. The silence that greeted his dismissal and long walk back to the pavilion haunts me still.
A cynical Scottish friend claimed thirty years later that Yardley’s call for ‘cheers’ was a piece of gamesmanship destined to upset Bradman. As my friend used to say, ‘it’s hard to bat wi’ a tear in yer eye!’
Piers Jessop.