Empire Cricket Booklet

JONTYWINCH

telegraphed to his delighted editor. 16 Yet behind such boyish enthusiasm was a fearless operator, a man of perseverance, unselfishness and stoicism - cardinal virtues one might expect of an imperialist. Once Warton's tour was underway, Cadwallader worked closely with their management, an arrangement which suggested divided loyalties and, in time, was viewed with suspicion. To his credit, Cadwallader did go some way towards denouncing the tourists' strict adherence to class distinction between 'amateur' and 'professional'. He had been horrified to discover that at a dinner at the Kimberley Club 'the really capable portion of the [English] team, the professionals, were not present nor we believe, even invited'. He did, however, seem to fall short of implying that the tourists were entirely to blame by suggesting that local organisers were at fault for not issuing invitations:'Strange that at Kimberley, of all places, such a correction should be needed.' 17 The hospitality extended to Warton's team was generally of a magnitude that had not been previously experienced in South Africa. The colonial ruling elite attached political and social significance to the tour and sought publicity from events associated with the cricket. In a wider context, most English-speaking South Africans regarded involvement in a sporting event as an emulation of what was happening at 'home'. It was an era in which the mania for games at public schools coincided with the extension of British influence overseas. Many South Africans had graduated from public schools where headmasters played'the role of agents of hegemonic persuasion' in a system that believed'there was a strong connection between the qualities developed by games-playing and those needed to create and govern and defend an empire'. 18 Cricket was described as the'umbilical cord of empire linking the mother country with her children' and it was not altogether surprising that England's captain in the First Test at Port Elizabeth, Aubrey Smith of Charterhouse and Cambridge, was opposed by a product of Eton and Oxford, Owen Dunell. 19 A feature of newspaper reporting at that time was to record speeches in full detail, and the English captain

The idea of ignoring the English professional was opposed by Cadwallader of the Diamond Fields Advertiser. A devoted cricket enthusiast who had earlier followed the game as a reporter for the Sussex Daily News, he was adamant that Hearne had much to offer. The situation therefore arose whereby Cadwallader was exhorting Kimberley players to go to Cape Town to'get a little coaching from the Kent pro' while Finlason was instructing them to stay at home. Said the latter, 'Now, if I were the captain of the Kimberley team, I would rather put them in handcuffs until the day of the match'. 13 Flying the Union Jack Despite Finlason's aggressive stance, the tour promoted a cultural link between 'home' in Britain and settlers overseas. At the welcoming dinner for the touring side, it was made clear that cricket would be used to help instil the values of British elite culture still further through northern expansion into the African hinterland. Warton and former Cape prime minister, Sir Thomas Upington, were prominent in exchanging wildly applauded comment on the British flag being hoisted at the Zambezi and 'opening up [cricket] trips of much greater difficulty'. 14 The English press, confident of their team's superi ority, pushed the claim that their players would teach locals, stimulate interest and create material benefits for a territory with no governing cricket body. The view was taken up by Cadwallader who was an advocate of cementing ties with 'home'. He stated: 'Colonial cricketers have learnt all they can hope to learn from each other ... [Major Warton's team] will give the final finish to the course of instruction which was be gun by his brother officers when the colony was in its infancy.' 15 Cadwallader realised the significance of the visit as a public relations exercise in advancing the concept of empire. His pride in the English game shone through in his writing. So keen was he to be first to meet the touring cricketers that he hired a boat at two o'clock in the morning to take him out to the mail steamer when it entered Table Bay. He then clambered aboard 'to welcome Major Warton and his team on behalf of the Kimberley cricketers'. The 'scoop' was duly