Remembering Charlie Ollivierre: SVG’s representative on the West Indian Cricket team that toured England in 1900 – (Continued from last week)

I should have mentioned last week that Grenada had a representative on that historic 1900 touring team, W. Mignon. He was obviously white since the reports had mentioned only 4 coloured players: Ollivierre, Constantine and Woods of Trinidad, and Burton of British Guyana.

Mentioning that he was white is really a statement about the West Indian team at that historical moment. I need also to clarify the Ian Neverson issue. Neverson severed one of his fingers from an accident at the Bermudez Biscuit Company with which he had been working; the same Company that had sponsored him to Trinidad, with the possibility of being able to make the West Indian team. Neverson was then one of our outstanding cricketers, a wicket keeper and opening batsman, dominant in the middle 1950s, scoring 90 not out against an MCC team in Grenada and hitting Freddie Truman’s first ball for a six. I was told that he tried to continue playing cricket but was very much handicapped and unable to fulfil his dreams.

The point about last week’s article and this week’s is to show that SVG has a long cricketing tradition. I noted last week that Charlie Ollivierre headed the West Indian batting average with 32.70, having been not out twice and with the highest score of 159- his only century. He also took 13 wickets at 35.53 runs average. His partnership of 238 with Pelham Warner was considered one of the highlights of the tour. He also had another first wicket partnership with Percy Cox of 209. In a match against the MCC at Lords in July 1900 he played against the celebrated W G Grace, recognised as the ‘Father of Cricket’, being the first cricketer to surpass 50,000 runs in first class cricket.

The 1900 team was recognised not for the quality of its play but for its ‘smart fielding’ and ‘intelligent bowling’. Their unfamiliarity with the English wickets and the conditions was noted. Ollivierre, however, obviously stood out and did not return with the team. After receiving offers to play county cricket, he accepted one from Derbyshire and stayed on in England to meet the two-year residential qualification, becoming the first West Indian to do so, starting a tradition that continued for a long time. He was at that point lost to West Indian cricket but made a name for himself representing Derbyshire. He resided in Glossop, a market town in Derbyshire that had once been a centre for cotton spinning. When he left St. Vincent, this colony had not as yet gone strongly into cotton cultivation, getting its first cotton ginnery in 1903. During his residency qualification period he played for Glossop.

The Vincentian newspapers, particularly the SENTRY, followed closely his exploits, playing for Derbyshire. Its issue of May 31, 1901, noted that he had saved his team from defeat by scoring heavily “while his colleagues failed.” In a game against the LCCC captained by W G Grace, he scored 12 of 64 in the first innings and 54 in the second. The London Daily Express noted, “Ollivierre played brilliantly and made his 54 in just over an hour.”

The Manchester Guardian of August 15, 1902, in reporting on a match between Derbyshire and Warwickshire on August 11 wrote as follows, “The hero of the day was C A Ollivierre the West Indian, who was batting three hours for a most brilliant and faultless innings of 167 and who thus early proved what a valuable acquisition he is to Derbyshire cricket. He went in first with Wright at ten minutes past twelve, the first partnership realising 134 in an hour and twenty-five minutes before Wright was caught at mid-on…. Ashcroft coming in at 138, helped Ollivierre to double the score. The West Indian himself was fourth out at 234, his magnificent innings being quite faultless and full of brilliantly executed strokes on either side of the wicket. Three times he hit the ball over people’s heads, and on twenty-seven other occasions he sent it to the boundary, his other hits being five threes and nine twos…’.

On one occasion it was stated that he missed scoring two centuries in a match. He scored 207 in the first innings and had 94 not out in the second innings. His exploits on the English cricket fields, especially as a coloured person from the British colonies were closely followed by the British newspapers. He was forced to retire in 1907 from county cricket because of failing eyesight. He moved to Pontefract in Wakefield, another market town where he coached cricket. His impact went beyond the actual scores on the cricket field. Tim Knebel of Peak in the Past, said about him “Charles Augustus Ollivierre (1876- 1949) is a trailblazing sporting figure of national significance; the first black West Indian to play county cricket in England who helped break down major barriers of racial prejudice in his lifetime. He played matches all over the country in front of thousands of spectators against some of the biggest names in international cricket at the time, capturing the attention of fans of the sport and newspaper reporters wherever he went.”

The Vincentian newspaper of April 23, 1949, announced that it had received a brief telegram announcing the death of “one of the very best cricketers the West Indies have produced, Charles A Ollivierre.” Unfortunately, it was England that benefitted from his obviously enormous talent. There is no indication that he ever came back to SVG, but he was a son of the soil that took up an opportunity that was offered to him. So, we were there from the beginning.

• Dr Adrian Fraser is a social commentator and historian