William Caffyn (2 February 1828 – 28 August 1919), known as Billy Caffyn, was an English

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er who played mainly for

Surrey County Cricket Club Surrey County Cricket Club (Surrey CCC) is a first-class club in county cricket, one of eighteen in the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Surrey, including areas that now form South London ...

and various England representative sides. He played in 200

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officiall ...

matches, 89 of them for Surrey. He made five appearances for

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, two for

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

and one for

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...

as well as appearing five times for the

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...

.Billy Caffyn
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-04-15. Caffyn was born in Reigate in

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

in 1828 and died in 1919 aged 91 in the town.

Surrey and All-England

Caffyn was a genuine all-rounder: a middle-order right-handed batsman and an effective right-arm medium-fast roundarm bowler. He played a major part in the success of Surrey during the 1850s.Carlaw D (2020) ''Kent County Cricketers A to Z. Part One: 1806–1914'' (revised edition), pp. 99–100.
Available online
at the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians. Retrieved 2020-12-21.) Caffyn's known first-class career extended from

1849 Events January–March * January 1 – France begins issue of the Ceres series, the nation's first postage stamps. * January 5 – Hungarian Revolution of 1848: The Austrian army, led by Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätz, enters in th ...

1873 Events January–March * January 1 ** Japan adopts the Gregorian calendar. ** The California Penal Code goes into effect. * January 17 – American Indian Wars: Modoc War: First Battle of the Stronghold – Modoc Indians defeat ...

. He took 602 wickets in his 200 matches at an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

of 13.47 runs each, with a best analysis of nine wickets for the cost of 29 runs (9/29). He took

five wickets in an innings In cricket, a five-wicket haul (also known as a "five–for" or "fifer") occurs when a bowler takes five or more wickets in a single innings. This is regarded by critics as a notable achievement, equivalent to a century from a batsman. Taki ...

49 times and

10 wickets in a match In cricket, a ten-wicket haul occurs when a bowler takes ten wickets in either a single innings or across both innings of a two-innings match. The phrase ten wickets in a match is also used. Taking ten wickets in a match at Lord's earns the bow ...

11 times. He scored 5,885 runs at an

of 17.99 runs per innings, with a highest score of 103, one of his two centuries. In 1860 whilst employed as a professional at

Winchester College Winchester College is a public school (fee-charging independent day and boarding school) in Winchester, Hampshire, England. It was founded by William of Wykeham in 1382 and has existed in its present location ever since. It is the oldest of the ...

he played and beat an XI of the Town of Winchester single handed by 28 runs. Caffyn made scores of 35 and 1, and with two men fielding for him he bowled out the opposition for 4 and 4.Caffyn, William
Obituaries in 1919, ''

Wisden Cricketers' Almanack ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

'', 1920. Retrieved 2015-08-26. At the end of the

1859 English cricket season Events January–March * January 21 – José Mariano Salas (1797–1867) becomes Conservative interim President of Mexico. * January 24 ( O. S.) – Wallachia and Moldavia are united under Alexandru Ioan Cuza (Romania since 1866, final u ...

, Caffyn was one of the 12 players who took part in cricket's first-ever overseas tour when an

England cricket team The England cricket team represents England and Wales in international cricket. Since 1997, it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club (the MCC) since 1903. Engla ...

led by George Parr visited North America.

Influence in Australia

Caffyn was instrumental in the early development of Australian cricket and the establishment of Anglo-Australian competition. He first came to Australia with a sponsored team which consisted of mainly Surrey cricketers in 1861/62, visiting again in 1863/64. For both of these trips, Caffyn and the team travelled to Melbourne on the SS Great Britain. Following his 1864 visit he remained in Australia as coach of the Melbourne Cricket Club. After a period in Melbourne, he moved to Sydney, where he started a hairdressing business with his wife and coached at the Warwick Club. During this time he was closely associated with fellow ex-Surrey professional cricketer Charles Lawrence who coached at the Albert Cricket Club in Sydney. In his book ''Seventy-one Not Out'' he wrote: : The cricket out there in the ten years that have elapsed between the first visit of an English eleven and my leaving the country had made phenomenal improvement... It is a source of the greatest satisfaction to me that I have in some measure contributed to the successful state of things. Caffyn has the distinction of bowling the first ball in the first match between a team from England and one from Australia at the

Melbourne Cricket Ground The Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), also known locally as "The 'G", is an Australian sports stadium located in Yarra Park, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, Victoria. Founded and managed by the Melbourne Cricket Club, it is the largest stadiu ...

. The match took place on New Year's Day 1862, and saw his visiting England XI up against a Victorian XVIII. He also played in the first Anglo-Australian

match, played from 1 March 1862 and dubbed ''The World v Surrey'', also at the MCG. The first Test match was not played until 1877, 15 years later.

Later life

He returned to England in 1871 and played for Surrey a few times in 1872 and 1873. He was awarded an annual payment by the club before retiring to live in Reigate. He died at his home in Surrey in 1919 at the age of 91. His house still remains at 'Sydneyville', 20 Parkgate Road, Reigate, unaltered from the time he resided there, the name a testament to his time in Australia. John Arlott recognised the importance of his book of reminiscences ''Seventy-one Not out'', edited by "Mid-On". Arlott wrote: "...despite its literary limitations, ''Seventy-one Not out'' is an essential book for anyone who wants to understand the history of cricket."Allen DR (ed) (1985) ''Arlott on Cricket'', p.180. London: Fontana/Collins.

Notes

External links

*
''Seventy-one Not Out'' by William Caffyn
digitised text at

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Surrey and All-England

Influence in Australia

Later life

Notes

External links

Further reading