Charles John Capes (5 January 1898 – 16 February 1933), known as Jack Capes, was an English amateur hockey player and

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. He played for the England hockey team and for

Kent County Cricket Club Kent County Cricket Club is one of the eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Kent. A club representing the county was first founded in 1842 but Ke ...

between 1923 and 1928.Capes, Mr CJ
Obituaries in 1933, ''

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 ...

'', 1934. Retrieved 2017-04-15. He served in the

British army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Early life and education

Capes was born in

Forest Hill Forest Hill or Forrest Hill may refer to: Places Australia * Forest Hill, New South Wales, a suburb of Wagga Wagga * Forrest Hill, New South Wales, a suburb of Albury * Forest Hill, Queensland * Forest Hill, Victoria ** Forest Hill Chase Sh ...

in London in 1898, the son of Matthew and Amy Capes. His father was a master printer.Lewis P (2014) ''For Kent and Country'', pp.130–132. Brighton: Reveille Press. He attended Heathfield School in

Keston Keston is a village in Greater London, England, located within the London Borough of Bromley, Greater London. Prior to 1965 it was withing the historic county of Kent. It is part suburban, part rural in nature and lies on the edge of Hayes Com ...

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 ...

from 1904 until 1912 and then

Malvern College Malvern College is an Independent school (United Kingdom), independent coeducational day and boarding school in Malvern, Worcestershire, Malvern, Worcestershire, England. It is a public school (United Kingdom), public school in the British sen ...

where he was in the school Cricket XI in 1914 and 1915. He was a

school prefect Prefect (from the Latin ''praefectus'', substantive adjectival form of ''praeficere'': "put in front", meaning in charge) is a magisterial title of varying definition, but essentially refers to the leader of an administrative area. A prefect's ...

and head of house at Malvern, played in the football team and was in the Officers' Training Corps. He passed the Army Entrance Exam in 1916 and graduated from Sandhurst after a six-month, war-shortened course later the same year.

Military service

After graduating from Sandhurst, Capes was commissioned as a

2nd Lieutenant Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces, comparable to NATO OF-1 rank. Australia The rank of second lieutenant existed in the military forces of the Australian colonies and Australian Army until ...

in the Royal West Kent Regiment (RWK) in October 1916. After a period of training in Britain, he was posted with the 2nd Battalion, RWK in

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the F ...

, initially at

Basra Basra ( ar, ٱلْبَصْرَة, al-Baṣrah) is an Iraqi city located on the Shatt al-Arab. It had an estimated population of 1.4 million in 2018. Basra is also Iraq's main port, although it does not have deep water access, which is hand ...

. He served in the area for the remainder of

in the region and was promoted to Lieutenant (British Army and Royal Marines), Lieutenant in April 1918. He saw action at the Battle of Sharqat in October 1918 immediately before the Armistice of Mudros brought the war with Ottoman Empire, Turkey to an end. Capes returned to England in April 1919 and was demobilised, resigning his commission in November the same year. He was briefly recalled to the army during the 1921 General Strike.

Sporting career

Capes' Wisden Cricketers' Almanack, Wisden obituary says that he was "better known as an English International hockey player". He played hockey many times for the South in international trial matches and represented the England hockey team in 1926. He made his Second XI debut for Kent County Cricket Club, Kent in 1920 and played a few matches for the team before making his first-class cricket debut for the county in 1923. He was awarded his Kent county cap in 1927 and played a total of 33 first-class matches for the county, playing his final first-class match in 1928. He played club cricket for Beckenham and toured the Netherlands in 1931 with Free Foresters Cricket Club, Free Foresters.Jack Capes
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2017-04-15.Carlaw D (2020) ''Kent County Cricketers A to Z. Part Two: 1919–1939'', pp. 29–30.
Available online
at the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians. Retrieved 2020-07-01.)

Death

Capes was ill for some time and died at Ospedaletti in Italy in 1933 aged 35.Charles Capes
CricInfo. Retrieved 2017-04-15.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Capes, Jack 1898 births 1933 deaths English cricketers Kent cricketers British Army personnel of World War I Officers' Training Corps officers Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment officers Graduates of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst People from Forest Hill, London