Stephen Amherst or Amhurst (1750 – 6 May 1814), 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 and organiser of cricket matches. Amherst was born in 1750.Stephen Amherst

CricInfo ESPN cricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a d ...

. Retrieved 2022-04-08. He is most associated with organising matches involving Kent teams towards the end of the 18th century. Ranjitsinhji KS ed. (1897) ''The Jubilee Book of Cricket'', p. 394. London: William Blackwood and Sons.
Available online
at Wikisource. Retrieved 2022-04-09. Pycroft J The Hambledon Club and the Old Players, in Lucas EV ed (1907) ''The Hambledon Men'', p. 136, p. 142. London: Henry Frowde.
Available online
at Wikisource. Retrieved 2022-03-20.) Amherst employed cricketers such as

Thomas Boxall Thomas Boxall (dates unknown) was a noted English cricketer who played during the late 18th century. He is considered to have been "one of the finest professional cricketers" of his day. Boxall was a noted bowler and is believed to be the firs ...

, a noted bowler who is believed to have been the first player to bowl

legbreak Leg spin is a type of spin bowling in cricket. A leg spinner bowls right-arm with a wrist spin action. The leg spinner's normal delivery causes the ball to spin from right to left (from the bowler's perspective) when the ball bounces on the ...

s, Rajan A (2011) ''Twirlymen: The Unlikely History of Cricket's Greatest Spin Bowlers'', p. 24. London: Yellow Jersey Press. and John Crawte, who he persuaded to move from the

Hambledon Club The Hambledon Club was a social club that is famous for its organisation of 18th century cricket matches. By the late 1770s it was the foremost cricket club in England. Foundation The origin of the club, based near Hambledon in rural Hampshire, ...

in Hampshire. Arlott LTJ (1978
Alresford's Famous Cricketers
Alresford Historical and Literary Society. Retrieved 2022-03-21. Both men played for Kent sides whilst employed by Amherst who built an indoor training centre in a converted barn for Boxall to use. As well as organising matches, Amherst played in 31 first-class matches between 1783 and 1795.Stephen Amherst
CricketArchive. Retrieved 2018-04-10. He played most frequently for Kent sides, making 18 appearances for teams using the name Kent as well as three for

West Kent Kent is a traditional county in South East England with long-established human occupation. Prehistoric Kent Kent has been occupied since the Lower Palaeolithic as finds from the quarries at Fordwich and Swanscombe attest. The Swanscombe skul ...

and one for both East Kent and for the

Gentlemen of Kent 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 ...

. He is known to have played non-first-class matches until at least 1800, including for the Gentlemen of Kent and the

Rochester Rochester may refer to: Places Australia * Rochester, Victoria Canada * Rochester, Alberta United Kingdom *Rochester, Kent ** City of Rochester-upon-Medway (1982–1998), district council area ** History of Rochester, Kent ** HM Prison ...

club. Amherst died at

West Farleigh West Farleigh is a village and civil parish four miles (6km) southwest of Maidstone in the county of Kent. The parish has a population of approximately 450, and is bounded by the civil parishes of East Farleigh, Hunton, Yalding, and over the Rive ...

near

Maidstone Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies 32 miles (51 km) east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the c ...

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 ...

in 1814. Arthur Haygarth quoted from a tablet in the parish church at West Farleigh to confirm his view that the spelling of Amherst's name was correct, rather than Amhurst which is used in a number of other sources.West Kent vs East Kent, Jun 25–26 1783
– scorecard,

. Retrieved 2022-03-21. A Stephen Amhurst is recorded as the owner of Court Lodge in the village in 1798, a house his family had lived in since the 17th century,East Farleigh: a brief history
p. 19, p. 27. East Farleigh Parish Council (2016). and it is possible that both spellings of the name were used by the same family.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Amherst, Stephen English cricketers Kent cricketers English cricketers of 1701 to 1786 English cricketers of 1787 to 1825 1750 births 1814 deaths Middlesex cricketers English amateur cricketers Non-international England cricketers Gentlemen of England cricketers Gentlemen of Kent cricketers Cricket patrons Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers West Kent cricketers East Kent cricketers