William Martin Leake (23 April 1831 – 25 August 1918) was an English

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing ...

and

industrialist A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

and a

cricketer 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 ...

who played

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 ...

for

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

, 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 ...

and other amateur sides in the 1850s. He was born at

Marylebone Marylebone (usually , also , ) is a district in the West End of London, in the City of Westminster. Oxford Street, Europe's busiest shopping street, forms its southern boundary. An Civil parish#Ancient parishes, ancient parish and latterly a ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

and died at Newnham on Severn,

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean. The county town is the city of Gl ...

. Educated at

Rugby School Rugby School is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) in Rugby, Warwickshire, England. Founded in 1567 as a free grammar school for local boys, it is one of the oldest independent schools in Britain. Up ...

and

St John's College, Cambridge St John's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corpo ...

, Leake was placed 24th in the list of Wranglers in 1854. As a cricketer, he played as a batsman, sometimes opening the innings but more often in the middle order; it is not known if he was right-handed or left-handed. His figures are not impressive by modern standards, but he retained his place in the Cambridge team across four summers and appeared four times, from 1851 to 1854, in the annual

University match The University Match in a cricketing context is generally understood to refer to the annual fixture between Oxford University Cricket Club and Cambridge University Cricket Club. From 2001, as part of the reorganisation of first-class cricket, ...

against

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. His best innings came in his first appearance in this fixture in 1851, when he opened the batting and made a score of 66, which was the highest innings of the match. After graduating from Cambridge he played one game for a "Gentlemen of England" side in the summer of 1854 and once for MCC in 1858. After graduating, Leake appears to have gone to

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

, then called "Ceylon", as a civil engineer but then to have become involved in the introduction tea and cinnamon as crops on the island. By 1873, he had returned to England and was manager of a cement works at Blackwall in

, and he is recorded as such in the 1881 England and Wales census, when he was living in West Dulwich. He retained interests in Sri Lankan tea plantations and as late as 1898 he was representing "tea interests" in Ceylon to a committee debating future currency arrangements for India.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Leake, William Martin 1831 births 1918 deaths English cricketers Cambridge University cricketers Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers Sri Lankan people of British descent People from British Ceylon Gentlemen of England cricketers People educated at Rugby School Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge