This is Findon Village — this website was created by Valerie Martin and contains scenes from her home village of Findon, West Sussex, U.K.

Kennel Bottom Hits the News in 1867

Early in the twentieth century — Huntsman's House on Long Furlong (A280) next to the Findon Cricket Pitch at Kennel Bottom.

Copyright Valerie Martin 1999

I have discovered that cricket has been played since early times in Findon. There was a match at Findon with Horsham in August of 1773.  

The game was not only played in Findon and there are many records of the game in Sussex from the time of the 18th Century — and in the following century there were matches played between teams of from Sussex and Kent and of course local fixtures between village sides.

A very early cricket match dated 1750.   Unfortunately not in Findon
but at Brading on the Isle of Wight — but that just could be Cissbury Ring on the horizon on the mainland.

 

By the end of the 18th Century the Prince Regent (later King George IV and a visitor to the Manor of Findon) took an avid interest in the game and presented the Brighton cricketers with a ground to play on — the Royal Brighton Cricket Ground (later taken over by a gentleman by the name of James Ireland — and subsequently known as Ireland's Gardens.

On Wednesday 18th June 1794, two employees from Muntham Court in Findon, named Dick and Thorp, were absent because they were watching a cricket match. We know about this because it went on record that they missed out on the distribution of their beer ration at the mansion on that particular afternoon. This proves that cricket was popular long before there was an official cricket club in the village.

On the occasion of this particular cricket match on 18th June 1794, a banker by the name of Mr. Hore in the company of three ladies from Worthing visited Muntham Court to see William Frankland’s Machinery.   Upon their departure, Mr. Hore and the ladies it is recorded —

 

....they gave Mr. Hasted 5 shillings, with which Osburn and Glassbrook went to Mr. Gravely at Storrington and bought beer at the rate of 14d. per Gallon, brought it home and gave every one their proper share about the house, except Dick & Thorp, who were at cricket”

 

It would appear to have been a somewhat risky proceeding to send those two particular men for the beer.  A week earlier on 12th June 1794 —

 

....Osburn, Glassbrook and Dick got drunk & kept holidays. 

 

The day after Mr. Hore’s visit, it has been handed down that —

 

.....  Miss Wyatt and Niece the Housekeeper from Mitchelgrove and Mrs. Tate from Findon came to Muntham to see the Machinery, and gave Osburn a Shilling to which the Workmen added a little more and  bought Beer at the Gun, brought it home & drank it in the afternoon.

 

I have come across a cricket match played at nearby Broadwater (just to the south o Findon) on Tuesday 16th August 1805 for 500 guineas.

I have also heard it said that there was a cricket bat behind the door, or else up in the bacon rack, in every cottage in the 1840s.  It was played by tradesmen and labourers for whom the cricket provided enjoyment and relaxation after the day's work.

This is a painting of the Oddfellows 13th Anniversary Cricket Match at Broadwater Green just to the south of Findon on 21st July 1858.     Artist is unkown.

The Findon Cricket Club had been formed in 1867 and it had been an auspicious year for the inhabitants of Findon, especially for those who were anxious to take up the bat and be players of the game.   

The ground for the Findon Cricket Club was donated to the village by William Westbrook Richardson's Estate and it took the villager men some six years to landscape it into a state useable for cricket, hence the bank/mound behind the pavilion seen today.

Findon's Cricket Pitch 1999.

The elected Treasurer was William Goater Senior and J. P. Millen was the Secretary. The Committee members were well-known village names, E Burchell, A. Hewett, James Carter, Walter Brown, (who became the innkeeper of the Gun Inn c.1874); and Albert Short Junior (of Findon Farm in the Square).

The team played on one of the most picturesque pitches in the country. This was by courtesy of the Findon Place Estate and was known as Kennel Bottom — receiving its name from the nearby Kennels where the foxhounds were lodged on the Manor of Findon Estate.

Church Hill from the top of Stable Lane in Findon. Watercolour by Betty Martin of Steep Lane, Findon, who died in 1994.

 

Huntsman's House and the Kennels were constructed when the Richardsons were Lords of the Manor of Findon. Cricket matches have always been played at Kennel Bottom below Church Hill by the kindness of successive tenants of Findon Place.

A cricket match was played between ladies and gentlemen at Homefield Park in nearby Worthing in the summer of 1889.  You may be astonished to earn that the ladies won by 53 runs..... but you will not be so surprised when you know that the guys had to bat with broomsticks and field using only their left hands.

 

Continue if you would like to read how Findon Cricket Runs Into Trouble in the 1890s .

 Back to Sport Index

 Back to Main Index

THIS IS FINDON VILLAGE — was launched by Valerie Martin in January 1999 and will grow to be a historical record of life in Findon, West Sussex, U.K.

 

E-mail: valeriemartin@findonvillage.com