According to Rowland Bowen in his Growth and Development of Cricket, the first reference to cricket being played in the county of Berkshire was in 1751. Cricket certainly reached Berkshire much earlier than that for it originated on the Wealdin Saxon or Norman times and was definitely being played in Berkshire’s neighbouring county of Surrey in 1550.
The first definite mention of cricket in Berkshire relates to the famous all rounder Thomas Waymark who resided at Bray Wick, near Maidenhead in the 1740s, though there are earlier mentions of the game at Eton College. The first definite mention of cricket in Berkshire relates to a team called “Buckinghamshire, Berkshire & Hertfordshire” in September 1740, which played two matches against London Cricket Club at Uxbridge and the Artillery Ground. London won the first “with great difficulty” but no post-match report was found of the second. See H. T. Waghorn: Cricket Scores 1730–73.
By the late 18th century, Berkshire had achieved first-class status. Its strength was in the prominent Old Field Club of Bray, near Maidenhead, which had a team representative of Berkshire as a county and was capable of taking on other leading teams of the time. The first time Berkshire is recorded as a county team is in a match against Surrey in June 1769 and the county was top-class from then until August 1795 when, after losing to MCC at Lord’s, it abruptly ceased to appear in first-class matches.
The Oldfield Club was effectively a Berkshire county team but it was not formally constituted as a county club. Rowland Bowen’s researches discovered evidence of a county organisation by 1841, but it may only have been a loose association of local clubs, as was sometimes the case elsewhere.
Berkshire CCC was founded on 17 March 1895, the same year that the Minor Counties Championship began. It did not compete in the first year of the competition but joined for 1896.
| PRESIDENT
1896-1917 – H R H Prince Christian, KG 1919-1934 – J H Benyon 1935-1944 – A T Loyd, OBE, JP 1945-1967 – Lord Remnant 1968-1990 – Lord Palmer, OBE 1991-2000 – JJ War 2001-2009 – G A Clift 2009- 2022 – F W Neate 2023- D C R Hall
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TREASURER
1896-1905 – J Simmonds 1906-1947 – J H Simmonds, CB 1947-1963 – Major M H Simmonds 1964-1975 – D H Maddox 1976-1988 – D J Laker 1989-2001 – C J Fright 2002-2021 – GG Fyffe 2022- Dr C Sweeney
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CHAIRMAN 1896-1898 – C T Murdoch, MP 1899-1905 – C K Keyser, JP 1983- 2004 – LA Sears 2004-2014 – CJ Fright 2014-2021 – NB Doody 2022- ML Simmons
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HON. SECRETARY
1896-1901 – W O Nares 1902-1903 – Capt. J W St L Wheble 1904-1926 – Major C Turner 1927-1928 – Major A C G Luther 1929-1932 – Capt. R Fort 1933-1937 – Capt. G R Dunlop 1938-1944 – A H M Salmon 1945-1946 – A H M Salmon & H H Lewis 1946-1972 – H L Lewis 1973-1989 – C F V Martin, MC 1990-1994 – CMS Crombie 1994-1998 – J A W Carlisle 1999-2021 – R M New 2022- E Davison |
| CAPTAIN
1896-1899 – A C M Croome 1900-1902 – J A Gibb 1903-1914 – Sir C Y Nepean 1920-1932 – Dr. W Y Woodburn 1933 – H L Lewis 1934-1936 – Dr. W Y Woodburn 1937-1953 – Dw Stokes 1954-1955 – J A Mence 1956-1959 – G R Langdale 1960-1970 – A T Davis, JP 1971-1975 – F W Neate 1976-1978 – M D Mence 1979-1981 – G E J Child 1982-1986 – J F Harvey 1987-1995 – M L Simmons 1996-2000 – G E Loveday 2001-2006 – J R Wood 2007-2012 – B H D Mordt 2013-2021 – J C Morris 2022- – D J Lincoln
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Berkshire CCC Captain – Dan Lincoln
Berkshire CCC Chairman – Mark Simmons
