Celebrating Hampshire Historians

Ashley-Cooper, Frederick Samuel

02.03.1877 - 31.01.1932

Ashley-Cooper was born at Bermondsey, in metropolitan Surrey, and lived for most of his life in rural Surrey. When he died his home was at Milford, near Godalming. Throughout his life Cooper’s passion was cricket, in particular the history of the game and the statistics it generated. Ironically, as recorded in his Wikipedia entry, ‘Frail and short-sighted, he never played cricket, and seldom watched, but his “total involvement in the game almost precluded every other interest”’.

Where he was educated is not known. As recorded in an obituary which was published in The Times: due to his poor health he did not follow any profession ‘and yet his researches and literary output involved an amout of labour which might have deterred the most robust of men.’ The sheer scale of his output is breathtaking: ‘Such was his amazing energy that altogether he produced 103 books and pamphlets on the game, besides a very large amount of matter including 40,000 biographical and obituary notices, his work being characterised by phenomenal accuracy’. In short, he was ‘unrivalled as an authority on cricket history’. 

Sources

• Wikipedia

• The Times, 2 February 1932, p.5.

Portrait

Photo from Follow On by E W Swanton.

Contribution to county’s history

Given the scale of his published outputs, Cooper’s specific contribution to Hampshire’s history is relatively limited and he has been included in the project due to his study of the early years of Hambledon Cricket Club. This is a very impressive piece of work and reflects his obsessive attention to detail. There were already histories of the club and as he points out in his Foreword: ‘It seemed almost too much to expect that it would ever be possible for new light to be thrown on the subject.’ However, he found sources in the form of minute books and accounts which had not previously been utilised.

Relevant published works

• The Hambledon Cricket Chronicle 1772-1796 (London: H. Jenkins, 1923)

Critical Comments

Other Comments

It is possible that there are references to, and accounts of, Hampshire cricketers in his publications, such as Scores and Biographies Vol 15 (Longmans & Co, 1925) and Cricket Highways and Byways (George Allen & Unwin, 1927); his contributions to Wisden; and the newspaper Cricket, which he edited for five years.

Contributor

Roger Ottewill (15 April 2024)

Key Words

Cricket, Hambledon, Hambledon Cricket Club

Any queries or further suggestions for this part of the list should be addressed to celebrating@hantsfieldclub.org.uk.

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