Hidden history of SA's cricket heroes

04 January 2017 - 09:40 By Archie Henderson
subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now
Image: Gallo Images/ IStock

Austin Ngcumbe is not a household name in South African cricket. Perhaps he should be; it could just be that the man from King William's Town is the prototype South African fast bowler.

For about a decade Ngcumbe was something of a cricket colossus in the Eastern Cape, having emerged as a promising talent in 1884, opening the bowling for Champion Cricket Club, winners of a tournament among black clubs.

In a match containing contrasting figures of the time, he took 11 wickets against Alberts, the leading white club in the town (yes, there was occasional cricket across racial barriers).

Champion CC were captained by Nathaniel Umhalla, the son of a chief who had been sent to Zonnebloem College in Cape Town in the 1860s, where he'd learnt to play cricket, and was still doing so 20 years later.

His father had once been charged with treason for disloyalty in one of the wars between the British and the Xhosas.

The Rev John Gawler, who with Ngcumbe had taken the new ball for the Champion CC, was the grandson of the Xhosa warrior "prophet" Makhanda ka Nxele, who drowned while trying to swim from Robben Island, where he was a prisoner, to the mainland in 1819.

Makhanda had led an attack on the British garrison in Grahamstown earlier that year.

In the opposition was EP Schermbrucker, the son of Frederick Schermbrucker, a veteran of the Crimean war who was among the German settlers of 1857 to the Cape. Soon after what is now called the ninth war of dispossession, Schermbrucker senior had led troops who killed Chief Sandile of the Ngqika. When the son, an accomplished batsman, was dismissed for three and one, there was understandable joy among the black spectators.

Whether Schermbrucker's wickets were taken by Ngcumbe or Gawler is not known, but the saga is one of many in a new history of South African cricket, Cricket and Conquest, by Andre Odendaal, Krish Reddy, Christopher Merrett and Jonty Winch.

It is only the first volume, covers 1795-1914 and is the brainchild of Odendaal, who came upon the exploits of Ngcumbe and his teammates about 40 years ago while he was captaining Stellenbosch University's first XI and doing research at the South African Library in the Company's Gardens, Cape Town.

There was excitement in his voice at the time of his discovery of cricket scorecards in copies of Imvo Zabantsundu, the pioneering newspaper started by John Tengu Jabavu, which reflected "native opinion" in those hopeful days.

It is an intriguing book, telling a story about how the British empire brought cricket to South Africa and then attempted to keep control of "their" game. When South Africa was invited to send a team to England in 1900, it had to be explained to the MCC that there was a war going on here.

The invitation was delayed until the following year, a time of scorched earth against Boer commandos. This time the MCC would not accept war as an excuse because it would, the men at Lord's insisted, disrupt their fixture list!

Jimmy Sinclair, scorer of South Africa's first Test century, was able to make himself available for the tour, having recently escaped from a Boer prisoner of war camp.

South Africans know what they want from their cricket team this year: wins. A major trophy, even. But what do they not want to see?

subscribe Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package.
Subscribe now