WHILE 1895 WAS very much W. G. Grace's Indian Summer, it was also the year when a very young amateur made a profound mark on the cricket world in a different way.

 Charles Lucas Townsend was born on Nov 7, 1876, son of Frank Townsend, who had played for Gloucestershire in the great days of the Graces. Young Charles took 199 wickets for Clifton College during his three years there, and his success attracted the attention of the county club, and particularly WG. So, at only 16 years of age, Townsend found himself playing for Gloucestershire against Middlesex in 1893 on the close at Clifton college, where he bowled 70 overs.

In the next match, against Somerset, he achieved an unlikely hat-trick by having three men stumped by W. H. Brain off successive deliveries (the only instance in first-class cricket history). The centenary of this event was celebrated in 1993 by a special match at Cheltenham between these two countries for the `Brain Trophy'. Brain had the ball mounted and presented to Townsend. It is still treasured by the family.

But Townsend's great year was 1895. Bowling legbreaks with an occasional off-break, he took 122 wickets at 12.58 in the period from July 22 to Aug 31. It is worth recalling these extraordinary figures in detail:

July 22–24	v Lancashire	6 for 111
July 25–27	v Nottinghamshire	16 for 122
July 29–30	v Yorkshire	6 for 71
Aug 1–3	v Warwickshire	10 for 129
Aug 5–7	v Sussex	12 for 87
Aug 8–10	v Middlesex	13 for 173
Aug 12–14	v Kent	7 for 80
Aug 19–20	v Nottinghamshire	13 for 110
Aug 22–24	v Yorkshire	15 for 184
Aug 26–28	v Surrey	12 for 175
Aug 29–31	v Somerset	12 for 225

Bearing in mind that Townsend was only 18 and had left school only the previous summer, he sent down in that season 675 overs, with 169 maidens, and took 124 wickets for 1561 – an average of 12.73 in 12 matches.

His other achievement in this remarkable year was as WG's partner in the first game of the season against Somerset, when he put on 223 for the third wicket with the great man and enabled him to complete his 100th hundred. WG went on to make 288.

 Townsend had a strange career. In 1896 he took 109 wickets, but his average rose to 22. He took 16 wickets against the Australians at Cheltenham, but this was to no avail as Gloucestershire were bowled out for 17 in their second innings.

Between 1896 and 1900, his bowling declined but his batting improved so much that he became one of the best left-handers in the country and was being thought of now as an allrounder. In 1898 he performed the double of 1072 runs and 130 wickets and was selected for both the Gentlemen v Players matches.

C. L. Townsend: prodigy

`He took 122 wickets in the period from July 22 to August 31'

The next year he was one of Wisden's Five Cricketers of the Year and was selected for England against Australia at Lord's and the Oval. But his contributions here were very modest. He again achieved the `double'– this time with 2440 runs and 101 wickets in all matches. That winter Townsend toured with Ranji on a short tour of Canada and the USA, but he was unable to find his form with either bat or ball.

His last summer as a regular player was 1900. Trained as a solicitor and always maintaining his amateur status, Townsend played only fleetingly for Gloucestershire over the next two decades. He later became the Official Receiver at Stockton-on-Tees.

He did however have some notable innings before he finally gave up cricket altogether in 1922. In 1906, in his first match of the season, he scored 214 against Worcestershire. In 1909 at Cheltenham, against M. A. Noble's Australians, he scored 129 out of 169 in two hours – again his first match of the season. In 1920 he was involved in a remarkable game against Somerset, when, having been dismissed for 22, Gloucestershire were set 274 to win and got there with four wickets to spare mainly thanks to Townsend's 84 in 75 minutes –Wisden described the innings as one of the events of the year!

There is no doubt that Townsend could have achieved a great deal more in cricket had he been able to play regularly after 1900, but he said in later life that cricket as a career was too uncertain and that he needed to have a professional career to fall back on.

For a few years at the end of last century, Gloucestershire had in Charles Townsend and Gilbert Jessop as brilliant a pair of young amateurs as any county. Gloucestershire's fortunes may have been very different in the period from 1900 to 1914 had Jessop had the support of Townsend.

After Townsend gave up playing, the family cricket tradition was maintained. His son D. C. H. won a Blue at Oxford, and although only representing Durham (then a Minor County), was chosen for the 1934–35 MCC tour of West Indies, where he played in three Tests. His son J. R. A. played for Oxford University. There were thus four generations of first-class cricketers – a unique record for one family.

 Charles Townsend died at his home in Stockton-on-Tees in 1958, aged 81.

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