Name:

Hawke, Martin Bladen

Nickname:

7th Baron Hawke

Date of Birth:

16 Aug 1860

Gender:

Men

Place of Birth:

Gainsborough, Lincolnshire, England

Date Died:

10 Oct 1938

Career:

Test: 1896 - 1899
First Class: 1881 - 1911

Teams:

Yorkshire (Regional)
England (Country)

Lord Hawke; Captain, Yorkshire supremo and administrator

Date Died:10 Oct 1938

Hawke was a right handed batsman. He was sent to Eton and from there went to Cambridge, where he played cricket for the university. He first represented Yorkshire in 1881, against the MCC at the Scarborough Festival, and two years later he took over the captaincy of the county.

Under Hawke, Yorkshire won the county championship a record 8 times. 

Hawke was passionate about spreading cricket to all parts of the empire. He represented England on 9 overseas tours between 1887 and 1912, leading teams in Australia, India, Ceylon, North America, South Africa, West Indies and Argentina. On four occasions he also captained his country, all four times to victory.

Hawke was Wisden’s Cricketer of the Year in 1909.

After he retired from playing in 1911, Hawke was involved as an administrator with MCC and Yorkshire. Hawke became President of the MCC through the First World War and then Honourary Treasurer in the 1930s. He was known for his outspoken views on the issues of employing a professional captain, something which became a huge issue in the Yorkshire team of the 1920s and 30s.

At the Yorkshire club's Annual General Meeting in 1925, Hawke made his infamous statement that has often been both quoted and misquoted: Pray God, no professional shall ever captain England.

Hawke died in 1938, aged 78. His obituary in Wisden describes him as “a great cricketer in the highest sense of the word [and] an administrator who not only aimed at the general welfare of the game, but sought to preserve in it an untarnished ethical code.”

Source: CricketCrowd Staff Reporter