Samuel George Homfray was a highly influential figure in the evolution of cricket in South Wales during the second half of the 19th century. Besides playing for Glamorganshire from 1863 until 1870, he was a founding member of the South Wales Cricket Club – the first quasi-county team in the region and whose members in 1886 agreed to dissolve the Club and create fully fledged county teams, including Glamorgan CCC.
He was the eldest son of Samuel Homfray, the wealthy ironmaster who lived at Bedwellty House in Tredegar and owned ironworks in the town as well as in Merthyr and Ebbw Vale. He was educated at King’s College School in Wimbledon before returning to Tredegar to learn the iron trade and assist his father in running the family’s ironworks. On 5 April 1853, he married Jane Elizabeth, the daughter of Richard Fothergill of Erwood Hall, Breconshire.
He also joined the Monmouthshire Militia, rising to the rank of Captain on 26 March 1855 and undertook garrison duty at Pembroke Dock during the Crimean War.
Around 1856 he left the Militia and moved with his family to Newport where he became involved in the exportation of coal from the town’s docks, in addition to becoming a co-proprietor of the Glyncorrwg Coal Company.
Having learnt to play cricket whilst at school in Cheltenham and London, he played for the Newport club, besides guesting for Cardiff in the exhibition match at the Arms Park against the United England XI. Samuel George was a player of quite modest abilities and bagged a pair against the crack professionals. Nevertheless, he acted as an enthusiastic promoter of the game and in 1858 and 1859 he energetically arranged fixtures for a Monmouthshire and South Wales XXII against the All-England Eleven. The matches on the Newport Marshes were evidence of his skills as both an entrepreneur and an organiser, with the contest in 1859 also having a much wider importance in the history of cricket in Wales.
Using his wide range of contacts, Homfray was able to assemble decent sides for both games. In 1858, he drew heavily from the Newport and Cardiff clubs, as well as hiring the professional services of Francis Tinley of Nottinghamshire, plus two others from Lancashire who held engagements with local clubs, but hey could not prevent English side winning by four wickets. Mr. Homfray was able to recoup some of his outlay by charging sixpence for admission. A bumper crowd turned up, with the local newspaper reporting how “the Marshes Road was densely crowded, fruit and ginger beer stalls were pitched along the sidewalks, and the upper windows in most of the houses displayed numerous smiling faces….The taverns and beer houses did a thriving business along the road during the match.”
The rematch in June 1859 saw Mr. Homfray selected leading players from Newport, Cardiff, Abergavenny, Brecon and Llandovery, augmented by two professionals from Northern England as well as a couple of cricketing clergymen from Hampshire. For their part, the English side could not muster all of their regular men, and a below-strength side struggled against the local side, much to the delight of Mr. Homfray and his affluent supporters. All of the hired hands made useful contributions, not least a professional called Grundy who claimed six wickets on the final day, as the English side, chasing 158, were dismissed for 96. This long-awaited victory – the first by a Welsh side over a major England team – was celebrated with much glee and led Mr. Homfray to form the South Wales Cricket Club – a gentleman’s eleven playing matches against crack teams in the Home Counties and the West Country, and the first regional team to represent the Principality.
The Club’s first fixture took place against the Clifton club, but it was a rather shambolic start for Mr. Homfray’s men as he arrived in Bristol with only nine players. Although the home club chose a very promising eleven year-old called WG Grace, they proved far too strong for the Welsh side, winning the contest by the small matter of 114 runs. Despite the reverse, Homfray remained sufficiently upbeat to wager £50 on the return contest at Newport – a match that ended all square, but only after several disputes over umpiring decisions.
The match at Newport was a rare outing on Welsh soil with their fixture list mainly comprising a London tour lasting up to ten days with two- or three-day contests against some of the top gentlemen’s teams in the Home Counties including the M.C.C., I Zingari, Prince’s, and Knickerbockers as well as Surrey Club and Ground, plus both the Gentlemen of Kent, and their counterparts from Sussex. It is very likely that Mr. Homfray dipped into his pockets to guarantee some of these games as well as other sundry costs including the sums charged by some of the guest players including EM and WG Grace to clinch, in theory, their unpaid services as amateurs.
Around this time, he also met with financial difficulties with his businesses, and his cricketing largesse may, in part, explain why on 16 April 1863, Samuel George Homfray was declared bankrupt. The year before he had also left Newport to live at Neuaddfach in Hendy and became the owner of the Grovesend Colliery in Gorseinon. He also rebuilt his business interests in Swansea and continued his cricketing activity by raising a team called the Welsh Wanderers – comprising amateurs from the Swansea, Neath and Llanelly clubs, and augmented by former pupils from Cheltenham College and Clifton College.- who played at Pembroke Dock and Newcastle Emlyn. On 7 and 8 September 1863, he also made his debut for Glamorganshire at Llanelly House against Carmarthenshire and made 0 and 4 besides claiming the wicket of Ben Arthur.
Mr. Homfray played in the return fixture the following year at Neath, making 2 and 6, besides travelling to Brecon, Cardigan and Pembroke with the Welsh Wanderers in 1865. In 1866 he played for Glamorganshire against Carmarthenshire at Merthyr Mawr, before playing for the Gentlemen of South Wales at Heath in September 1867 and in 1868 at Bryn-y-Mor Field where he met with more success with the bat, making 14 and 0.
In 1868 he also made 9 and 5 for Glamorganshire against Breconshire at Neath, besides appearing in four of the county’s matches in 1869 – following the creation of a formal club by his close friend JTD Llewelyn – with Mr. Homfray appearing in the trial match against a Colts XXII, as well as in the away match with Breconshire and against Monmouthshire at both the Arms Park and Usk. The latter also proved to be the venue for his final match of note, appearing on 22 July 1870 against Monmouthshire with Mr. Homfray making 5* and 5.
His son, also Samuel George, had been born in July 1855 and played cricket at Cheltenham College before becoming a hydraulic engineer in Newcastle where in 1877 he played for the Northumberland club. He subsequently worked in London and one of the projects in which he was involved was designing a mechanism which raised and lowered Tower Bridge.
Image Credit (opposite) – Glamorgan Cricket Archives.
In 1876 Mr. Homfray senior had returned with his wife to live at Ferncliffe in Stow Park. It was here that he died in March 1894 after a very active life and helping to lay the foundations for the creation of Glamorgan County Cricket Club. His widow lived at the house until her passing on 23 May 1921 – just a week after the Club’s inaugural first-class match against Sussex at Cardiff.
HOMFRAY, Capt. Samuel George
Born: Bedwellty House, Tredegar, 7 December 1830.
Died: Newport, 13 March 1894.