Although 1904 has been accepted as the date of the founding of Wigston Primitive Methodists Cricket Club, this date may not be strictly true, for suggestions have been made that organised matches took place much earlier in a field behind what is now Heating Elements factory in Moat Street.
With little else to occupy their leisure time, it would seem fairly reasonable to suppose that the young men of the Chapel should take the basic necessities of the game into an adjacent field and in the nature of things, very soon to play matches against others.
That the Club should, from the very onset, be a well organised affair, with two teams playing on such a splendid ground as Cottage Field in Welford Road, hardly fits in with the normal beginnings of sporting clubs.
The ground was purchased by Mr. J.D.Broughton, founder of the Wigston hosiery firm, and in the early days, leased to the Club for a nominal rent. This small sum was taken to the owner each Christmas and always returned to Club funds.
From its arbitrary starting date until 1927, the Cricket Club 2nd XI also participated in the Mutual Sunday School league, afterwards turning to friendly fixtures, the senior side games were all of a friendly nature for they would been far too strong for any local leagues. They were, by all accounts, a very talented side indeed, ranking for most of the first 35 years amongst the strongest of the County’s club sides.
Practice was held at the ground most evenings in the week and for some, the added pleasure of private nets at ‘The Elms’, home of Mr. Bertram Broughton in Bushloe End, now the Royal British Legion H.Q. He often arranged that players from the County Club, such as Ewart Astill and George Geary would attend there to bowl to the P.M. Batsmen.
Described as a cricket fanatic, Bertram Broughton was possibly the longest serving captain ever, for he led the side up to 1937, generally batting at number eleven, but usually taking wickets when he put himself on to bowl. He also apparently supplied the kit and most things necessary for the well being of the Club.
For the remaining years until the outbreak of the Second World War, he was succeeded in the captaincy by Herbert Johnson, a slow spin bowler who appears in 1905 photographs.
For the senior teams, travel to ‘away’ matches was undertaken by private motor car and likewise on occasions for the second team, though they had much recourse to hired charabancs, trains and service buses. Often the car owners made two trips to a ground inaccessible to service routes.
A welcome benefactor of the Club in those days was Mr. Harry Holmes, who not being content with an annual donation, was not averse to taking the collecting box around Cottage Field on suitable days, adding sufficient to the resulting income to total a highly improbable ten shillings, enough in those days for a very good quality ball.
Mr. Arnold Carter, now a Vice President of the Club, joined the Club at the end of the First World War whilst still a boy and recalls being paid two pence (2d) to attend the baggage and score for the 1st XI before becoming a player. Although played mainly for his bowling, he still figures in two 1st XI record wicket stands. He was also well known as an alert and safe fielder.
His earliest recollection concerns the restoration of the square after the War by the simple expedient of the players on hands and knees, hand weeding and cutting with garden shears, followed by hours of trundling to and fro with the heavy roller.
The Club’s sporting activities went beyond the two main games, for on completion of Peace Memorial Park in Long Street, a bowls contest was staged annually against Wigston Bowling Club. Mr Harry Carter, whose distinguished cricketing career lasted from 1923 as a youthful scorer until old enough to play for the 2nd XI, followed by first team play until 1955, is still a playing member of the Bowls Club and a Vice President of the Cricket Club.
In addition to Saturday afternoons, regular holiday matches were played during the Whitsuntide and August holidays against Lutterworth and certainly by 1930, day matches against Grantham had taken place.
During the latter holiday week, both at Cottage Field and on occasions at a ground behind the ‘Horse and Trumpet’, owned by Mr. Merrick, matches were played by an eleven all bearing the surname Broughton against the remainder of the Club.
Ron Franklin joined the Club in 1925. A more than useful wicket-keeper batsman, sharing the former duties with Ron Elliott and often opening the innings together, his career, during which he scored one century, had lasted longer than most when he retired from the game in 1952.
He was Secretary and Treasurer during the period 1927-31, at which time the ground rent was fixed at 5 pounds annually, this sum being returned as ever in the form of a subscription. At the date of his joining, members subscriptions were 30 shillings, a sum that stayed unaltered until it was reduced in 1945.
In 1932, Ron Elliott undertook the general running of the Club until the outbreak of the War.
