Incident at the Otira Gorge

Martin Chandler | 9:14am BST 16 October 2022

Published: 2022
Pages: 16
Author: Gault, Adrian and Gault, Julia
Publisher: Mitcham CC
Rating: 3.5 stars

Ashes history began in 1877 when James Lillywhite’s band of touring professionals lost the inaugural Test match at the MCG by 45 runs. In the course of the match the Australian batsman Charles Bannerman put together the first Ashes century, retiring hurt on 165, which to this day is still a record in terms of the highest percentage of a team’s total in a Test to be contributed by one batsman.

To bastardise a phrase that, apparently, Michael Caine never actually said anyway, ‘quite a lot of people know that’. That apart however knowledge of that ground breaking tour tends to be sketchy amongst all other than the keenest students of the game’s history, and the story that makes up this interesting little booklet, why the first ever Test nearly didn’t happen, is not at all well known.

The tour was an arduous one. It lasted five months in all, and to that has to be added the travel time that the two sea voyages from the UK to Adelaide and back again took. The tourists spent most of their time in Australia, but before the MCG Test travelled across the Tasman Sea to play eight matches in New Zealand, and it is whilst there that disaster almost struck.

Whilst travelling between two of the New Zealand fixtures, by horse drawn carriage, the cricketers encountered a rainstorm, the ferocity of which really should have seen them stay put. The intrepid band carried on however and, only just and not without a number of hairy moments, managed to negotiate the conditions and the swollen watercourses intact and got to their destination.

The story is told largely through the eyes of one of the party, James Southerton, who wrote regular reports on the team’s progress, and there are contributions too from other members of the side George Ulyett, Alfred Shaw and Allen Hill.

So why produce the booklet now? Also travelling with the party was an artist, John Gibb, who produced a painting of the most dangerous phase of the journey, at Otira Gorge. That painting was acquired at auction last year by Mitcham Cricket Club, with whom Southerton was long associated, and the booklet was produced as part of an exhibition that was held recently in the club’s famous old pavilion.

There are no great revelations in Incident at the Otira Gorge, but it is still thoroughly researched and a detailed and easy read, finished off with a brief profile of Gibb. Illustrated throughout and available currently at a mere £2 plus postage* it is an absolute steal, and certainly recommended.

*Interested purchasers should contact the authors via email to mitchamcricketclub@gmail.com.