Walter Fellows

Walter Fellows (23 February 1834, Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire – 23 July 1901, Toorak, Melbourne) was an English amateur cricketer who later became a clergyman in Australia. He was the brother of Harvey Fellows, who also played first-class cricket.

Cricket player

Walter Fellows was an all-rounder who was first noted as a schoolboy cricketer at Westminster School. In first-class cricket, he was mainly associated with Oxford University and Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC). He played for several predominantly amateur teams including the Gentlemen in the Gentlemen v Players series. He had a reputation as a "terrific and very successful hitter". Fellows' name has appeared in the "records" section of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack for many years under the heading "Record Hit" with the same wording: "The Rev. W. Fellows, while at practice on the Christ Church ground at Oxford in 1856, drove a ball bowled by Charles Rogers 175 yards from hit to pitch." A note reproduced in an Australian newspaper in 1890 states that Fellows at the time was 5 feet 11 inches tall and weighed 17 stones 4 pounds.

Fellows made 24 known appearances in first-class matches from 1853 to 1857. He played in the University match for Oxford University against Cambridge University as a lower middle-order batsman and a bowler for four years from 1854 to 1857, making important batting contributions in 1854, 1856 and 1857 and having some limited success as a bowler in 1855 and 1856; he appeared in the Gentlemen v Players matches at Lord's from 1855 to 1857.

Later career

Fellows became a clergyman and went to Australia, where he became the first vicar of St John's Church, Toorak. In Australia, he played for the Melbourne Cricket Club; a report in an Australian newspaper in 1878 indicates that Fellows was discouraged from playing in major matches by his bishop, Charles Perry, but that the retirement of Perry brought about a more permissive attitude from the new incumbent, James Moorhouse, and Fellows was able to resume.

External links

• CricketArchive record