Memories of bowls and cricket greats

Colin Macbeth has got good reason to believe it was taken in Worthing.

Among the players is his grandfather Rowland Macbeth (1874-1959), who lived in Worthing between the wars.

"I think he retired to Worthing in the early 30s," says Colin, who lives in North End. "Possibly he lived down there earlier than that.

"My grandfather had come down from Streatham in South London and I think he came to Worthing because he got richer. He was with the Midland Bank and he had started quite young. He married above himself in the sense that my grandmother came from Horsted Keynes and had a rather posh address.

"The old boy was quite good at sport. He had played, I believe, for the Surrey seconds in the 1890s, and as a bowls player he was top notch.

"He was given to exaggeration and creating stories of things that perhaps were not as true as he would have liked them to have been. When he told me that he played bowls for England, it may or may not have been true!

"I was ten when he died. He was my big mate. He lived with us in the New Forest when I was growing up as a little lad. He taught me how to play cricket and football. He took me to see players like Freddie Trueman and Tom Graveney.

"For Graveney, I remember an absolutely scintillating shot, a beautiful shot through the covers. And then he was out. That was 1957. And I remember Trueman looking thunderous in 1958.

"I remember very well that in 1957 my grandfather took me to see the cricket. In 1958, I took him. He was getting rather old by then'¦"