page_title: Leslie Hylton
section_title: England tour, 1939
hierarchical_section_title: Leslie Hylton / Cricketing career / England tour, 1939
caption_attribution_description: English: Old Trafford Cricket Ground, near to Chorlton-Cum-Hardy, Manchester, Great Britain. Looking across Old Trafford cricket ground from the Warwick Road end during a match between Lancashire and the Australian Tourists. There have been many developments at the ground since this photograph was taken in 1972 (eg see &lt;a href="https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/2238526"&gt;SJ8195&#160;: Old Trafford Cricket Ground&lt;/a&gt;). This year (2011), the square, which currently runs east-west is to be rotated by 90 degrees, so future views will look very different.
context_page_description: Leslie George Hylton was a Jamaican cricketer, a right-arm bowler and useful lower-order batsman who played in six Test matches for the West Indies between 1935 and 1939. In May 1955 he was hanged for the murder of his wife, whom he had shot in a jealous rage a year earlier.
  Born into poverty, Hylton became a regular member of the Jamaican cricket side from 1927. Although overlooked on several occasions for the full West Indies team, he was finally selected in 1935, to face the visiting English touring team. He performed well, as part of a trio of fast bowlers that also included Learie Constantine and Manny Martindale, and helped to secure a West Indies victory in the four-match Test series. He was chosen again in 1939, for a three-Test tour of England, but was out of form and lost his place in the Test side. On his return home he retired from first-class cricket.
  In 1942 Hylton married Lurline Rose, the daughter of a police inspector. A son was born in 1947. In the early 1950s, Lurline Hylton's ambitions to be a dress designer led to long absences at fashion schools in New York. There, she met up with Roy Francis, a reputed philanderer, and the two began an affair.
context_section_description: Hylton's omission from the 1939 touring party caused a storm of protest in the Jamaican press. Particular anger was directed at what was perceived as the excessive influence of the Queen's Park Club in Trinidad, and the selection of the 18-year-old Trinidadian novice batsman Jeff Stollmeyer, apparently in preference to Hylton. The chief cricket correspondent of the Daily Gleaner  suggested that  the four Jamaicans in the party should all withdraw in protest, a view supported by many letters to the paper.   It emerged that one factor behind Hylton's omission was financial; the impoverished West Indies Cricket Board could not afford the cost of another player in the party. Led by the Daily Gleaner, a campaign began in Jamaica to raise the funds that would support Hylton on the tour. The Board relented, and Hylton was belatedly added to the touring party.
  Hylton began the tour well; after seeing him in action against Lancashire in May, the Manchester Guardian's cricket correspondent Neville Cardus observed: "Hylton is unmistakably a good bowler, possibly more than good". However, he was now 34, and his powers were waning. During the  tour he played a total of 15 first-class matches, in which he took 39 wickets for an average of 27.71, and scored 215 runs, av. 14.33.  He rarely found the form of 1934–35, and did nothing of note in either of the two Test matches in which he played, other than getting Hutton's wicket in both innings at Lord's. In these Tests he took three wickets for an average of 55.66, and scored a total of 17 runs in  three innings with the bat. He was not selected  for the last game of the three-match series.  Wisden wrote of his performance in the Tests: "Hylton, a deadly bowler in conjunction with Martindale and Constantine when Wyatt's team were beaten, could not find his form".  His best match of the tour was the game against Northamptonshire, when he took five cheap wickets and then scored an aggressive 55 runs. West Indies lost the first Test, and the following two were drawn.  The tour ended prematurely when, in view of the worsening international situation, the West Indies team sailed for home immediately on the conclusion of the final Test, abandoning several end-of-season fixtures.
  On his arrival home, Hylton announced his retirement from representative cricket. In his six Tests he scored 70 runs with the bat, average 11.66, and as a bowler he took 16 wickets, averaging 26.12. In his whole first-class career of 40 matches he scored 843 runs, average 18.73, and took 120 wickets at 25.62.  He also held 31 catches.
caption: Old Trafford, Manchester, where Hylton played the last of his six Test matches (the ground has since been completely redeveloped)
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