The title of O’Neil Gordon ‘Collie’ Smith is one which has fascinated me all my life, though I can’t recall now simply how that began. It will need to have been due to tales my father instructed me, and though precisely what he mentioned now escapes me it will have been one thing alongside the strains of ‘What would possibly he have achieved however for his premature demise?’.
The shortage of any actual data past the idea of his Take a look at profession and his sadly early demise have been a supply of frustration for someday, however one thing that I discovered straightforward sufficient to stay with till I received spherical to studying Garry Sobers’ 2002 revealed My Autobiography, the opening chapter of which is a heartfelt homily to the good friend he misplaced in that tragic street accident in 1959.
It was inevitable due to this fact that when, a couple of years later, I discovered an outlet for my musings as regards to cricket and cricketers that one of many first topics I wished to jot down about was Collie Smith.
There are books aplenty which were written about Sobers, and I discovered materials in these in addition to books by or about Everton Weekes, Frank Worrell and Clyde Walcott in addition to varied histories of West Indies cricket and accounts of the few collection by which Collie appeared. However what I couldn’t monitor down was a biography of Collie himself, and I knew there was one because it had a passing point out on, of all locations, his Wikipedia web page.
The place I couldn’t discover any reference to the guide, titled The Completely happy Warrior and written by Kenneth Chaplin, was in Padwick’s Bibliography of Cricket. The primary version of Padwick appeared in 1977, and an up to date and expanded second version seven years later. I did for some time assume that maybe it was a type of books that was written however by no means truly revealed, however then I did see a replica. It was in a seller’s store, however was not in nice situation, was not substantial and, even when I might have overcome these considerations, was priced manner in extra of what in these days I used to be ready to pay for a cricket guide.
By 2012 I had seen no different copy of The Completely happy Warrior so, on the idea I had researched all over the place else that I might discover point out of Collie, I wrote the characteristic, that appeared as this, again in March 2012. I used to be joyful sufficient with the consequence and, at all times the fantastic thing about something that seems on line, figured I might tinker with it when and if a replica of the guide ever appeared.
For the subsequent dozen years I stored on on the lookout for the guide. I often requested sellers, in hope moderately than expectation, whether or not they had copies and the reply was at all times no. I by no means noticed a replica on a seller’s web site, in a list or up for public sale. I additionally trawled eBay each day, and often used quite a lot of search websites within the hope somebody someplace on the earth would listing a replica.
So obsessed was I with this search that I took to asking everybody within the Caribbean that I got here throughout to maintain an eye fixed open for a replica for me. Over time I’ve additionally had dealings with a couple of shoppers whose roots have been in Jamaica, and have provided all of them enormous reductions on charges if they may supply a replica for me. It received to the stage the place I’ve made comparable provides to anybody I do know with essentially the most tenuous reference to the Caribbean, and naturally nothing ever got here of any of those requests for help.
At one stage I even managed to safe an e mail tackle for creator Kenneth Chaplin, sadly now not with us. To be honest to him Chaplin did reply to my e mail, albeit merely to say moderately unhelpfully that the guide ‘has lengthy been out of print’ and ‘I can’t assist you to with discovering a replica’. I did ask him a couple of observe up questions on who revealed the guide, the dimensions of its print run and the like however, maybe understandably, I didn’t hear from him once more.
I usually contemplated why the guide ought to be so vanishingly uncommon. It wasn’t a restricted version as such, though I settle for that could be a misnomer within the sense that any guide is restricted by the variety of copies printed, however then curiosity in Collie was enormous. Tens of hundreds of Jamaicans turned out for his funeral, so there was certainly a requirement. I may settle for that a lot of those that did purchase copies weren’t cricketing bibliophiles, nor certainly ‘guide individuals’ in any respect, however certainly some copies will need to have been stored?
I may recognize that in 1960 the world was a a lot bigger place, and information of the guide’s publication could not have reached far, however certainly among the many mates who Collie made in his two seasons within the Lancashire League with Burnley would have heard of the guide’s existence and made positive a couple of copies arrived right here?
Nicely it in the end looks like no less than one did as, a couple of weeks in the past, I received dwelling from work and, for need of one thing to occupy my thoughts earlier than the 7pm information started, had a glance on eBay and, lo and behold, there was a replica of The Completely happy Warrior, and I didn’t even have the stress of an public sale to endure because it had a ‘purchase it now’ value, which I duly paid.
And so, a few days later, a replica of Collie Smith’s biography duly turned up at my home. Probably the most outstanding factor in regards to the sale was that to the most effective of my recollection the unique itemizing will need to have gone up no less than eight hours earlier than I noticed it – am I actually the one cricket collector with an obsession with The Completely happy Warrior?
One of many traits that collectors have, and one of many issues that I consider places us nicely and actually ‘on the spectrum’, is that the joys of the acquisition conquers all. Thus I had owned The Completely happy Warrior for a full six weeks earlier than the considered truly studying the factor occurred to me, and it was solely as a result of I used to be caught with little or no to do final Saturday morning that I truly did so. Wouldn’t it have made a lot distinction to the characteristic I wrote all these years in the past? I reasoned that I owed it to myself to search out out.
The 62 pages took lower than an hour to learn. Its creator, I had discovered, handed away in 2019 on the age of 90. He was a profession journalist, not primarily in sport reporting, however you merely should google his title to see that he was a extremely revered man who served as press secretary to 4 Jamaican Prime Ministers. So far as sport is anxious his principal contribution appears to have been as a soccer referee, and a FIFA recognised one for 18 years. So far as I can see The Completely happy Warrior is his solely guide.
I had questioned if maybe the guide was merely not superb, and that the shortage of high quality contributed to why it was so elusive. That thought was definitely mistaken, because the guide is a well-written one and sheds an excessive amount of mild on Collie’s upbringing, his spiritual values and his life at dwelling. Letters that he wrote from England to his mom and his fiancee seem within the textual content to additional illustrate his character.
However when it comes to my characteristic there may be, I used to be happy to notice, nothing to vary. I had managed to choose up all of Collie’s cricketing achievements from elsewhere, though have been I writing the characteristic at present I may need talked about having lastly realized the place the title ‘Collie’ got here from, the reason being it was a pet title, after her maid Conchita, that Collie’s grandmother gave to him and which caught to him for the remainder of his days.
The one slight shock in The Completely happy Warrior is that there isn’t any point out of the ‘particular relationship’ with Sobers, however then Chaplin had not so far as I can see, excluding Gerry Alexander who supplies a foreword, spoken to any of Collie’s West Indies teammates. The guide could be very a lot a case of 1 Jamaican paying tribute to a different, so maybe that’s the rationalization for that.
It goes with out saying that I used to be delighted to lastly monitor down a replica of a guide I’ve been actively on the lookout for for the most effective a part of 20 years. Equally with success in lastly doing so one thing has gone out of my life, so I should discover one thing else to use the identical power to discovering – i’m wondering what it will likely be?