Life and Career
Smithson was a left-handed middle-order batsman. In first-class cricket he played for Yorkshire between 1946 and 1950, his highest innings for the county being 169 against Leicestershire at Grace Road, Leicester in 1947. Smithson later played for Leicestershire between 1951 and 1956, and then for Hertfordshire in Minor Counties cricket between 1957 and 1962.
Smithson's 98 for Yorkshire in the Roses Match of 1947 against Lancashire when he was aged 20 has been described in the writings of broadcaster and journalist Michael Parkinson (Parkinson's Lore, London: Pavilion, 1981). According to the then Yorkshire captain, Norman Yardley, his batting invited comparison with the young Australians of the time. Historian Alan Hill likened his style to the later left-hander David Gower, and wrote that this particular innings "aroused hopes of an exciting future".
Conscripted into National Service as a Bevin Boy in the coal mines after World War II, he worked at Askern Colliery in South Yorkshire, before receiving special permission (after his case had been debated in the House of Commons) to tour the West Indies with the MCC team of 1947-48. Smithson took part in two Test matches in the Kensington Oval in Bridgetown, Barbados and the Queen's Park Oval in Port of Spain, Trinidad - where the West Indies trio of Frank Worrell, Clyde Walcott and Everton Weekes first appeared together. He was injured on the tour, and did not play for Yorkshire in 1948.
In 1949, Smithson was part of Yardley's side that won the County Championship, sharing the title with Middlesex. His last recorded appearance for Yorkshire was a match against Scotland at Edinburgh in July 1950.
In 1951 he joined Leicestershire, with whom he remained until the close of the 1956 season. His best season there was in 1952, when he hit 1,264 runs, (including two centuries) averaging 28.08. His last first-class match was for Leicestershire against Northamptonshire at the County Ground, Northampton, in August 1956.
After his professional playing career ended, Smithson served as a professional cricket coach and groundsman, first at Caterham School, Surrey, and then at Abingdon School, Oxfordshire. The annual Gerald Smithson Memorial Twenty20 Cricket Tournament was inaugurated at Abingdon School on 21 June 2009, with former England cricketer Devon Malcolm the guest of honour.
Smithson's photograph appeared twice in Wisden; once in 1948 on page 38, and once as the frontispiece to the 1971 edition.
He married Anne Salter at St Peter's Church, Earley, Berkshire, in 1954. Together they had four daughters; Jacqueline (born 1956), Gillian (1958), Joanne (1964) and Justine (1966).
Gerald Smithson died suddenly in Abingdon, Oxfordshire in September 1970, at the age of 43.
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