Francis Hamilton Mellor (13 May 1854 – 26 April 1925) was an English judge and a

cricketer Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

who played in

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is of three or more days scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officially adju ...

matches for

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

and the

Marylebone Cricket Club The Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's, Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London, England. The club was the governing body of cricket from 1788 to 1989 and retain ...

between 1874 and 1878. He was born in Bloomsbury,

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and died in

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France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

.Carlaw D (2020) ''Kent County Cricketers A to Z. Part One: 1806–1914'' (revised edition), pp. 382–383.
Available online
at the

Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians The Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians (ACS) was founded in England in 1973 for the purpose of researching and collating information about the history and statistics of cricket. Originally called the Association of Cricket Stati ...

. Retrieved 7 August 2022.)

Career

Mellor was part of a distinguished legal family: his father was Sir John Mellor, a judge of the

Queen's Bench Division The King's Bench Division (or Queen's Bench Division when the monarch is female) of the High Court of Justice deals with a wide range of common law cases and has supervisory responsibility over certain lower courts. It hears appeals on point ...

of the High Court and among his brothers

John William Mellor John William Mellor PC DL QC (26 July 1835 – 13 October 1911) was an English lawyer and Liberal Party politician. Born in London, the eldest of the eight sons of Rt Hon. Sir John Mellor, of Otterhead, Devonshire, a Judge of the Queen' ...

was Judge Advocate General and a Member of Parliament who became Charman of Ways and Means and Deputy Speaker. Another brother, Sir James Mellor, was Master of the Supreme Court,

King's Remembrancer The King's Remembrancer (or Queen's Remembrancer) is an ancient judicial post in the legal system of England and Wales. Since the Lord Chancellor no longer sits as a judge, the Remembrancer is the oldest judicial position in continual existence ...

and King's Coroner, and the first registrar of the Court of Criminal Appeal; Frank Mellor was part author of a standard legal work on ''Crown Office Practice'' on which his brother James was cited by ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' as "probably the greatest living authority". His nephew,

John Paget Mellor Sir John Paget Mellor, 1st Baronet, (13 March 1862 – 4 February 1929) was an English lawyer and U.K. Treasury Solicitor's Department, Treasury Solicitor. He was a talented amateur artist who contributed caricatures to Vanity Fair (Britis ...

, who was John William's son, was

Treasury Solicitor The Government Legal Department (previously called the Treasury Solicitor's Department) is the largest in-house legal organisation in the United Kingdom's Government Legal Profession. The department is headed by the Treasury Solicitor (formall ...

and was awarded a

baronetcy A baronet ( or ; abbreviated Bart or Bt) or the female equivalent, a baronetess (, , or ; abbreviation Btss), is the holder of a baronetcy, a hereditary title awarded by the British Crown. The title of baronet is mentioned as early as the 14th ...

. Frank Mellor was educated at

Cheltenham College Cheltenham College is a public school ( fee-charging boarding and day school for pupils aged 13–18) in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. The school opened in 1841 as a Church of England foundation and is known for its outstanding linguis ...

and at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any ...

. Mellor followed the family tradition and became a lawyer: he was

called to the bar The call to the bar is a legal term of art in most common law jurisdictions where persons must be qualified to be allowed to argue in court on behalf of another party and are then said to have been "called to the bar" or to have received "call to ...

in 1880 and then practised on the

Northern Circuit The Northern Circuit is a circuit of the General Council of the Bar and English judiciary. The Northern Circuit stretches from Carlisle in Cumberland at its northernmost point, running through Lakeland to the port of Whitehaven in the West, ...

. He served as a

special pleader A special pleader was a historical legal occupation. The practitioner, or "special pleader" in English law specialised in drafting "pleadings", in modern terminology statements of case. History Up to the 19th century, there were many rules, tech ...

and was the

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of Preston from 1898 to 1911; he was called as a

King's Counsel A King's Counsel (Post-nominal letters, post-nominal initials KC) is a senior lawyer appointed by the monarch (or their Viceroy, viceregal representative) of some Commonwealth realms as a "Counsel learned in the law". When the reigning monarc ...

in 1903 and served as a county court judge in

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

from 1911 to his death. He was appointed a Commander of the

Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

in the

1918 New Year Honours The 1918 New Year Honours were appointments by King George V to various orders and honours to reward and highlight good works by citizens of the British Empire. The appointments were published in ''The London Gazette'' and ''The Times'' in Janu ...

. He died suddenly after an operation in Paris.

Cricket

He played as a right-handed middle-order batsman and an underarm slow bowler in the Cheltenham cricket team for three seasons and was tried as a lower-order batsman in a single match for the Cambridge University side in 1874, without success. He returned to the Cambridge first team in 1877 having not progressed beyond the trial matches in the intervening years, and scored 46, his highest in first-class cricket, in his first game back. Despite a modest batting record – and he did not bowl in first-class cricket – Mellor retained his place in the Cambridge eleven and played in the 1877

University Match The University Match is an annual cricket fixture between Oxford University Cricket Club and Cambridge University Cricket Club. First played in 1827, it is the oldest varsity match in the world. Until 2001, when first-class cricket was reorga ...

, scoring 5 and 15

not out In cricket, a batsman is not out if they come out to bat in an innings and have not been dismissed by the end of an innings. The batsman is also ''not out'' while their innings is still in progress. Occurrence At least one batter is not out at ...

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

won the game easily. Later in the 1877 season and also in 1878 he played a couple of games for Kent and he also appeared in 1878 in a match for the Marylebone Cricket Club: in none of these games did he achieve anything of note.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mellor, Frank 1854 births 1925 deaths English cricketers Cambridge University cricketers Kent cricketers Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers People educated at Cheltenham College Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge 20th-century King's Counsel 20th-century English judges Commanders of the Order of the British Empire County Court judges (England and Wales)