Raymond Charles "Crusoe" Robertson-Glasgow (15 July 1901 – 4 March 1965) was a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

cricket 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 ...

er and cricket writer.

Early life

Robertson-Glasgow was born in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

to a Scottish soldier and the daughter of an East Anglian clergyman. Their marriage was an unhappy one, and Robertson-Glasgow's mother was inattentive to her two sons. He won a scholarship to

Charterhouse School Charterhouse is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 13–18) in Godalming, Surrey, England. Founded by Thomas Sutton in 1611 on the site of the old Carthusian monastery in Charter ...

and went on to

Corpus Christi College, Oxford Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517 by Richard Fo ...

. Although he enjoyed university life, it was while at Oxford that he began to experience the periodical depression that he was to struggle with for the rest of his life.

Cricket

Robertson-Glasgow was a right-arm fast-medium bowler and useful tail-end batsman who played for

Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...

and

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

in a first-class career that lasted from 1920 to 1937. In all he took 464 wickets at 25.77 in first-class cricket, with best innings figures of 9 for 38 when Somerset defeated

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, former county in South East England, now mainly within Greater London. Its boundaries largely followed three rivers: the River Thames, Thames in the south, the River Lea, Le ...

Lord's Lord's Cricket Ground, commonly known as Lord's, is a cricket List of Test cricket grounds, venue in St John's Wood, Westminster. Named after its founder, Thomas Lord, it is owned by Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) and is the home of Middlesex C ...

in June 1924. Convivial, popular and humorous, Robertson-Glasgow subsequently won acclaim for his writing, in which his strong sense of humour shone through. In 1933 he became cricket correspondent for the ''

Morning Post ''The Morning Post'' was a conservative daily newspaper published in London from 1772 to 1937, when it was acquired by ''The Daily Telegraph''. History The paper was founded by John Bell. According to historian Robert Darnton, ''The Morning ...

''. He later wrote for the ''

Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was foun ...

'', ''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. First published in 1791, it is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper. In 1993 it was acquired by Guardian Media Group Limited, and operated as a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' ...

'' and the ''

Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British Sunday newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of N ...

''. He retired from regular cricket writing in 1953. He was Chairman of the Cricket Writers' Club in 1959. His nickname of "Crusoe" came, according to Robertson-Glasgow himself, from the Essex batsman Charlie McGahey during a match in May 1920. When his captain asked McGahey how he had been dismissed, he replied: "I was bowled by an old ----- I thought was dead two thousand years ago, called

Robinson Crusoe ''Robinson Crusoe'' ( ) is an English adventure novel by Daniel Defoe, first published on 25 April 1719. Written with a combination of Epistolary novel, epistolary, Confessional writing, confessional, and Didacticism, didactic forms, the ...

Death

Robertson-Glasgow committed suicide during a snowstorm whilst in the grip of melancholic depression.

Books

Robertson-Glasgow's cricket books include:Robertson Glasgow R C – new and used books
/ref> *''Cricket Prints: Some Batsmen and Bowlers (1920-1940)'' (Werner Laurie, 1948) *''More Cricket Prints: Some Batsmen and Bowlers (1920-1945)'' (1948) *''46 Not Out'' - an autobiography (1948) *''Rain Stopped Play'' (1948) *''The Brighter Side of Cricket'' (Arthur Barker, 1950) *''All in the Game'' (1952) *''How to Become a Test Cricketer'' (1962) *''Crusoe on Cricket: The Cricket Writings of R. C. Robertson-Glasgow'' (1966) He also wrote the following non-cricket books: *''I was Himmler's Aunt'' (1940) *''No Other Land'' (1942) *''Country Talk: A Miscellany'' (1964)

References

External links

*

{{DEFAULTSORT:Robertson-Glasgow, Raymond 1901 births 1965 deaths 1965 suicides Cricketers from Edinburgh People educated at Charterhouse School People with mood disorders Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Oxford English cricketers Oxford University cricketers Somerset cricketers Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers Gentlemen cricketers Cricket writers Suicides in England Free Foresters cricketers Harlequins cricketers Gentlemen of England cricketers Oxford and Cambridge Universities cricketers H. D. G. Leveson Gower's XI cricketers 20th-century English sportsmen