John Stephenson

Who was John Stephenson?

Lieutenant-Colonel John William Arthur Stephenson DSO was a Hong-Kong-born English cricketer who played first-class cricket in both India and England from the late 1920s until shortly after the Second World War. His Wisden obituarist opined that "there would always have been fewer empty grounds" had more players been like him. He was also a British Army officer, who saw service in the Second World War.

Stephenson was educated at Clayesmore School. On 2 February 1928, after having played some games for Buckinghamshire in the 1927 Minor Counties Championship while training at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant into the Middlesex Regiment . Posted to India, he made his first-class cricket debut for the Europeans against the Muslims at Bombay Gymkhana in the 1928/29 Bombay Quadrangular tournament, scoring 17 and 42 runs as well as taking 2 for 24 in the second innings. In his next match, against Parsees, he scored his maiden century, hitting 135 in the first innings. He played one more game for Europeans that season, then two more the following year, without much success. In 1930/31 he played for Madras against the Maharajkumar of Vizianagram's XI, then returned to the Europeans side and produced a good all-round display against Indians, making 117 and taking six wickets in an innings victory.