Townsend Warner

George Townsend Warner (9 May 1841 – 22 November 1902) was an English clergyman and schoolmaster and a cricketer who played in three first-class cricket matches between 1860 and 1863.[1] He was born at Southampton in Hampshire and died at Torquay in Devon.

Warner was educated at Harrow School and at Trinity College, Cambridge.[2] As a cricketer, he played as an opening batsman in two matches against Cambridge University: one for the Cambridge Town Club in 1860 and the other for the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1863.[1] Though he played in trial matches and lesser games for Cambridge University, his only first-class match for the university's first team saw him bat in the lower order and he was not successful. It is not known if he batted right- or left-handed.[1]

Warner graduated from Cambridge University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1864, and this was converted to a Master of Arts in 1868.[2] He was ordained as a Church of England deacon in 1864 and as a priest two years later and served as curate at parishes in Devon until 1875.[2] He then became headmaster of the Newton Abbot College for 20 years; one of his pupils there was the writer Arthur Quiller-Couch who wrote of him that he was "a gentleman with every attribute of a good Head Master save a sense of justice, of which he had scarcely a glimmer".[2] From 1895 to his death in 1902 he returned to church work as rector of Alfold, Surrey.[2]

Warner's younger brother William was a much more successful cricketer at Cambridge University.