Gloucestershire County Cricket Club League in 2000. Cricket probably reached Gloucestershire by the end of the 17th century. It is known that the related sport of "Stow-Ball" "aka" "Stob-Ball" was played in the county during the 16th century. In this game, the bat was called a "stave". See Alice B Gomme : "The Traditional Games of England, Scotland and Ireland". A game in Gloucester on 22 September 1729 is the earliest definite reference to cricket in the county. From then until the founding of the county club, very little has been found outside parish cricket. In the early 1840s, Dr Henry Grace and his
W. G. Grace in the 1878 English cricket season called to account by the Gloucestershire membership and a special enquiry was ordered to investigate their blatant "shamateurism". As amateur players, they should only have been claiming reasonable expenses for travel and accommodation but they were accused of claiming inflated expenses and appearance fees. The matter came to a head after Surrey County Cricket Club refused to meet their expense claims when Gloucestershire played at The Oval in June. Prior to the same match, Grace was accused of "kidnapping" the Australian player Billy Midwinter when he insisted that Midwinter was contractually bound to play for Gloucestershire and not the Australian