Walter Lyon (cricketer)

Walter John Lyon (28 February 1841 – 16 March 1918) was an English cricketer who played in first-class cricket matches for Cambridge University between 1861 and 1863.[1] He was born at Barton-under-Needwood in Staffordshire and died at Tutbury, also in Staffordshire.

Lyon was educated at a private school called Highstead in Torquay, Devon and at Trinity College, Cambridge.[2] As a cricketer, he played in six first-class matches over three seasons, five for Cambridge University and one for a "Gentlemen of the North" side for whom he made his highest score of 22.[1] His Cambridge matches included the 1861 University Match against Oxford University; batting in the lower order, he made 15 and 16 as Cambridge won the match by 133 runs.[3] He did not appear in the University Matches with Oxford in 1862 and 1863. He played a lot of amateur non-first-class cricket for teams such as Free Foresters through to the 1880s and beyond.[1]

Lyon graduated from Cambridge University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1864.[2] The following year, he and his younger brother Charles moved to Tutbury to take over the cotton mill previously owned by their uncle, Charles Webb.[4] The cotton mill was transferred to Rocester in 1888, after which the mill in Tutbury was used for grinding locally mined gypsum.[5] Tutbury being sited on the county boundary, Lyon was a Justice of the Peace for both Staffordshire and Derbyshire.[2]