In Marylebone, London in 1890, there was a boy named Harry Lee who grew up in a small home on the corner of a busy street. With so much noise from carts, vendors and smoke from coal, this young boy had a dream. The dream was to play the beautiful game of Cricket.
Amongst the hustle and bustle of his father’s fruit, vegetable and coal-selling business, Harry Lee, the eldest of three brothers, wanted to spend time watching the Men in White at Lord’s Cricket Ground. When Harry Lee turned 15, he applied for a position with the grounds staff at the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in order to get closer to his dream of playing the beautiful game.
It took Harry Lee 3 years of hard work to get noticed and eventually allowed to join the MCC as a groundsman.
From there, his rise was steady. First, he got into the Middlesex Colts, and later, the main team. By 1914, Harry Lee became a real cricketer.
Then War Arrives and Everything Changes
When the Bat Went Silent
The year was 1914 and first World war had arrived. All the soldiers marched past Harry Lee’s home as they went off to fight for their country. As the weeks went by, Harry Lee felt he needed to do his part and help his country too. So, he joined the 13th Battalion, also known as the Kensingtons, to fight for his country.
By March of 1915, Harry Lee was fighting in France. The war was getting very bloody. Then the battle of Aubers Ridge occurred on May 9th. Of the 550 men in Harry Lee’s battalion, 499 lost their lives. Harry Lee’s body was never found. The army declared him dead.
His family got the news. They held a small memorial service. For everyone, Harry Lee was gone.
But he wasn’t.
Three Days in No Man’s Land
Harry had been lying between the trenches for three whole days. Bleeding and unconscious. During those days, the bullets destroyed Harry Lee’s left leg. The bullet smashed the top portion of his thigh bone. They found him, picked him up and put him on a train filled with wounded prisoners. The conditions on that train were terrible, no food or medicine, and many of the prisoners did not survive. Somehow, Harry made it.
He was later kept in Hannover, Germany, for treatment.
Harry Lee finally returned to England in October 1915 after months of recovery. Upon returning to England, doctors said he would never be able to play cricket again due to one of his legs having become shorter than the other. Furthermore, doctors declared him unfit to continue serving in the military and as an Cricketer.
For most people, that would’ve been the end. But not for Harry Lee. Harry Lee was done taking orders from fate.
The Comeback Nobody Expected
To make a living, Harry Lee worked as a filing clerk at the War Office. However, every day after work, Harry Lee picked up his bat again and practiced. Slowly, with pain in every step, he began practicing. Middlesex supported him with his medical expenses, and by 1917, he was back playing small games for MCC.
Then life tested him again. Just as things began to settle down for Harry Lee, his mother passed away, leaving him to care for his 2 younger brothers, Jack and Frank. Eventually, his situation settled enough that he decided to travel to India after receiving an invitation to do so by the wife of a former Middlesex cricketer Frank Tarrant. She had asked him to come and meet her husband, who was coaching in Calcutta.
Before leaving, he changed his ship at the last moment. The ship he was supposed to board, Nyanza, was later torpedoed in the sea, and 49 passengers were killed. Once again, Harry escaped death.
While in India, Harry Lee worked as a coach to the Maharaja of Cooch Behar. Soon after, he was asked to participate in a First Class Match. Despite his injuries, he bowled brilliantly, taking 5 wickets for 11 runs in one innings and 3 for 41 in the other. For a man who had once been told he’d never walk properly again, this was beyond belief.
The Man Who Refused to Stop
County cricket resumed in England in 1919, and Harry Lee returned to Middlesex. That year, he scored over a thousand runs, including four centuries. In 1920, he helped Middlesex win the county championship.
He continued to succeed in cricket for the next 16 years, scoring 18,594 runs and taking 340 wickets. Despite his success in cricket, however, he never received a call-up to play Test cricket for England. Maybe the selectors didn’t notice what kind of story was standing right in front of them.
In the late 1920s, he moved to South Africa to work as a coach but would return to England each summer to play.
Then, at 40, fate smiled again, or maybe mocked him.
England’s team in South Africa was struggling with injuries. Their captain, Percy Chapman, asked Lee to join. And so, the man once declared dead in France finally played a Test for England at the age of 40.
He scored 18 and 1. It wasn’t fairytale stuff. But it was enough to show what human resilience looks like in whites.
Then came the cruelest twist, his coaching employer complained he joined the England team without permission. The MCC refused to give him a Test cap and blazer unless he apologized. Lee refused. So he played for England, but officially, never became an England cricketer.
The Final Overs
After Middlesex ended his contract in 1934, Lee became an umpire till 1946, then a school coach till 1953. Even in his later years, he never missed a Lord’s Test, quietly sitting in the stands, the survivor watching the game he’d given his life for.
In 1973, when a bomb threat was announced during a Test match, others panicked. Harry Lee sat still. Maybe after facing war, death, and disaster, nothing could shake him anymore.
Harry Lee passed away in 1980 at the age of 90. He was the 2nd oldest living English cricketer at the time of his passing.
The Man Who Refused to Die
Harry Lee’s story may seem unbelievable, but every aspect of it is true. Declared dead, buried in memory, and yet he walked back into life. Played again. Coached again. Lived again.
He didn’t just come back from the dead. He outlived the war, the pain, and every limitation set upon him. For the boy who once swept the Lord’s pitch, every run, every wicket, every breath after 1915 was a bonus.
Some men play cricket. Harry Lee played destiny.