Vera Cox

Vera Mary Machell Cox MBE (1885 – 1973) was an English hockey player who helped found the Women’s Cricket Association and the International Women’s Cricket Council, and held major roles in the Women’s Institute and the Women’s Land Army.

Sport

Born Veronica Mary Machell Cox, Vera played hockey for Kent, the East of England, and England between 1908 and 1912. She captained the team in 1912. After sustaining a knee injury in a 1912 fixture against Ireland, Cox returned to club hockey and served as a coach and umpire, umpiring for 30 international fixtures between 1914 and 1939. She also sat on several committees in the All England Women’s Hockey Association.[1][2]

In 1926, Cox became one of the founding members of the Women’s Cricket Association (WCA). She served as the secretary of the first committee, chaired by Frances Heron-Maxwell. She helped establish the first women’s international Test match between England and Australia in 1934 with her friend Elsie Bennett, another former hockey player.[3][4][5] Cox then became President of the WCA, during which time she contributed to the formation of the International Women’s Cricket Council, comprising former Commonwealth lands including England, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. She stepped down in 1964.[6][7]

Other positions

Cox served as the first national Markets Organiser for the National Federation of Women’s Institutes from 1932, and helped establish hundreds of markets for Women’s Institute members to sell surplus produce.[8][9][10]

She served as County Secretary for the West Kent Women’s Land Army during World War II, for which she was awarded an MBE in 1946.[11]

Personal life

Cox lived with Patrick and Frances Heron-Maxwell, whom she had met through hockey playing in 1908, from 1919. On Frances’ death in 1955 she inherited their estate, Great Comp, and sold it the following year. She died in 1973 in Scotland.[12]

References

  1. ^ Admin, Hockey (2025-06-23). "The suffrage roots of women's sport in the 'Garden of England': the hidden histories of Great Comp". The Hockey Museum. Retrieved 2026-01-15.
  2. ^ Museum, The Hockey (2022-05-12). "Discovering Vera Cox's Missing Scrapbooks". The Hockey Museum. Retrieved 2026-01-15.
  3. ^ Booth, Lawrence (2024-04-18). The Shorter Wisden 2024: The Best Writing from Wisden Cricketers' Almanack 2024. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN 978-1-3994-1188-2.
  4. ^ Stell, Marion (2022-10-05). The Bodyline Fix: How women saved cricket. Univ. of Queensland Press. ISBN 978-0-7022-6730-7.
  5. ^ "News From The Home of Cricket | Lord's". www.lords.org. Retrieved 2026-01-15.
  6. ^ Murray, Bruce; Parry, Richard; Winch, Jonty (2018-09-01). Cricket and Society in South Africa, 1910–1971: From Union to Isolation. Springer. pp. 329–333. ISBN 978-3-319-93608-6.
  7. ^ Markula, Pirkko; Knoppers, Annelies (2024-01-18). Research Handbook on Gender and Diversity in Sport Management. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 322. ISBN 978-1-80220-369-1.
  8. ^ Dudgeon, Piers (1989). Village Voices: A Portrait of Change in England's Green and Pleasant Land, 1915-1990 : a 75th Anniversary Celebration of Rural Britain by the W.I. : Britain's Foremost Women's Movement. Sidgwick & Jackson. p. 77. ISBN 978-0-283-99886-7.
  9. ^ Buchan, Ursula (2013-03-07). A Green and Pleasant Land: How England’s Gardeners Fought the Second World War. Random House. ISBN 978-1-4481-0891-6.
  10. ^ Jenkins, Inez (1953). The History of the Women's Institute Movement of England and Wales. Printed at the University Press, by C. Batey. p. 114.
  11. ^ United Kingdom list (1): "No. 37407". The London Gazette. 28 December 1945. pp. 1–132.
  12. ^ "VERA MACHELL COX OBE". Great Comp Garden. Retrieved 2026-01-15.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.