Rolland Beaumont
Rolland Beaumont was a South African cricketer. He was born at Newcastle, Natal, and died in Berea, Durban, aged 74. He attended Hilton College.
Beaumont was a hard hitting middle-order batsman and a good fielder. His first-class career spanned the years 1908 to 1914 and consisted of 32 matches, most of which were for South Africa during their tour of England in the wet summer of 1912. His first match of importance was for Wanderers when the Johannesburg club drew with a Rest of South Africa team containing S.J. Snooke and A.W. Nourse. He also turned out six times for Transvaal and represented South Africa at Test level in five matches against England and Australia. When playing his natural game Beaumont was a free-flowing batsman but too often he let an over-cautious nature restrict his talent. He scored his only first-class century, 121, whilst captaining Transvaal in a two-day match at Johannesburg against P.W. Sherwell’s XI in November 1913. But in all first-class matches he built only six scores of 50 or more. His highest Test score was 31, compiled against the Australians at Old Trafford during the Triangular Series of 1912. No obituary for Beaumont appeared in Wisden.
He managed an oil company in Trinidad in the 1920s and donated the Beaumont Cup, which was contested by North Trinidad and South Trinidad beginning in the 1925-26 cricket season.
