NOTHING captures the atmosphere of high summer more vividly than the tranquil sight of bowls scudding silently across a manicured pub or club green, spectators watching in rapt attention and songbirds bobbing about in the surrounding shrubbery.

But, believe it or not, bowling (immortalised in history by Sir Francis Drake) was once regarded as a rather unsavoury pursuit. It was reputed to attract "frequenters of low and dissolute taverns." More than one monarch actually banned this trundling sport.

Local history buff Tony Sweeney of Eccleston provides the eye-opening disclosure while explaining that bowling venues were once rather like skittle alleys attached to public houses.

Tony, who's already had local best-selling books on West Park Rugby Union club and Windle bowling club, has now turned his attention to a fascinating account of sport in general around old St Helens, including cock-fighting and clog-fighting.

A bowling green attached to the Gerard Arms pub at Dentons Green may date back to the 17th-century, he has discovered.

The less-demanding game of flat-green bowling had the path to respectability paved intially in Scotland. There, level, carefully-prepared turf was laid for bowls to glide across. But our old-time Lancashire 'crown' men seemed happy enough to compete on any reasonable piece of turf.

Tony records: "Gerry Rigby, the old panel bowler from St Helens, had a set of what he called field bowls. They were very tall and narrow, with soles (the running edge) barely two inches wide and designed to be played with on an ordinary meadow." By the 1840s, regular matches were played in front of large crowds on the green of the Bird i'th Hand, at the corner of Prescot Road and Jacks Lane (now called Dunriding Lane).

Old-time bare-knuckled prizefighters used to battle it out until one of them became bloodied and bowed. Rounds were punctuated by knock-downs. A 19th-century local historian named Brockbank recorded a fight at Islands Brow in 1861, between Paddy Marley and a man named Makin. Marley won after 52 rounds within 64 minutes, which meant that the bruisers had between them hit the deck 52 times, being allowed 30 seconds to recover and square up at the 'scratch' mark. Thus the old saying about 'coming up to scratch.'

Eccleston was the home of one of the best-known pugilists of his generation, Bob Gregson, a huge brute known as 'The Lancashire Giant.' Just after the turn of the 19th-century, he twice had memorable title battles against the legendary John Gulley, champion prizefighter of All-England. A truly remarkable man, Gulley had failed in business, and was jailed for debt. Prizefighting was to turn his fortunes around. Followers of the sport heard of his battling potential, displayed while in prison. His debts were paid off and Gulley was released.

Though Gulley won both of his ferocious encounters with the St Helens giant, he decided to hang up his gloves after the second fight and went back into business. Prospering this time, he became a wealthy race-horse owner (winner of two Derbies) and an MP. His respectability was further heightened when his son became Speaker of the House of Commons.

The fearsome Gregson also made quite a name for himself later, owning a London pub, setting up as a bookmaker and fight promoter and earning something of a reputation as a poet!

But prizefighting was not the most barbaric of sports witnessed on the St Helens scene. This dubious honour went to 'parring' or 'purring', usually featuring rock-hard miners. Tony explains: "It required the proponents to strip completely, down to their clogs, before kicking each other's shins. Presumably the winner was the one least crippled."

Others (including the landed gentry) who preferred not to personally enter into the pain barrier took delight in inflicting agony on dumb creatures. Michael Hughes staged hare-coursing on his Sherdley estates around the turn of the 18th-century; and in 1753 Basil Thomas Eccleston of Eccleston, Lord of the Manor, pitted his fighting cocks against those of the equally-eminent Peter Legh at Newton, losing "by one cock." This was a popular sport of that era and one of the well-attended local venues was the Black Horse Inn at the top of Moss Bank Brow.

Among the more civilised sports in which St Helens characters excelled were competitive jumping, swimming, ice-skating and strongman demonstrations (I intend to return fully to these particular areas of interest in the near future).

Meanwhile, let's sign off with a couple of other references to the 'noble art.' "We have had many boxing heroes, especially after Father Reginald Riley, no mean boxer himself, founded Lowe House Boxing Club," writes Tony. Fr. Riley is still vividly remembered by older members of the Lowe House flock.

And St Helens also boasted the woman heavyweight champion of the world. Polly Burns (nee Fairclough) even fought such legendary male heavyweights as world kingpin Jack Johnson and Bombadier Billy Wells, the British and Empire champion.

MANY thanks, Tony, for allowing myself and customers of this column a peep into your fascinating researches.