West Indian cricket team in England in 1939

The West Indies cricket team toured England in the 1939 season to play a three-match Test series against England. England won the series 1-0 with two matches drawn. A total of 25 first-class matches were played and the West Indian side won eight of them and lost six, with the others drawn. The tour was cut short by the preparations for and then the outbreak of World War II.

The manager of the team was John Kidney, who played 11 first-class matches for Barbados between 1909 and 1932 and who had managed the 1933 touring team in England.

Of the 16 players in the side, Martindale, Barrow and Headley had toured with the previous West Indies side to visit England in 1933, and Constantine (who toured England in 1923 and 1928) and Grant had been co-opted to that side for a few matches. Constantine had played in West Indies' first-ever Test on the 1928 tour and Sealy had played Test cricket in the first matches in the West Indies in 1929-30. Grant and Hylton had made their Test debuts in the 1934-35 series in the West Indies.

Eight of the nine other players in the side made their Test debuts during the 1939 tour. They were Cameron, Clarke, Gomez, Johnson, the Stollmeyer brothers, Weekes and Williams. Only Bayley was not capped on this tour, and he never played Test cricket.

Three Test matches of three days' duration each were played on the tour.

West Indies (277 and 225) lost to England (404 for five declared and 100 for two) by 8 wickets. Headley, with 106 in the first innings and 107 in the second, became the first cricketer to make separate hundreds in a Test at Lord's. It was the second time he had achieved this feat against England, having made 114 and 112 at Georgetown in 1929-30. Jeff Stollmeyer, on his Test debut, made 59 out of 147 in West Indies' first innings, and Bill Copson, also making his Test debut, took five for 85. England's reply was based on 196 for Len Hutton. Hutton shared a fourth wicket partnership of 248 with Denis Compton, who made 120. With the whole of the final day to save the match, West Indies looked to be on course at 190 for four, but lost their last six wickets for 35 runs. Copson took four in the innings to finish with match figures of nine for 152. England had 110 minutes to make 99 for victory and did it with 35 minutes to spare.

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