 Hornung was born Ernest William Hornung on 7 June 1866 at Cleveland <unk> , <unk> , Middlesbrough ; he was nicknamed Willie from an early age . He was the third son , and youngest of eight children , of John Peter Hornung ( 1821 – 86 ) and his wife Harriet née Armstrong ( 1824 – 96 ) . John was christened Johan Petrus Hornung in the Transylvania region of Hungary and , after working in Hamburg for a shipping firm , had moved to Britain in the 1840s as a coal and iron merchant . John married Harriet in March 1848 , by which time he had <unk> his name . At the age of 13 Hornung joined St Ninian 's Preparatory School in Moffat , <unk> before <unk> at Uppingham School in 1880 . Hornung was well liked at school , and developed a lifelong love of cricket despite limited skills at the game , which were further worsened by bad eyesight , asthma and , according to his biographer Peter Rowland , a permanent state of generally poor health . 
