James Renshaw

James Ernest Renshaw, aka “Ernest” was a professional English tennis player. He was born on January 03, 18611 in Leamington Spa, United Kingdom. He was the older brother of the well-known “Renshaw Twins”. He came out 15 minutes before his twin brother, Willie, was born. Although he was approximately a half-inch taller than his brother, Ernest was not able to achieve the same success playing singles as his twin.

Ernest, together with Willie, were a huge part in ushering a whole new attacking era. At doubles, the twins were considered as a force to be reckoned with on the tennis court. For a while, they held a record for having the straightest wins at Wimbledon, which was only surpassed once by Laurie and Reggie, the Doherty brothers.

Although not as successful as his brother in singles, Ernest still did well considering that he was able to reach the singles title round in five tournaments, and had even won one in 1888. Many believe that Ernest would have performed better, and he would have garnered the title in almost all of those final matches, if his brother had not been in the picture. As it was, Ernest lost the matches to his brother three of the five times he reached the finals round.

Truly, like any other brother-vs-brother match, the Renshaw twins were miserable when they fought against one another. Still, that did not stop them from competing to the best of their capabilities. In his career, Ernest has one Grand Slam win as singles player. On the other hand, he has seven Grand Slam titles for doubles, which he shares with his twin, Willie. Ernest passed away in September 02, 1899.