George Henry Stevens Trott was an Australian cricketer who played 24 Test matches as an all-rounder between 1888 and 1898. Although Trott was a versatile batsman, spin bowler and outstanding fielder. After a period of some instability and ill discipline in Australian cricket, he was the first in a succession of assertive Australian captains who restored the prestige of the Test team. Respected by teammates and opponents alike for his cricketing judgement, Trott was quick to pick up a weakness in opponents. A right-handed batsman, he was known for his sound defence and vigorous hitting. His slow leg-spin bowling was often able to deceive batsmen through subtle variations of pace and flight.

Born in Collingwood, an inner suburb of Melbourne, Trott was the third of eight children. His younger brother Albert also became a Test cricketer. The siblings played their junior cricket with the local Capulet club. Harry transferred to South Melbourne, which played in Melbourne's pennant competition, after scouts for the club noticed him playing park cricket. In his first season, the 18-year-old Trott recorded the best batting average and bowling average for the team.

Trott made his first-class debut for Victoria against an "Australian XI" on New Year's Day 1886, scoring four and 18 not out. Two months later, he played his first inter-colonial match, against South Australia at the Adelaide Oval. Batting, he scored 54 runs; his innings included a memorable hit over the leg side boundary from the bowling of leading Test all-rounder George Giffen, and he captured seven wickets for the match with his bowling. In 1886/87, Trott hit a double century for South Melbourne in a match against St Kilda and appeared for Victoria against Alfred Shaw's touring English team, claiming four wickets for 125 runs.

His chances for inclusion in the Australian squad for the forthcoming tour of England were enhanced when a number of leading players made themselves unavailable. However, Trott's batting credentials were modest: he had scored only one half-century in 29 first-class innings. At this point, Trott had enjoyed more success with his bowling. Prior to the Australian team departing for England, a change to the leg before wicket (LBW) law that would aid bowlers of Trott's style seemed imminent.

Included in the Australian squad to tour England in 1888, Trott was selected in the team for the First Test at Lord's. He had an inauspicious Test debut: he made a duck in the first innings and three runs in the second, and did not bowl. The Australians won the game by 62 runs, only their second Test match victory in England. However, England retained The Ashes by winning the remaining two Tests and Trott's influence on the series was negligible: he did not pass 20 in an innings, and he failed to take a wicket. Trott's opportunities were limited as his teammates Charles Turner and John Ferris, "monopolised the bowling.”

On his return to Australia, Trott's batting continued to improve. He scored 172 runs for an Australian XI against New South Wales, his maiden century in first-class cricket.[16] The Sydney Morning Herald wrote that the innings "... stamped him as a batsman of the highest class". In first-class matches, Trott posted 507 runs (39.00 average) and claimed 25 wickets (17.44 average) for the summer, and hit a double century in a club match against Melbourne. Another good all-round season in 1889–90 ensured his place for the next trip to England.

The 1890 Australian team touring England was relatively inexperienced. The team missed the all-round ability of George Giffen who had refused to tour, thinking it unlikely the tour would be a sporting or financial success. The Australians won 13 matches on tour, losing 16 and drawing 9. Trott scored 1,211 first-class runs (at 20.87 average) with a highest score of 186 against Cambridge University Past and Present, and captured 20 wickets, which was a little underwhelming by all accountts. In 1891/92, Lord Sheffield's team captained by W. G. Grace toured Australia, the first English side to do so in four years. The presence of Grace contributed to a revival of interest in the game that had waned due to a surfeit of international tours and indifferent performances by the Australian team. The Australians won the series 2–1 to regain The Ashes.

A reorganisation of Australian cricket took place in the wake of the tour. The first national body to control the game, the Australasian Cricket Council (ACC), was formed to co-ordinate the Australian Test team. Previously, private entrepreneurs and the players themselves organised international cricket. Lord Sheffield donated money to the ACC, which was used to purchase a trophy for the champion domestic team. Trott appeared in Victoria's inaugural Sheffield Shield match, against New South Wales in December 1892. He scored 63 and 70 not out in a winning effort. The ACC appointed Trott as one of the six players to select the touring team for England.

The Australian team toured England in 1893 for The Ashes. The English won the series one Test to nil, with two drawn to recover The Ashes. Playing in all three Tests, Trott scored 146 runs in the series at an average of 29.20 and in all first-class matches he scored 1269 runs. While Trott did not take a wicket in the Tests, he took 38 wickets in all first-class matches that season. In the Second Test at The Oval, Trott scored 92 runs in the second innings after the Australians were forced to follow on; an innings described as "really superb cricket" and "the finest exhibition he has ever given in England."

Andrew Stoddart led an English team to Australia in 1894/95 to defend The Ashes. A feature of the summer was the emergence of Albert Trott and the performance of the brothers in tandem. Playing for Victoria against the touring side, the Trotts claimed twelve wickets and held eight catches between them; Harry scored 63 in the second innings. During the second innings of the traditional Christmas fixture against New South Wales, Albert claimed five wickets, took three catches (two from Harry's bowling) and made a run out.

England won the first Test at Sydney in a remarkable turnaround after they had been forced to follow-on by bowling the Australians out for 166 in the second innings. The second Test at Melbourne saw another English victory; Trott played a rearguard innings of 95 in the second innings, to no avail. Attempting to stay in the series, Australia dramatically revamped their team for the next Test at Adelaide. Albert Trott, making his Test debut, was one of four inclusions while Harry was elevated to open the batting. In a match played in intense heat throughout, Harry Trott made 48 on the opening day before he was run out. Albert was the dominant player of the match with innings of 38 not out and 72 not out (both scored from the number ten position), and a bowling return of 8/43 in England's second innings. Australia won the match by 382 runs.

The fluctuating fortunes of the Test series created immense interest in the deciding Test at Melbourne. Spectators arrived from all over the country, with special trains laid on from Adelaide and Sydney. Harry Trott's all-round contribution was a score of 42 in each innings, six wickets and two catches, but England won The Ashes by chasing a target of 297 runs in the second innings, which they reached with six wickets in hand. Even in England, interest in matches played abroad surpassed all previous levels, with significant public demand for updates on Australian results and their performance.

The team chosen for the 1896 tour of England included a number of promising young players, including Joe Darling and Clem Hill, both of whom went on to captain Australia. Test captain George Giffen used his influence to ensure the selection of his younger brother, Walter. Albert Trott was a controversial omission, in light of performances in the previous Ashes series, but he accompanied the team on their voyage and later settled in England. He had a successful career with Middlesex and appeared for England in two Test matches against South Africa. The cricket historian David Frith records that when the Trott brothers encountered each other on an English street, they merely exchanged acknowledging nods and kept walking.

While the team was en route to England, the players elected Trott as captain ahead of George Giffen. On the opening day of the first Test at Lord's, England bowled Australia out in 75 minutes for only 53 runs on a pitch thought to be good for batting. In reply, England made 292 with Trott taking two wickets. Australia was still 177 runs in arrears with three wickets down when Syd Gregory joined Trott at the crease. Trott's score of 143 (the only Test century of his career) was not enough to prevent England winning by six wickets.

In the second Test at Manchester, Australia again batted first, scoring 412 runs; Frank Iredale making 108 and Trott 53. At the beginning of England's first innings, Trott opened the bowling with his flighted leg-spin. It was unusual for a leg-spinner to take the new ball, but the move was successful as he dismissed Stoddart and W. G. Grace for low scores. Both batsmen were deceived by Trott's flight and stumped by the wicket-keeper. England totaled 231 and, forced to follow on, scored 305 runs in the second innings, K. S. Ranjitsinhji making 154 not out. In a tense finish, Australia made the 125 runs needed for victory with three wickets in hand. On a pitch affected by rain, England won the series and The Ashes, defeating Australia in the Third Test by 66 runs.

Trott retained the captaincy when Andrew Stoddart returned to Australia with his English team in 1897/98. Stoddart's team got away to a good start when they won the First Test in Sydney by nine wickets, K. S. Ranjitsinhji scoring 175 runs. With Joe Darling, Trott devised a plan to curb Ranjitsinhji's run scoring. An exponent of the leg glance, "Ranji" would take a last look at the field before he took guard. Taking advantage of this fact, after he took strike, the Australians deliberately weakened the off side. Regardless of the tactics, Ranji made 457 runs at an average of 50.77 for the Test series.

Australia fought back to win the Second Test in Melbourne by an innings and 55 runs with Trott scoring 79 runs. The Third and Fourth Tests were both won by Australia as they retrieved The Ashes. The Fifth and final Test in Sydney would be Trott's last. In the Sydney heat, Australia won the Test by 6 wickets but Trott had an attack of sunstroke. This caused him to lose the sight in one eye before his last Test innings, where he made 18 runs. The victory over England dominated the attention of the Australian public and some newspapers decried the focus on cricket when important matters were being discussed. In reply to complaints about leave granted to Trott to play cricket, his proud employers at the Post office responded "Harry Trott is a national institution."

Less than six months after leading his team to victory over England, Trott endured a severe mental illness. While visiting his mother on 8 August 1898, Trott collapsed and lost consciousness. Later, on the train home with his wife, he had another convulsive fit and yet another at 10 pm that evening, in the presence of a doctor. Trott passed in and out of consciousness over the next four weeks, unable to work or even communicate. His supporters raised £453 to send him for two weeks at a private retreat at Woodend, a small town north-west of Melbourne. The treatment was unsuccessful and Trott continued to suffer from insomnia, memory loss and apathy.

Because Trott's illness precluded his selection for the 1899 Australian team to England, the Australian captaincy passed to Joe Darling. In May 1899, Trott was committed to the Kew Asylum, a psychiatric hospital in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. The facility opened in 1871 during an era when large asylums were in vogue. By the time of Trott's admission, expert opinion had changed on the effectiveness of Asylums. Trott was recorded as suffering "dementia" and "alcoholism", although there is little empirical evidence for either diagnosis. His symptoms would possibly be identified in modern times as depressive psychosis and treated with antipsychotics.

Attempting to reach him, doctors sent Trott to play cricket, which he did in a "mechanical, indifferent fashion". In a departure from normal hospital procedure, he was allowed newspapers reporting the details of Darling's Australian side in England; this left him unmoved. Trott's friend Ben Wardill, the secretary of the Melbourne Cricket Club, visited in November 1899 but Trott did not recognise him. In February 1900, Trott played in a cricket match for the asylum team against the North Melbourne Rovers club. To the astonishment of his treating doctors and his teammates, he scored 98 runs in 40 minutes, including 20 fours and a six.

Trott played in further matches against other visiting teams and in April 1900, he took a hat-trick against a team from the Commercial Travellers Association. Declared to be "recovered", Trott was discharged after spending 400 days at Kew Asylum. He returned to the South Melbourne team and captained Victoria against Tasmania at Launceston (taking eight wickets) during the 1900/01 season, but otherwise failed to recapture the form that made him captain of his country.

To aid his convalescence, the Postmaster-General's Department transferred him to the post office at Bendigo in central Victoria. In 1902/03, he turned up uninvited to a Bendigo United Cricket Club practice session and asked to join in. He played five first-class matches during 1903/04 season, scoring 268 runs at an average of 26.80 and taking 13 wickets at 23.53 runs each. In his final appearance of the season, he led Victoria against Plum Warner's touring English team. Trott captained the Carlton club for two seasons, before spending two seasons with Fitzroy. During the 1907/08 season, he led XVIII of Bendigo against the touring English team and made a farewell first-class appearance against the tourists for Victoria. Opening the bowling, Trott returned 5/116, including the wickets of England's leading batsmen Jack Hobbs and George Gunn. Trott later returned to South Melbourne, where he played until the age of 44.

At the age of 51, Trott died of Hodgkin's lymphoma, at his home in inner-suburban Albert Park on 9 November 1917. He was buried at Brighton Cemetery where, two years later, a large monument was erected over his grave, paid for by the Victorian Cricket Association and cricket enthusiasts. His great-grandson, Stuart Trott, played 200 games for St Kilda and Hawthorn in the Victorian Football League between 1967 and 1977. Trott's role in Australian cricket was recognised by the clubs for which he had played. Until 2005, Trott's club team, South Melbourne Cricket Club was based at Harry Trott Oval in Albert Park, while Bendigo United Cricket Club, for whom Trott played in 1902, still play at the Harry Trott Oval in the Bendigo suburb of Kennington.