Born in Blackheath, the son of J.M. Burnup.
Educated at Malvern College where he captained the school cricket and racquets teams.
Matriculated from Clare College in Michaelmas 1894. B.A. 1898
Cricket ‘blue’, 1896, 1897, 1898 (leading run scorer in 1896 and 1898)
Football ‘blue’ 1895, 1896, 1897, 1898
1894 – 1901 - Played 79 matches for Corinthian FC scoring 28 times. In April 1896, whilst at Cambridge, he was selected to represent England against Scotland.
1896, whilst at Cambridge, he made his Kent County Cricket Club debut and played regularly for the county until 1907. He scored over 1,000 runs in a season for Kent eight times and made 157 first-class appearances for the side. In 1896 he became the first Kent batsman to score a century before lunch in Kent.
He made 102 consecutive County Championship appearances for Kent between 1899 and 1903, becoming the first man to play in over 100 consecutive Championship matches for the county. He captained Kent for one season in 1903. In that year he was named Wisden’s Cricketer of the Year.