Marsh was educated at Amersham Hall School, Reading, and at Jesus College, Cambridge, where, unusually, he was in his late 20s by the time of his matriculation in 1900.
However, Frederick did eventually achieve selection in 1904 and went on to break the record for the highest individual score in the University Match.
[4] James Marsh played for Oxfordshire in the Minor Counties Championship, representing them regularly from 1901 to 1906.
However, after leaving the university, he only played in one more first-class match which was an end-of-season game against the 1907 South Africans.
[3] He had an itinerant clerical career, being successively at Oakham, Rutland and Knighton, Leicester as a curate, then vicar at Belgrave, Leicester and rector at Kings Cliffe, Northamptonshire, and finally reverting to curate status at Bitterley, Shropshire.