America's game, or not?

Despite the claims of the colonists, evidence exists which reveals that baseball had been established in England as early as 1700. It is even mentioned by Jane Austen in Northanger Abbey, written in 1798.

We have heard that one Abner Doubleday "devised" baseball in 1839 in Cooperstown, New York. However, what they do not say, is that it was "devised" earlier in England for those poor sods unable to handle cricket.