This book should be an interesting read:
https://www.pitchpublishing.co.uk/shop/last-corinthian
And a happy 90th birthday to him at the end of June!

M.J.K. at Edgbaston for his birthday:
https://edgbaston.com/news/bears-legend-mjk-smith-celebrates-90th-birthday-at-edgbaston/

Anybody have any recollection of whether MJK was involved in a similar controversy against South Africans In Johannesburg in 1965? With the appeal withdrawn?

BosworthBear wrote:

Anybody have any recollection of whether MJK was involved in a similar controversy against South Africans In Johannesburg in 1965? With the appeal withdrawn?

That's a great call!
I had no recollection; but Wisden says (re Fourth Test in 1965 at Johannesburg): "After a ball had rested in the hands of Waite [the wicket keeper] and tossed by him to leg slip, Smith went "gardening", whereupon van der Merswe [presumably the leg slip] threw down the wicket. Umpire Kidson gave Smith out, but was prevailed upon by [Trevor] Goddard [the South African captain] to call him back."
So very similar to the Bairstow incident except that the wicket keeper had tossed the ball to a fielder, which would suggest that he regarded the ball as dead.