270 



A HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH TURF. 



ancestors, and handed it on to worthy representatives of the same family in our own 

 times. The Plate of 1756 was won by the Duke of Ancaster's Spectator, who beat 

 Whistlejacket, then the property of Sir William Middleton and sold by him in the 

 year before his death to Lord Rockingham. Sir William represented Northumber- 

 land in Parliament for almost five-and-thirty years, and owned the dam of the Bartlett's 

 Childers mare, who was sister to the two True Blues. Two famous horses of his 

 were Squirrel and Camilla. Another early member, whose connection with politics 

 was rather by inheritance than by experience, was Sir Robert Walpole's grandson, 

 the third Earl of Orford, who was the last great country gentleman to keep up the 



sport of hawking. In 

 other directions his 

 sport was rather too 

 eccentric to be valuable, 

 but he at least showed 

 his acuteness in stud 

 matters by breeding the 

 speedy Firetail (by the 

 Squirrel just mentioned), 

 and by his ownership of 

 the Orford Barb Mare, 

 dam of Spitfire by 

 Eclipse. In 1757 to 

 conclude this little list 

 of early members - 



Sir Charles Turner, of Yorkshire, who was a noted rider to hounds and across 

 country, ran his Brutus against Lord Rockingham's Remus at Newmarket for 500 

 guineas, B.C., 8st. 7lbs., giving his lordship 4lbs., and won. The loser is another 

 conspicuous instance at this time of a racing Prime Minister, for Charles Watson 

 Wentworth, second Marquess of Rockingham, who signed the Club's first public 

 document, was the owner of Sampson, and Solon whom he afterwards used as his 

 charger. In 1768 he won the Whip at Newmarket with Bay Malton, beating Cardinal 

 Puff easily. But his great claim to the respect of every Turfite is that he won the 

 first St. Leger Stakes (as far as the conditions of the race were concerned) with 

 Alabacidia. Two years afterwards he gave its name to the famous Doncaster 

 contest in 1778 from that of his friend and neighbour, Colonel St. Leger of Park Mill. 



The Marquis of Rockingham's " Cato." 



