622 



A HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH TURF. 



Copeland's horses; and who first saw, also at Hednesford, those famous jockeys 

 Charles Marlow and George Whitehouse, the first and second for the Derby of 

 1849 on The Flying Dutchman and Hotspur. Hednesford was not far from Rugeley, 

 in Staffordshire, where John Porter was born in 1838. It was a far bigger racing 

 centre in those days than it is now, for Mr. Mostyn sent Queen of Trumps there with 

 John Blenkhorn, to be trained into a St. Leger winner that was to give his final 

 quietus to Bob Ridsdale. It was in the stable where Palmer the poisoner kept his 

 horses that young Porter got his first year's experience under Saunders, and left 



' there to go to "old John Day," who 



was then training for Mr. Padwick at 

 Michel Grove, in Sussex, where he 

 helped in many an important trial, as 

 a lad of fifteen, with that wonderful 

 mare Virago. Some question about 

 St. Hubert and Oulston led to William 

 Goater, Day's head lad, removing 

 Mr. Padwick's horses to Findon, 

 where young Porter was persuaded 

 by the late Lord Westmoreland to 

 stay until 1863. 



He could scarcely have made a 

 better beginning. John Barham Day, 

 born in 1794, died in 1860, and was 

 father of John, born 1815 ; William, 

 born 1822 ; and Alfred, born in 

 Tom Cannon. 1830. In the saddle he had steered 

 Crucifix, Chorister, Elis, Oxygen, 



Pussy, Ralph, and other winners ; and what he had done at Danebury, his son 

 William did later on at Woodyates, which was rented from Lord Shaftesbury. 

 The unpleasantness about Old England passed away by 1847, and William Day 

 counted among his patrons Mr. James Merry, Lord Alington, Sir Frederick 

 Johnstone, the Earl of Durham, Mr. Frederick Swindell, Earl Howe, Lord 

 Ribblesdale, and Lord Rivers. His horses were very successful too, though he- 

 always objected to high prices for yearlings, and in handicaps he scored three 

 victories each in the Chester Cup, Cambridgeshire, Royal Hunt Cup, and 



From a pencil drawing by 

 Jane E. Cook. 



