Major Wilfrid Ricardo 



being aa offer against the winner. Up till 1897, in which year 

 he retired, Captain Crawley rode all Major Eustace Loder's 

 horses, just then carrying everything before them in Ireland, 

 and in 1895, ^t Sandown Park, he won the Grand Military Gold 

 Cup on Field Marshal for the popular owner of Pretty Polly. 

 He had previously ridden the same horse without luck in the 

 Grand National of 1893, won by Cloister. 



Besides innumerable races in Ireland on Ravenswood and 

 others. Major Crawley won the Sefton Steeplechase for the 

 same owner on The Shaker. 



But though Major Crawley's riding career was, in com- 

 parison with many others, comparatively short, it was an 

 exceptionally brilliant one while it lasted, and it is certain that 

 the record he left behind him was one any horseman might 

 be proud of. 



MAJOR WILFRID RICARDO 



One of the most successful amongst the military horsemen who 

 were riding at the same time as himself, and quite capable of 

 holding his own in the best of company, amateur or professional, 

 was Major Wilfrid Ricardo. 



The son of Mr. Francis Ricardo, and his wife, Louisa, 

 daughter of Sir Erskine Perry, the subject of our memoir was 

 born in 1868, and received his education at Eton, afterwards 

 joining the Blues, in which gallant regiment he served from 

 1888 until 1906. In 1889 he scored his maiden victory at 

 Hawthorn Hill on Grimaldi, after which he went rapidly 

 ahead, and in 1894 we find him winning the National Hunt 



419 



