A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE 



nevertheless the fields were small, the race for 

 which no entry money was asked bringing only 

 four starters. 



There was vitality in the movement, how- 

 ever. At the meeting of 1754 one of the 

 three races, that for four-year-olds, was fairly 

 well supported, seven horses starting ; the 

 number of entries being due possibly to the — 

 for those days — light weight imposed, 8 st. 7 lb. 

 This race appears to furnish an example of the 

 severity of the old system of heat racing. The 

 distance is not recorded, but no fewer than five 

 heats were run before the race could be awarded. 

 The third heat having resulted in a dead-heat 

 between Mr. Keek's Ruby and Lord Godolphin's 

 dun gelding, which had run first and second in 

 the first heat, a fourth heat was run, when their 

 positions were reversed ; being thus even, a fifth 

 was necessary, which was won by Ruby. Four 

 of the original seven horses ran in the fourth 

 heat, and two of them falling, the fifth was 

 fought out between Ruby and the dun gelding. 

 It will be borne in mind that heats were run at 

 intervals of half an hour. The Marquess of 

 Hartington, the Earl of March, Lord Albe- 

 marle Bertie and Lord Gower ran horses at the 

 meeting ; the names of Lords Sandwich, Port- 

 more and Oxford occur among those of owners 

 who entered horses during subsequent years. In 

 1758 the programme had expanded to four 

 events, and the races were often supplemented 

 by various private matches common at the time. 

 The conditions of the various events indicate 

 endeavour to cater for all classes of horse. Thus 

 in 1758 the Noblemen's and Gentlemen's 

 Sweepstake was open to horses which had never 

 won a j^ioo stake ; while at the other end of 

 the scale were a ' Whim ' plate (weight for age 

 and inches; horses of from 13 to 15 hands 

 eligible) and a ;^50 prize for horses which had 

 never won a j^io race. The latter events filled 

 best ; only four horses faced the starter's drum 

 for the Noblemen's and Gentlemen's Sweep- 

 stake, while the Whim Plate brought seven, and 

 the £$0 prize eleven horses to the post. In 

 1760 occurred an event which gave the 

 meeting a distinct fillip ; the Duke of Bedford 

 offered a prize of j^ 50 to be run for by horses 

 which had never won a stake of that value ; 

 weight for age, three four-mile heats. This 

 gift was renewed in 1760, and thenceforward, 

 until the meeting came to an end in 1874, was 

 an annual event. Bedford races were now 

 launched upon a very successful career ; the 

 executive continued to provide four events, 

 enough under the heat system to give two days' 

 sport, and several of the most prominent racing 

 men of the day sent horses to run ; among these 

 were the Earl of Ossory, Lord Eglinton, Sir 

 Charles Bunbury, Sir J. Lowther and Mr. Shafto. 

 If none of the famous horses of the time ran 

 at Bedford, animals of good class were not 



wanting, and some good racing was seen. At the 

 meeting of 1773, for instance, Lord Ossory's 

 Chalkstone by Herod met Lord March's Picca- 

 dilly by Squirrel in a 50-gn. race for four-year- 

 olds ; there were only four starters, but the race 

 was not decided until the fifth heat, for which 

 Piccadilly was allowed to walk over. This 

 meeting included a primitive handicap, propor- 

 tionate penalties being laid on horses which had 

 won one, two, or more races during the year. 

 Lord Ossory was one of the most consistent 

 supporters of the meeting at this period ; he 

 ran many horses and was the winner of numerous 

 races ; and in 1776 he gave a ;^50 prize, which 

 gift he repeated several times ; it may be added 

 that on at least one occasion, in 1781, he won 

 this prize himself with a brown colt by Pay- 

 master. The colours of Sir John Moore and 

 Mr. Vernon were also very regularly represented 

 on the Bedford course ; the Duke of Queens- 

 berry, Earl Grosvenor and the Earl of Clermont 

 also ran horses occasionally during the last de- 

 cades of the 1 8th century. 'Class' was im- 

 proving during this period. At the meeting of 

 1784 the three ;^50 races were won respectively 

 by an unsexed son of Mambrino, by Flamer, a 

 son of the famous Eclipse, and by a son of 

 Pumpkin bearing the same name. Probably the 

 appearance of horses so much superior to those 

 owned by local sportsmen frightened the latter 

 away, for the meeting of 1785 came near being 

 a fiasco ; only one race was contested. One 

 prize under varying conditions formed the pro- 

 gramme until 1789, in which year there was no 

 sport at all, the race failing to fill. In ^790 the 

 ;^50 stake for four-year-olds brought four entries, 

 but an attempt to get up a hunters' sweepstake 

 brought to the post only one horse. In 1791 

 the Duke of Bedford again came forward with 

 a ;^50 prize for three-year-olds; the sup- 

 port accorded was poor ; Lord Barrymore's 

 Halbert by Javelin won the race, his only 

 opponent being the Duke of Bedford's Tick ; a 

 second race obtained little patronage. In the 

 following year there is evidence of determined 

 effort to set the meeting on a better footing 

 again ; no doubt influence was brought to bear 

 in high places, royal patronage being not less 

 valuable then than it is now. However this be, 

 the fact remains that the 1792 programme con- 

 sisted of four races in which horses belonging to 

 many distinguished persons, including the Prince 

 of Wales and the Duke of York, competed. 

 The fields were small, two or three horses 

 starting in each race save one. The Duke of 

 York won the Duke of Bedford's ^^50 with 

 Whisky by Saltram, the Prince won the 25-gn. 



. sweepstake with a colt by Cymbeline ; the 

 Duke of Bedford the j^5o race with Tick ; and 

 his Skyscraper walked over for the lo-gn. sweep, 

 In 1793 the card was again reduced to three 

 races, one of which was a 5-gn. sweepstake foi 



92 



