As the celebrations marking the Queen's Platinum Jubilee commence in Britain, we continue our three-part series reflecting on Her Majesty's longstanding commitment to the Turf, written by John Berry
Aureole, who had been bred by the Queen's father, was a wonderful standard-bearer at the outset of her reign. While her father had been alive, she and her mother had begun owning jumpers, jointly enjoying their first National Hunt success when the Peter Cazalet-trained Monaveen (racing in the same colours which Astrakhan bore at Hurst Park) had won over fences at Fontwell in October 1949 before taking the Queen Elizabeth Chase at Hurst Park two months later. After Princess Elizabeth became Queen, though, her mother became the First Lady of National Hunt racing, while Queen Elizabeth took over the Royal Flat string and the Royal Studs with a passion which has never wavered in the subsequent 70 years.
This successful start to the Queen's ownership career set the tone for what was to follow. After Aureole, the next star was another Hyperion colt, High Veldt, whose finest hour came when he came closer than any other horse to beating the Italian champion Ribot when runner-up in the 1956 King George And Queen Elizabeth S. The Royal Ascot triumphs of Jardiniere in the King George V S. in 1955 and of Alexander in the Royal Hunt Cup in 1956 were great occasions, while the win of Atlas in the 1956 Doncaster Cup proved to be the first of three triumphs for Her Majesty in the race in a four-year period, with Apprentice taking the race in 1958 and '59.
It turned out that 1957 was a true annus mirabilis for the Royal string, which consisted of 21 homebreds with Boyd-Rochfort in Freemason Lodge augmented by a few horses leased from the National Stud and trained by Noel Murless in Warren Place. The monarch leasing horses from the National Stud was a tradition whose roots traced back to 1907 when King Edward VII had leased six yearlings from Colonel Hall Walker (later Lord Wavertree) from Tully Stud in Ireland, which lovely property was later given to the nation to be the National Stud and is now the Irish National Stud. Minoru was one of this sextet, while in later years the habit was revived on the advice of the royal bloodstock manager Captain Charlies Moore, with the first batch of yearlings containing both Big Game and Sun Chariot.
Three fillies in particular looked very good in the spring of 1957: the Boyd-Rochfort pair of Mulberry Harbour and Almeria, and the Murless-trained Carozza. Carozza won the Princess Elizabeth S. at Epsom and Mulberry Harbour took the Cheshire Oaks, but Almeria struggled on the downhill run in the Lingfield Oaks Trial, finishing a disappointing third. Mulberry Harbour and Carozza pressed on to Epsom for the Oaks with, sensibly, Almeria waiting instead for Ascot. At Epsom Harry Carr wore the first colours on Mulberry Harbour, leaving the 21-year-old Lester Piggott to bear a distinguishing white cap on Carozza. Mulberry Harbour ran abysmally to finish last but Carozza landed a thrilling win, holding off the late challenge of the Irish raider Silken Glider by inches. It was the first royal triumph in an Oaks at Epsom (although, of course, Sun Chariot had won a wartime substitute at Newmarket) and the first royal Classic winner at Epsom since Minoru had won the Derby for the Queen's great-grandfather Edward VII in 1909.
At Ascot, Almeria showed her Lingfield form to be all wrong by winning the Ribblesdale S. before beating Irish Derby runner-up Hindu Festival in the Bentinck S. at Goodwood. She then won the Yorkshire Oaks in a canter before taking the Park Hill S. at Doncaster. Carozza failed to repeat the excellence which she had shown at Epsom and was retired after a poor run in the Nassau S. at Goodwood, but Mulberry Harbour bounced back from her Oaks debacle (when it was suspected that she may have been doped) by taking the Newmarket Oaks in the autumn. At the end of the season, the Jockey Club handicapper rated Almeria the best 3-year-old filly trained in England, Carozza the second best and Mulberry Harbour the third best. The Queen ended the year as champion owner for a second time, with winnings of £62,211. Eleven of the 21 horses at Freemason Lodge had won a total of 23 races, with Murless providing a further seven victories.
That glorious season would clearly be hard to follow, but the following year, when the Queen finished second in the list of leading owners, contained several more treats even so. The brightest star was the Palestine 3-year-old Pall Mall, who had come to hand early in his 2-year-old season the previous year, winning on debut at Haydock before taking the New (now Norfolk) S. at Royal Ascot. On his resumption in the spring of 1958 he struggled in the heavy ground at Kempton first time out and thus failed to give the Queen a fourth consecutive win in the Kempton Park 2,000 Guineas Trial (following Alexander, High Veldt and Doutelle) but then won the Thirsk Classic Trial before, when seemingly his stable's second string, he landed a shock 20/1 victory under Doug Smith in the 2,000 Guineas, providing the Queen with her first homebred Classic winner. Smith's presence in the saddle provided a pleasing note of continuity as he had previously won a Classic up the Rowley Mile in the royal silks when guiding Hypericum to victory for King George VI in the 1,000 Guineas 12 years earlier.
The following month, Her Majesty enjoyed a Royal Ascot double when Restoration won the King Edward VII S. (then the second most valuable race at the meeting, behind only the Gold Cup) on his racecourse debut and Snow Cat won the Rous Memorial S. At Newmarket's July Meeting, Miner's Lamp, previously winner of the Blue Riband Trial S. at Epsom's Spring Meeting, won the Princess Of Wales's S., in those days the most valuable race run all season on the July Course.
Furthermore, Almeria remained in training as a 4-year-old in 1958 as did Above Board's Prince Chevalier colt Doutelle, who had been the Queen's best colt of 1957, when he had suffered a very rough passage in the Derby after winning the Lingfield Derby Trial. Doutelle got his 4-year-old season off to a great start by winning on his reappearance at Newbury before beating the champion Ballymoss in the Ormonde S. at Chester. In the summer both Almeria and Doutelle lined up in the King George VI And Queen Elizabeth S. at Ascot and they ran great races, finishing second and third behind Ballymoss, who went on to win the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe in the autumn.
A daughter of Alycidon from the Hyperion mare Avila (who had won the Coronation S. at Royal Ascot in 1949), Almeria subsequently became an excellent broodmare, her produce including 1970 Doncaster Cup winner Magna Carta and 1971 Prix de Psyché heroine Albany, herself the dam of 1979 Queen's Vase winner Buttress. In a tragically short stud career which ended when he died after an accident in his stable in December 1962, Doutelle produced several good horses for the Queen including the 1965 Eclipse S. hero Canisbay.
The 1950s ended with the Queen's run of form continuing. She finished third in the owners' championship in 1959 with two high-class 3-year-old colts making significant contributions, including landing a double at Royal Ascot when Above Suspicion won the St. James's Palace S. and Pindari won the King Edward VII S. Pindari (who was bred on the Classic Derby winner/Oaks winner formula, being by Pinza out of Sun Chariot) subsequently won the Great Voltigeur S. at York. Furthermore, two terrific performances under big weights in handicaps stood out: Agreement, midway between his two Doncaster Cup victories, won the Chester Cup and Pall Mall finished second in the Royal Hunt Cup. It is hard to imagine the previous year's 2,000 Guineas winner running in the race nowadays!
That Royal Ascot also included another winner for the Royal Family. Bali Ha'i (NZ) had been given to the Queen Mother when she was on a tour of New Zealand the previous year. She had gone to the races at Trentham on a day when Bali Ha'i won and, on hearing that Her Majesty was admiring the horse, his owner kindly gave him to her. She brought him back to England and sent him to Cecil Boyd-Rochfort, who prepared him to win the Queen Alexandra S.
The Queen's fortunes waned during the 1960s in tandem with those of Boyd-Rochfort, who was coming to the end of his long and distinguished career. He had been champion trainer in 1958 and finished second in the table in 1959, but in 1960 his horses suffered from a virus for much of the year and he sent out only 13 winners (none owned by the Queen) from a string of nearly 60. Happily, things picked up a bit and royal winners from Freemason Lodge during the decade included Canisbay, successful in the Wood Ditton S. at Newmarket in 1964 and the Eclipse S. at Sandown in 1965; Apprentice and Gaulois, who landed successive Goodwood Cup victories in 1965 and '66, with the former having already taken that year's Yorkshire Cup; Impudent and Amicable, winners of the Lingfield Oaks Trial S. in 1961 and '63 respectively; and Hypericum's daughter Highlight, successful in the Ash S. at Kempton Park in 1961.
Arguably the best horse raced by the Queen in the 1960s was Hopeful Venture, a son of Aureole who was bred by the National Stud, from which he was leased by the Queen and sent to Noel Murless in Warren Place. He proved to be a wonderful trouper. As a 3-year-old in 1967 he won the Wood Ditton S. at Newmarket, the Grosvenor S. at Chester, the Princess of Wales's S. at Newmarket and the Oxforshire S. at Newbury. He also finished second in both the King Edward VII S. at Royal Ascot and the St. Leger. The following year he won the Ormonde S. at Chester, the Hardwicke S. at Royal Ascot and the Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud, beating a top-class field which included the subsequent Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Vaguely Noble.
A new trainer was added to the royal roster when Captain Peter Hastings-Bass received half of the Queen's intake of yearlings in the autumn of 1963 at Park House Stables in Kingsclere, near Polhampton Lodge Stud, on which the Queen had taken a lease the previous year to replace the old royal stud at Hampton Court. Kingsclere has been home to many of the Queen's horses ever since. Tragically, Peter Hastings-Bass died from cancer, aged only 43, the following year. The Queen remained a patron of the stable as Hastings-Bass's assistant Ian Balding (who later married Captain Hastings-Bass's daughter Emma) took over, as she subsequently also did when Balding handed over to his son Andrew in 2003. The connection with the family was further strengthened when Captain Hastings-Bass's son William (now Lord Huntingdon) started training in Newmarket in 1977 after having served as assistant trainer to Noel Murless, and he subsequently occupied the royal stables at West Ilsley through the 1990s.
One of the first horses whom William Hastings-Bass trained for Her Majesty was Australia Fair (Aus), a daughter of Without Fear (Fr) who was given to the Queen by the Australian nation as a Silver Jubilee present. Disappointingly, neither she nor her offspring achieved anything of note in the royal colours, but she did breed the high-class sprint handicapper Double Blue, a son of the Town Crier stallion Town And Country, whom the Queen's long-term racing manager, the 7th Earl of Carnarvon (formerly Lord Porchester), was standing at Highclere Stud. To continue a long-running family connection and friendship, the late 7th Earl of Carnarvon's son-in-law John Warren succeeded him in 2001 as the Queen's racing manager, a position which he holds to this day.
Tomorrow: An enduring patron of the Turf
If you missed the first part of this series, you can catch up here.
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