A Mirror of the Turf; Or, The Machinery of Horse-Racing Revealed, Showing the Sport of Kings as It Is To-Day

by James Glass Bertram

The same authority in his notes tells how the saddlers' ball, "profitable for few uses or purposes," being a ball of silk, of the bigness of a bowl, was changed into a silver bell weighing about two ounces, "the which saide silver bell was ordayned to be the reward for that horse, which with speedy runninge, then should rune before all the others." In the notes it is also stated that the shoemakers' footeball was before exchanged into silver gleaves. Without taking up space with particulars which can be obtained in county histories, it may be mentioned, in passing, that horse-racing was undoubtedly looked upon at Chester as a national pastime more than two hundred and seventy years ago. In the pageant for the inauguration of the first great festival of St. George, horses played a distinguished part, the victors in the various races being rewarded with the "cups and bels" provided. It will interest lovers of the turf to learn that the silver bell was of the then value of three shillings and fourpence.

In a "History of Horse-racing," published in 1863, appears the following summary of the early history of the sport at Chester: "In the year 1511, the silver bell of the value of three shillings and fourpence was first run for as a prize; in 1609 or 1610, the bell was converted into silver 'cupps,' the value of which is not stated, and from this date the race was annually run for on the Rood Dee, was then named and henceforth known as 'St. George's Race'; and in 1623 there was another alteration made in the prize run for, as in that year the three cups were changed into 'one faire silver cupp,' of about the value of eight pounds. With regard to the prizes, the silver bell run for in 1511 was apparently an absolute gift to the winner. The cups offered in 1609, however, were only temporary rewards, held by the winners for the space of twelve months, when the holders were under bond to deliver up the cups to be again run for; but they retained the amount in cash of the value of the cups as subscribed for by those who ran horses for the prize, and which was a condition of the race. But this again was altered in 1623, when the prize was once more to be held 'freely for ever by the winner.'"

Various alterations were from time to time made in the value of the Rood Dee prizes; in 1629, the city companies contributed to St. George's Race, to make up a certain sum of money; in the year 1640, the sheriffs contributed a piece of plate of the value of £13 6s. 8d. to be run for on Easter Tuesday, in place of a breakfast of calves' heads and bacon, which it had previously been the custom for the two sheriffs to shoot for on Easter Monday. In these early days of the pastime of horse-racing, there was only one day in which a race took place, one race only being run, and occasionally there was no lack of excitement; in 1665, for instance, there was a "row," because "the High Sheriff borrowed a Barbary horse of Sir Thomas Middleton, which won him the plate; and, being master of the race, he would not suffer the horses of Master Massey of Paddington, and of Sir Philip Egerton of Dalton, to run, because they came the day after the time prefixed for the horses to be brought and kept in the city; which thing caused all the gentry to relinquish the races ever since."

Having established Chester's pride of place in the chronology of the turf, the history of horse-racing as then carried on need scarcely be further alluded to, except to show how gradual was the change from the meagre sport of 1665 to the prolific pastime of the present period. In 1745, Chester races, we learn, occupied four days, but only one race took place each day; a case of linked sweetness long drawn out. During the year just named, the four prizes contended for were the St. George's Purse, of the value of £50, for which there was a field of nine horses; the City's Golden Cup of £60, five starters; the Contribution Plate of 50 gs., for which four horses ran.

Lloyd's Evening Post of 21st March, 1780, gives the worth and conditions of the chief race as then run, which are as follows: "On Thursday, the 4th May, the Annual City Plate, valued £30, with a purse of £20, given by the Corporation, for five, six-year-olds, and aged horses; five-year-olds to carry 8st. 2lb., six-year-olds, 8st. 11lb., and aged, 9st. 5lb., mares to be allowed 3lb.; the best of three four-mile heats. To pay five shillings to the clerk of the course, and three guineas of entrance." The races decided at Chester continued to multiply, as time went on, till the institution of the race for the Tradesman's Cup, in 1824.

It would have been interesting to be able to chronicle more exactly the rise of racing at Chester and other seats of the sport; but in early days the records of the sport enjoyed were, in all probability, never committed to paper, at all events they do not exist, so far as is known to historians of the turf, in any consultative form. It would be a sight worth seeing if the race for the St. George's Cup, with all its surroundings of two centuries and a half ago, could be reproduced on the Rood Dee "some fine morning in the merry month of May," to be viewed alongside the struggle for Chester's greatest prize of to-day. At the time when "the Cup" was instituted, the sport of racing had attained a high position both at Chester and some other parts of England, "the races" formed a meeting-place of the county people which was largely taken advantage of for assemblies and other social gatherings; but that is not the case to-day, when people arrive to see the races by some forenoon train, and the moment sport ceases, depart as hurriedly as they came.

III.

"The great County of York" was famed at an early date for its seats of racing. The "Turf Annals" of York and Doncaster have an historian in John Orton, keeper of the match-book and clerk of the course, York. The capital of the great county, as that gentleman tells us, was the first to chronicle her sports, and to Yorkshire, "the British turf," he says, "has perhaps been more indebted for the superior breed and present perfection of the high mettled racer, than any other portion of the kingdom."

Orton in his compilation—a most useful work, to which writers about "the turf" have often been indebted—only deals with the accredited figures of racing, when the results began to be chronicled in a somewhat formal manner. But long before the date of the first race given in his volume, "York, 1709," the sport of horse-racing had been inaugurated, the prize as usual in those early days being a small golden or silver bell, to be carried presumably, in all time coming, by the victorious horse. In Camden's "Britannia" (1590) we are told of horse-racing having taken place in a forest on the east side of the city of York.