a disappointing read.

​I am a sucker for biographies and autobiographies of trainers and jockeys, especially those written many years ago. These days such biographies seem to follow a template, with a prologue that whets the readers appetite with a glimpse of what was to become the defining moment of whoever’s life-story is being recounted, followed by sequential canter through the triumphs and the heartbreaks of a racing life. I have a good number of these biographies and autobiographies in my collection, with my two favourite trainers ‘books being Ginger McCain’s ‘My Colourful Life’ and Richard Pitman’s book in association with and about Martin Pipe. Of the books on jockeys I would nominate Ruby Walsh’s autobiography and Pat Taaffe’s ‘My Life and Arkle’s’, a gem of a book every collector of racing books should possess.
If I had to choose a book for potential biographers to read so they might learn how not to write a biography I must put forward Tim Fitzgeorge-Parker’s biography of Neville Crump, ‘Ever Loyal’. Now, there are many different ways to write a biography, as Ami Rao and Declan Murphy proved with ‘Centaur’, which is innovative and I suspect far more brilliant than I grasped when reading it a few months ago, and the reader is rarely told the story of the actual compilation of the book. It may be the biographer and his subject fell-out at some point or the publisher demanded a final copy before the author had finished the manuscript and had to cobble and chop. And I dare say I am doing Fitzgeorge-Parker a disservice by criticising ‘Ever Loyal’. He was, I know, a very respected journalist in his day, and a trainer himself before switching to the written word. It is just there wasn’t enough of Neville Crump within the chapters to justify this book being labelled ‘a racing book’, the biography of a great racehorse trainer.
The problems, for me, with the book begin with the dust jacket. It is a lovely dust jacket, by the way, with Neville Crump looking kindly and knowledgably at the head of a gorgeous chestnut horse as it looks out over a red stable door. Gerry Cranham took the photograph, which is why it is such a splendid cover picture. But what I wanted to know was the name of the horse! So annoying when no one at the publishing house thinks to put a name to the horse nominated to help move the book off the shelves of book-shops. It is truly a lovely picture. It would grace any study wall.
What is also annoying about this biography is that the author wallows in the war years as if they were the best years of His life. Indeed, half the chapters are taken up not only with Crump’s war experiences but also those several other people who in later life had but a scant influence on Crump’s career. The author also breaks the flow of the narrative by recounting stories about himself, as if aware that he would never get the opportunity to publish his own life-story. And when Fitzgeorge-Parker finally gets to recounting the early career of Neville Crump, a champion National Hunt trainer in his time, a man who won the Grand National three times, he uses half a chapter to peruse the family lineage of the Peacock family, the famous flat racing dynasty that trained from Warwick House, Middleham, prior to Crump turning it into one of the most respected National Hunt establishments in the country.
There are anecdotes a’plenty, though the humour implied dries on the page if you weren’t present at the time Crump said this or Crump did that. The most interesting chapter from my point of view is where Fitzgeorge-Parker makes use of a diary kept while John Penney worked for Crump detailing the little gems that are the principles of a trainer’s stable husbandry. Such advice as: if a horse goes off his food it may be in want of a good gallop. And: a bit is correctly set when it is possible to lay a finger on the bit in the corner of the mouth with ease. But as this was a biography of Neville Crump it would have been more authoritative if Crump had offered up his thoughts on stable husbandry himself, offering examples of how his principles became set in stone.
My disappointment with this book is probably mirrored by how much I had looked forward to reading it. Books can both disappoint and surprise. I had Harry Llewellyn’s autobiography ‘Passports To Life’ in my collection for around five years before I read it and was surprised by how informative and interesting it was, while Sid Barnes book ‘The Persian War Story’ was just plain awful. Crump trained some of the best chasers of his era, Merryman, Rough Tweed, Teal, Springbok, Even Melody, and the list goes on. Not that you will find Crump’s horses in the index. Other peoples’ horses, yes. Which just about tops and bottoms my criticism of this book.