skulduggery and ashforth.

​Skulduggery is an interesting word, wouldn’t you agree? It is a noun, meaning ‘devious trickery, especially underhand or unscrupulous behaviour’. It is an alteration, apparently, of sculduddery: ‘gross or lewd conduct’. Of unknown origin. I suspect if I put myself to the trouble of research, I would come across the derivation of the word but it would take time, time I cannot spare as I have much to get through this dreary February afternoon. So, unlike David Ashforth, who would go at it with the verve of dedication unbeknownst to someone like me, who is of the half-hearted band of so-called writers, I will only add, now I am aware of the oldie word ‘sculduddery’, that I prefer it to the modern-day version, which, it is easy to imagine, derives from the practice of digging-up graves to extract skulls for the purpose of sorcery or black magic. 
The dear Queen Mother once owned a chaser called Black Magic; I’m pretty sure I’m right about that. David Ashforth should write a book about the most successful owners of National Hunt horses of the sixties, seventies and possibly the eighties. If you know David, or Mr.Ashforth as I would address him, make him aware of my website and my suggestion for his next book Thank you.
Onto ‘Ringers and Rascals. A Taste of Skulduggery’. Published in 2003, back in the days of democracy, freedom of both speech and movement and when we hadn’t yet cottoned-on to how bad things in the near-future were going to be.
I admire David Ashforth and I am now on the lookout for his published work. To find his unpublished work I would have to break into his house and find his cache of unpublished or unfinished work, and in the process baffle both the police and Mr.Ashforth as to why anyone would go to so much trouble for so little reward. I will not be stoop to such nefarious business, mainly because I have no idea where the great man lives.
‘Ringers and Rascals’ is a book about people who substitute one horse, usually a horse with moderate form, for a look-a-like but of far greater ability in order to bring off a large gamble. My one quibble about this book, and it is only a small quibble as quibbles go, is that the book, by necessity as though he is a fine writer with a brain to go with it, he cannot know everything about every equine subject, is heavy on research, to the point where David Ashforth’s whimsical style appears far less frequently than I would wish. Other than that, there is little to quibble about. The ‘King of Ringers’, Peter Christian Barrie, takes up a lot of Mr.Ashforth’s time, mainly as he was actively painting (dying) horses to look like another horse and using cocaine and other substances as a back-up, on both sides of the Atlantic. It is amazing what he got away with. Read ‘Ringers and Rascals’ to find out exactly what. This book maybe twenty-years-old but that does not mean I am about to give you chapter and verse of the why, wherefores and dénouements of the book.
The Flockton Grey story is especially well told, with information I was unaware until reading the book.
Although definitely a good read, there are no real heroes; only villains and as someone who lives and breaths the sport of horse racing the stories were overhung with the odour of foul play and sometimes rank cruelty, as with the shooting of a horse no longer required. And, of course, maybe because I remain wet-behind-the-ears, I cannot admire or have empathy for someone who brings the sport into disrepute, even if they have fallen on hard-times and have no other options in life.
Horse racing doubtless reflects life in general; although I want everyone in the sport to be saints, I should imagine they are in short supply. Saints usually are, even in the House of the Lord. And there must be sinners, people who continue to get away with their own form of skulduggery. I both wish them caught so they can be expunged from the sport and I wish them to remain in the shadows so their villainy does not further sully the public’s image of the sport. I wish the sport clean. But then there would be fewer juicy topics for writers like David Ashforth to get his literary teeth into.
Defy the Grim Reaper, Mr.Ashforth, live long, live whimsically.