trelawny.

​As I repeatedly say, the names of racehorses are important. They are the portal from which outsiders cross the divide from racing illiteracy, people who perhaps only accompany devotees of the sport to the racecourse but possess no affinity with any aspect of the sport, to being captivated by the intrigue and splendour of the action. Why the B.H.A. will allow silly or disrespectful names when the full gamut of the English language, as well as all the languages of the world, are on offer, not to mention all the names that can be made from adding one word to another, Spanish Steps, for instance, or Desert Orchid, causes me great annoyance. Though only a fraction of the annoyance the re-use of the name of a famous horse from the past.
I cannot explain why, as when Trelawny was humping huge weights to victory at Royal Ascot and winning what is now the Stayers Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival I was but five or six-years-old, but the name has stuck in my memory with the fondness of a long-lost love. When the name is referenced in print, or if the name Trelawny is used in reference to ‘The Song of the Western Men’ – ‘A good sword and a trusty hand, A merry heart and true’. …etc. Or the 3rd Baronet Sir Jonathan Trelawny, one of the 7 bishops tried for seditious libel by James 2nd, referenced in these parts more often than you might think, my one-track mind recalls the horse, never the poet Hawker or the Trelawny who inspired his famous poem, the national anthem of Cornwall.
In his ‘Masters of Manton’, Paul Mathieu saw fit to devote an entire chapter to Trelawny, which is quite an honour to bestow when you take into the account all the classic winners trained there over the centuries by Taylor the elder and younger and Joe Lawson, especially when the preceding chapter was titled ‘The Good Horses’. Trelawny was not good in that respect but more of a legend, a peoples horse, as Tiger Roll has become.
One of the remarkable aspects of Trelawny’s career as a flat horse is that he didn’t really get going until he was six, having been trained by Fred Rimell, as George Todd refused to run him over hurdles, where he was placed four times, including in a division of the Gloucestershire Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival. When he was returned to Manton, George Todd set about training him for the Ascot Stakes, a race he had never won, having been placed 2nd or 3rd on eight occasions. He started his preparation by running him in the Chester Cup where he finished 3rd, having won the race when trained by Syd Mercer two years before.
The same season as he showed so much promise in winning the Chester Cup, Trelawny was badly injured in the Goodwood Cup, to the extent that the professional advice was that he should be put down. His owners decided to persevere and eventually he made a full recovery and Jack Colling, who took over his training when Mercer retired, ran him eight times, winning the Brown Jack at Ascot by 10 lengths. Yet even as Colling was taking the saddle from Trelawny’s back, Mrs.Carver, the horse’s owner, was starting a dispute with her trainer that resulted in the horse being transferred to George Todd, reputedly the best trainer of stayers in the country.
He didn’t stay long at Manton, as the Carvers (they owned E.S.B., the 1956 Grand National winner) wanted the horse run over hurdles, hence his detour to Kinnersley and the Rimells.
On his return to Manton, George Todd had his way and achieved a small ambition by winning the Ascot Stakes, Trelawny carrying a near weight-carrying record of 9st 8Ibs to victory by 4-lengths. A few days later Trelawny completed the ‘stayers double’ by winning the Queen Alexandra Stakes, the first time it had been achieved in 25-years. He won the same two races the following season, though in the Ascot Stakes he carried a welter burden of 10-stone. The same season he won the Goodwood Cup. It was his final win in a flat race.
The Carvers decided to relaunch Trelawny as a hurdler but George Todd refused yet again to agree and the great horse once more was dispatched to Kinnersley where he proceeded to win three races in a row, culminating in the Spa Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival, the race Paisley Park will doubtless be winning next week. He also won the Coronation Hurdle at Liverpool, his final victory as his form from then on deteriorated. The Carvers, adopting the principle of getting as much blood out of the stone as they could, demanded Fred Rimell run Trelawny over fences. He refused, even though he had schooled, as Mercy Rimell recorded in her autobiography ‘Reflections on Racing’ ‘quite brilliantly’. Mercy had known Stella Carver most of her life and considered her ‘a difficult owner’ and Fred, fearing Trelawny might suffer a horror fall, stood firm and insisted the horse deserved to be retired.
He got his retirement but he did not get his deserved long and pampered life, with a gravestone to mark his final resting place. But in the Carvers he was not blessed with owners of sentiment and he lived for only two more years with his body fed to the hounds as if he were nothing but a dead sheep or cow.
Nothing of what I have written has come from my memory. It is all to be found in ‘Masters of Manton’, a really fine racing book. So why does the name Trelawny conjure so much fondness in me. I wish I knew the reason why. But for a long time, I thought I’d name my first-born Trelawny. Or my first dog. Or house. None of which has thus far come to pass.
I hope that when I die, I go to a place where horses such as Trelawny and Spanish Steps live a life of equine luxury and I’ll be able to pat their graceful necks and try to explain to them what they meant to me when we all toiled on this unforgiving plane of existence.