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FAMOUS HORSES DISPUTED ORIGIN INVESTIGATION OF THE BEND OR TADCASTER CASE CASEREVEALS REVEALS EXTRAORDINARY LAXNESS IN THE RECORD RECORDOF OF FOALING AT A GREAT ENGLISH STUD By SALVATORJ In modern times no horse more thoroughly entitled to be called great has appeared than was llonil Or Himself a Derby winner and of one of the most thrilling Derbys ever run s a progenitor only St Simon among his contemporaries or successors ranks with or above him It is unnecessary to go into details regarding his achievements for the story is familiar to all turfmen but to single out a few names only we mention that Ormonde the horse of the century and still by common consent the mightiest that Britain has produced was his son Ormonde won 142325 and was never defeated In his turn he sired Ormc which won fourteen out of eighteen races and 1 30 and then sired Flying Fox which won nine out of eleven races and inii400 Topiary a daughter of Orme produced Tracery winner of six out of nine races and 101085 while Optime another Orme mare produced Sysonby winner of fourteen out of fifteen races and 184438 Again Ornament sister of Ormonde produced Sceptre winner of thirteen out of twentyJive races and 20100 while Lemberg son of Cyllene by Bona Vista by Bend Or won seventeen out of twentythree races and 2047 Cyllene himself having previously won nine out of eleven races and 128150 128150Many Many other only less splendid names might bo added to the above brief roster but their citation would be superfluous Sufficient be it to say that the debt of the thoroughbred breed as at present con ¬ stituted to this son of Doncaster is one tiiat cannot be called other than incalculable His blood more ¬ over promises to go on and on and there seems no reasonable room to doubt that its potency will prove a permanent force for good Yet how many turfmen today remember if in fact they ever were aware of it that a shadow rests over the identity of Iend Or which while officially dissipated was never con ¬ clusively expunged expungedRend Rend Or was bred by the Duke of Westminster at Eaton one of the most famous of all the ducal speed nurseries of England if notJ iudeel tho most so H was foaled in 1877 and cauicout1as atwo yearohl matting his debut at Newmarket in the Chesterfield Stakes which he won impressively It is unnecessary to give the itinerary of his racing career of which the most stirring portion involved his rivalry with Robert the Devil in his threeyearold form They met four times and three times Robert won to Rend Ors once but the latter by defeating his adversary in the Derby by a short head under Archers masterful riding really got the best of him in a classic sense The following year as four yearolds the two fought out a final duel in the Epsom Gold Cup when Rend Or though Robert was the favorite defeated him by a neck at even weights weightsRobert Robert the Devil was owned by Charles Rrewer in partnership with his trainer Rlanton and the colts defeat in the Derby was a sore blow to them Rut shortly after that race was run the owners of the loser caused a sensation by asking for an investigation of the antecedents of the winner on the ground that he was not bred as represented Which if true meant that Bend Or must de disqualified and Robert the Devil proclaimed technically if not actually the Derby winner The source of Mr Rrewers com ¬ plaint was as follows followsROUGE ROUGE ROSE VERSUS CLEMENCE CLEMENCEIn In 1870 among the mares lined to Doncaster by the Duke of Westminster were Rouge Rose a chest ¬ nut by Thorninnhy and Clemence a chestnut by Newminster In 1877 each foaled a chestnut colt Rouge Roses being named Rend Or and Clemences Tadcrster It was the complainants contention that the colt raced as Rend Or was really Tadcaster the two foals like the historic twins of comic opera having got mixpd It appeared that as early as July 1S79 when Rend Or or the colt so called made bis twoyearold debut at Newmarket he had been seen by a number of the stud grooms from Eaton who looking him over curiously had pricked up their ears and declared that he was not the colt dam Rouge Rose but the one dam Clemcnce This gossip however while it persisted snbrosa came to nothing until Rend Or having the next year won the Derby it suddenly became public property The man in charge of Doncaster it appeared had been talking and this talk had reached as it was bound to reach the cars of Mr Rrewer who after consulting with Prince Saltykoff decided to lay the case before the stewards of the Jockey Club When this was done the sensation was as may be imagined prodigious indeed it is improbable that the Rritish turf world was ever rocked by a bigger one not even that of Running Rein the false Derby winner of 1841 The upshot was an investigation by the Jockey Club Four days were consumed in hearing and deciding upon the evidence and finally a verdict was rendered that Rend Or was bred as represented and was of Rongo Rose and not Clemence The verdict however never entirely dissipated the doubts except among those with the will to believe on account of the nature of the testimony testimonyThe The star witness in the case was one Arnull who had oversight of the foals at Eaton his son being his assistant He it was who insisted that the Derby winner was the Clemence colt However the record of the Dukes foals which Arnull was supposed to keep containing a detailed statement of their identity marks etc proved inaccurate and incomplete and Arnulls own memory led him into conflicting state ¬ ments Moreover as Arnull and his son were under notice of discharge from Eaton and other witnesses stoutly affirmed that Rend Or was the Rouge Rose foal they were finally discredited by the stewards who tried the case and Rend Or given a clean bill of health healthThe The trial developed many interesting things and perhaps the most interesting was that Major Rarlow who was officially the superintendent of the Dukes stud and its responsible manager had kept no stud book or foal register whatever and was just as confused and contradictory in his testimony as was Arnull who was merely one of his employes And this leads to a still more interesting thing which the Earl of Suffolk in his work on the Rritish turf published shortly after the affair characterized as fol ¬ lows lowsEARL EARL OF SUFFOLKS CAUSTIC COMMENT COMMENTIt It was at this point of the inquiry that the extraordinary fact came to light how few there arc among breeders of thoroughbred stock who do keep any such register This considering the value of the animals produced the perfect possibility of mistakes occurring and the disastrous inconvenience which might thus accrue does strike us as an instance of remarkable and dangerous neglect of interests both public and private privateNow Now if these things were true as unquestionably they were the mere question as to whether Rend Or was a son of Rouge Rose or lenience which herself won lasting fame as the granddam of the re ¬ nowned Carbine sinks into insignificance beside that of the conditions it revealed as concerns the accuracy with which the genealogies of Rritish thoroughbreds may be regarded Lord Suffolks remark that these conditions constituted a remarkable and dangerous neglect of interests both public and private seems fully justified and we are also justified in wondering how many changelings and genealogical errors may not in the history of the breed have been perpetrated perpetratedThe The foundations of the breed were laid under the Stuart kings in the first place and later under Wil ¬ liam and Mary Queen Anne and the Four Georges The patronage of Newmarket by royalty began in the reign of James I who was passionately fond of the turf His son Charles I was less so yet racing thrived under him nevertheless He was dethroned and beheaded and Oliver Cromwell became Protector of the Realm and refused its crown when it was offered him His death was followed by the Restoration which saw the Stuarts again upon the throne Charles II the merry monarch was the son of Charles I and he was succeeded by his brother James II Charles II was one of the most infatuated of racing devotees and even rode his own horses in matches if old turf history be true His reign saw both racing and breeding become irmly established under his personal leadership James II who followed him held the throne but a short time and was then driven from it William Prince of Orange who had married James daughter Mary was then made king and Mary queen and when they passed Marys younger sister Queen Anne ascended the throne She was the last of the Stuart line to reign in Britain for her death without immediate heirs left the crown to pass to the Hanover branch in the person of George I after whom George II George III and George IV reigned in succession To be Coutiined
