-- Reviews by the Famous and well Known
I greatly enjoyed Tony Byles’ account of the amazing 1844 Derby. How it came to be written in the first place, thanks to Gina, is quite a story in itself and the subsequent eight years of research has resulted in a fascinating read.
Lester Piggott, Former Professional Jockey (Winner of the Derby 9 Times)
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As a horse racing historian I am well aware that the sport was plagued during the first half of the nineteenth century by, to use Tony Byles' words, "rampant scams, cheating, deceptions, substitutes and, yes, poisoning". But even against such a background, the "Running Rein Derby" of 1844 stands alone in terms of its sheer audaciousness. Tony has done an excellent and comprehensive job in unearthing the details and the aftermath of the episode. Furthermore, he relates the story in a such a way that brings the best out of the intriguing complexities of this extraordinary case.
Chris Pitt, Author of ‘Long Time Gone: The History of Britain's Defunct Racecourses’ and ‘When Birmingham Went Racing: A History of Birmingham's Racecourses’
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A fascinating publication, a story about racing scandals of old makes for an interesting and exciting read also today, not only for enthusiasts of the turf. As absorbing as a good crime novel, it is also a superbly documented piece of historical work on extraordinary events from racing's colorful history.
Dr. Jacek Lojek, Warsaw Agricultural University (Faculty of Animal Science)
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The most ripping of all horseracing's ripping yarns, told with panache, deep knowledge of the sport's history, and a wealth of detail. People keep asking whether horseracing is cleaner than it used to be. This book provides the incontrovertible answer.
Sean Magee, Author of ‘Ascot: The History’, ‘Lester's Derbys’ and ‘Arkle: The Story of the World's Greatest Steeplechaser’
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IT was way back in my pre-teen years when I discovered racing, and while I liked to follow the form in my father’s Daily Express and my aunt’s Daily Mirror, it was not what The Scout or Newsboy was tipping that appealed to me. With pocket-money of half a crown a week, and sweets and comics to be bought, it was not realistic to think about the game as a medium for betting.
No, what grabbed me most especially was the rich and colourful history of a sport whose origins pre-dated those of football and cricket, and the realisation that here was a pastime that had gripped imaginations for more than two centuries, that had been faithfully recorded throughout that time, and that offered me the opportunity to delve into a past so much more fascinating than Britain’s loss of her colonies or the Napoleonic wars.
The history I was taught in the classroom, about events whose cause and effects were so remote from my view of reality, could not begin to compare with the living history of horseracing, as exemplified by its continuity – including some contests that had been renewed annually from the time of George III down to the reign of Elizabeth II.
It was natural for me to focus on the Derby, the race that through the generations since its inception in 1780 had been the one most coveted by every owner, breeder, trainer and jockey, and which still, in the middle of the twentieth century, held every enthusiast in thrall. I memorised the names of all the winners, and constantly sought more information about anything that appertained to the history of this great and fabled institution.
Of all the Derby renewals I read about, one stood out as different from the rest. Yes, there were plenty of great winners and great contests to stir the imagination, but what happened in 1844 beat the lot as something apart – a landmark in the history of horseracing itself, with the first horse home disqualified, exposed as an impostor.
I have waited over half a century for the full story of this scandalous and intriguing affair, and take my hat off to Tony Byles for the prodigious research he has undertaken in compiling this comprehensive account of a saga that shook the nation more than a century and a half ago, and is guaranteed to fascinate readers of the modern era.
Tony Morris, Horseracing and Pedigree Journalist - Written the Foreword
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BYLES, TONY. In Search of Running Rein: The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby. Clacton-on-Sea, Essex: Apex Publishing. Pp. xiii + 226. 21 illustrations, index. £12.99 hb.
Back in 1996, I wrote a short article on Lord George Bentinck, the Jockey Club and racing morality in mid-nineteenth century England, which in part explored the various famous racing scandals attached to the 1844 Epsom Derby, setting it in the broader context of British racing culture. The Derby was and is the leading English race for three-year-olds. Only the best of such young horses coped with its mile and a half of undulating and demanding turf, and by 1844 it was a major betting focus. That year there were two attempts to secretly substitute three-year-old entries with similar horses a year older and so stronger and more mature. These potential substitutions were already rumoured well before the race, and formal objections by Bentinck and others owning horses were made in the race in the week before the Derby. But both the Epsom stewards and the Jockey Club strangely refused to act. One of the substitute horses, racing under the name of Running Rein, actually won. The notorious gambler and defaulter Abraham Levi (a.k.a. Goodman) was the man behind this audacious fraud. The other substitute horse, Leander, owned by the German horse dealers the Litchwald brothers, was struck by Running Rein’s hoof during the race, and later destroyed. The substitution was revealed when his body was examined. Bentinck’s own horse Ratan, a leading favourite, was rumoured to have been ‘made safe’, and though Bentinck checked the betting book of his jockey, Sam Rogers, and had the horse guarded closely, it finished a poor seventh. Later in the year Rogers was ‘warned-off’ by the Jockey Club. After the race Bentinck took up the cause of the second horse Orlando, and tracked down the evidence to ensure that Running Rein was disqualified.
The tale is a fascinating one, merging complex contemporary attitudes to gambling and social class mixing with honour on the turf and ethnic prejudice, and the race has recently attracted more substantive coverage in the form of two book-length studies. In 2010 professional writer Nicholas Foulkes brought out Gentlemen and Blackguards: Gambling Mania and the Plot to Steal the Derby of 1844 (London: 2010). This was extremely well constructed, entertaining and hugely readable. However it exploited few new sources, whilst Foulkes’ actual understanding of racing, horses and the wider context was relatively limited. .
By contrast Tony Byles is not a professional writer or historian, but has a love of horses and racing. To his credit he exhibits many of the historian’s skills, and he provides us with a stronger account than hitherto, for three main reasons. Firstly, the depth of his historical research stands out, as does his exploitation of a much wider range of sources than previously. Among these were material in Jockey Club and Weatherby’s files, court transcripts, county archives, records offices and the newspaper archives at Colindale, especially the sporting press. Second, this was a very complex, difficult case both in its details and in its aftermath, and both are handled well, with a strong sense of the cultural context, drawing attention to new insights and findings. Thirdly, the book, rarely for a sports history, conveys a sense of place as well as time. Byles visited training centres and racecourses associated with the event, such as Newmarket, Epsom and Norton (Malton, Yorkshire), as well as the country houses of some breeders and owners, and even travelled to Poland in his pursuit of what happened to ‘Running Rein’ afterwards.
There are a few reservations.. Its bibliography of secondary works is relatively brief, and the footnoting is limited. Byles has a love of horses and racing, but historians of sport may well find the occasional chapters and appendices devoted largely to conformation and breeding of the horses involved less interesting than they undoubtedly are to those readers which anthropologist Kate Fox, in The Racing Tribe: Watching the Horsewatchers (London, 1999) succinctly summarized as ‘horseys’ and ‘anoraks’, both groups attending race meetings who have a particular interest in racehorse breeding details.
One aspect of the story is under-played. Both Levi and the Litchwalds were Jewish at a time when gambling Jews were increasingly exploiting the opportunities racing offered, acting as owners and backing horses. Most came from relatively poor backgrounds, and though their behaviour was little different from many other turfites, they faced substantial anti-Semitic feeling amongst some at least of the upper classes with whom they mixed on the Turf. Whilst Bentinck’s political links with Disraeli over the Corn Laws might suggest otherwise, his actual correspondence in the early 1840s suggests a similar antipathy. Substitutions, manipulation of horses in the betting market, the pulling of horses by jockeys, could all be found across racing both before and after 1844, and despite the publicity there was certainly little if any initial change in overall attitudes and behaviour within racing. Would there have been the same public interest and media frenzy, and would Bentinck have done the detective work, if Levi had not been Jewish?
But historians who want to understand what racing in England was like around the middle of the nineteenth century would gain insight from Tony Byles’s book. It is a fascinating piece of social, sporting and racing history.
• Mike Huggins, University of Cumbria.
1 M. J. Huggins , 'Lord Bentinck and the Jockey Club; Racing Morality in Mid-Nineteenth Century England', International Journal of the History of Sport, 13, 3 (1996), pp. 432-444
Dr Mike Huggins, University of Cumbria (Emeritus Professor of Cultural History)
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-- Newspaper and Website Reviews
IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Shropshire Star
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Daily Star Sunday (Take 5 Magazine)
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RACY BOOK TELLS OF 1844 SCANDAL
Tony BylesHorse-racing fans were treated to a book signing about the 1844 Epsom Derby scandal.
Racing expert and historian Tony Byles signed copies of his book In Search of Running Rein: The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby in Waterstones, St Neots.
The book chronicles the deceit surrounding the original but subsequently disqualified Derby winner, Running Rein, who was victim of a betting coup orchestrated by Abraham Levi Goodman.
The fraud caused the 1844 Derby to become one of the most scandalous on the turf.
Mr Byles, who lives near Ironbridge, Shropshire, said: “I’m excited about being here for the book signing in St Neots.
“Although the topic of the book is specific, anybody will find it an extremely interesting read. The book took me eight years to write and I was spurred on when my daughter worked at Newmarket Racecourse. She found piles of papers relating to the 1844 scandal and the book went from there.”
Mr Byles has been a member at Newmarket racecourse for many years. The book costs £12.99.
Cambridge News
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Ipswich 24 Magazine
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The Cheltonian Magazine
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Kent on Saturday
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The Weekly News
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Country & Border Life
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West Sussex Gazette
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The Comet
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BYLES, TONY. In Search of Running Rein: The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby. Clacton-on-Sea, Essex: Apex Publishing. Pp. xiii + 226. 21 illustrations, index. £12.99 hb.
This is an authoritative and readable account of the Running Rein Affair and ranks alongside all the other attempts to understand what happened when a gang of conspirators led by Abraham Levi Goodman tried to win the Derby by deception.
We now know that Running Rein ‘won’ the 1844 Derby and was later exposed as the four-year-old Maccabeus, and thereby disqualified. There had been rumours before the race that Running Rein/Maccabeus was a year older than he should have been, but the Epsom Stewards allowed him to run. The owner of the second objected; Lord George Bentinck took up the case. Eventually the horse was disqualified when he could not be produced before the judge. The story has always been told and retold as an ‘open and shut case’. It was inevitable that he would be disqualified as soon as it was proved that he was a four-year-old. Or so you would think.
But the story did not have quite that certitude at the time. Squire Osbaldeston in His Autobiography* had backed the horse to win several thousand pounds on the basis of his run at Newmarket. Osbaldeston had heard the rumours and therefore wanted to make sure that he did not need to hedge his bets after the race. He approached the connections of Running Rein and, perhaps not surprisingly, was reassured by their solicitor that they had a ‘plain unvarnished case’ and that it would be impossible for the prosecution to prove otherwise. Osbaldeston sat through the trial and judged that for most of the time the Running Rein party was winning ‘in a canter’ and that his bets were safe. It was not until near the end that Osbaldeston knew that he was sunk by ‘old Worley (the farmer)’, who produced evidence that was so clear that ‘not one iota could be contradicted’.
Lord George Bentinck took up the case as soon as the race was run, but it took him a couple of months to gather his evidence. This was not a simple case of turning up and running an impostor in the race. There had been months of planning. A horse had to be found that could run in earlier races and the conspirators had to cover their tracks and distance themselves from the fraud.
Tony Byles has gone back to basics to understand how the fraud was set up and executed. His daughter had found the original case notes when she was working at the Jockey Club. We owe Tony a debt of gratitude for wading through the court papers and then gathering his own evidence over eight years of dedicated effort. He even went to Poland to track down what happened to Maccabeus (renamed Zanoni). Having sifted through the evidence Tony has then put everything in order to produce a very readable account of what happened. This is the work of a racing man who has put his knowledge of racing into a proper understanding of how the fraud was perpetrated and how Goodman and his gang nearly got away with it. It was not an open-and-shut case.
* Squire Osbaldeston His Autobiography, edited by E. D. Cuming (1926)
National Horse Racing Museum's Newsletter
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
The Brit (Madeira Newspaper)
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The Northern Echo
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The substitution of the four-year-old Maccabeus for the three-year-old Running Rein to win the 1844 Derby was well planned and almost flawless in its execution. It was the greatest racing scandal of the Nineteenth Century and was only unearthed by the dedicated detective work of Lord George Bentinck. With a keen ‘racing eye’ Tony Byles has gone to great lengths to uncover all the subterfuge of the perpetrators by a painstaking search of the original records and shows why they nearly got away with it.
www.thecoxlibrary.com
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Sport Magazine
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In Search of Running Rein
The Great Derby 1844
I have to admit I did have a chuckle at the recent melee at Ascot, because for so long horse racing has been perceived as a noble and sophisticated sporting event which isn’t attended by drunken yobs. Yet there is a history attached to the game that is dark. Such as the brutality of the race track gangs which were a social problem right up until the middle of the 20th Century, plus vast gambling scams and there was no bigger betting coup then The Epsom Derby of 1844.
Author Tony Byles has certainly done some painstaking research to retell the yarn, and the events before and after the race, as he takes us into a world of deceit, brutality, villains, noblemen, gambling dens, horses staking themselves by accident in the excitement after winning a race and a society gripped by betting fever.
Centring round Abraham Levi Goodman, whose cunning plan was to switch a three year old horse, for a four year old horse at The Epsom Derby. The Derby is a race for three year old thoroughbreds not four year old thoroughbreds, as an older horse would be able to handle the psychical demands of the mile and half course better then a younger horse. So Goodman disguised a four year old horse called Maccabeus for a three year old horse, Running Rein, by dying its hair and removing some its teeth. Documents were switched, horses were poisoned, men were beaten up, and people were being paid off all in the name of skulduggery and to obtain ill gotten gains.
Yet even when the villain, Goodman, enters the plot, you are unable to hiss and boo because you are overwhelmed with his bravery and ingenious planning, as he planned the event two years prior to the race date.
Goodman’s behaviour and actions did not go unnoticed as Lord George Bentinck was suspicious of Goodman from the onset. Acting like a detective by following his every move, and when Running Rein did win, Lord Bentinck encouraged the owner of Orlando, the horse that came second, to lodge a complaint.
Bentinck, himself, was certainly a known character within the world of horse racing, and like the values of the Victorian age of righteousness and accountability, Bentinck wanted to squash the Georgian age values of debauchery and overindulgence. Bentinck himself introduced the first smoking enclosure at a sporting event, by roping off an area at a race track, so it did not to upset the ladies who did not smoke. So maybe Bentinck and Goodman are symbolic of two ages clashing publicly.
So the celebrations by Goodman and his merry gang were short lived, as there was a steward’s inquiry. This led to a long drawn out court case, which saw men again scheme in order to protect their skin.
The trial became major news across England, as thousands upon thousands of the gambling public waited with baited breath, to see if Orlando or Running Rein was the eventual winner and in doing so, they could claim their winnings. In addition, the trial became the ideal opportunity for the government to tighten gambling laws, enforce stronger administration and raid smaller gambling dens.
This book is certainly worthy reading, paced out like a court trial and reads like a Victorian detective novel. It is an interesting combination of history, suspense, court room drama and thriller. It would make an ideal film or TV series, and the origin of the book itself is beautiful, as it was Byles’s daughter, Georgina, who brought awareness to her father, when she came across a box of original documents concerning the great scandal. So when Byles read these papers, he turned detective himself and in return has produced a warm, witty and intelligent insight into a part of sporting history the world of horse racing would rather forget.
www.zani.co.uk
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Pockington Post
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Spalding Guardian
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Great Yarmouth Mercury
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Racing Post
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Hampstead and Highgate Express
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Tenby Observer
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Blackpool Gazette
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Book Review
“In Search of Running Rein: The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby”, Tony Byles; Apex Publishing Limited 2011 (£12.99)
A chance find by the daughter of author Tony Byles provided the inspiration for this most interesting book. Whilst employed in the marketing department of Newmarket Racecourse, his daughter, Georgina, was checking out an outhouse for possible storage space when she came upon a brown manila envelope containing case notes and letters relative to one of the most infamous scandals in the history of the British turf – the disqualification of Running Rein, first past the post in the 1844 renewal of the Derby. Byles set himself the task of unravelling the mystery of that notorious race.
It would appear that, back in the early Nineteenth century, racing was full of what the author calls ‘murky practices and dirty tricks’, many of which are rehearsed before the full tale of Running Rein unfolds. It would perhaps be inappropriate to reveal the details of the attempted fraud here, but in essence the plan involved running a four-year-old horse in the Derby; the horse running as ‘Running Rein’ duly won the race, but then the real fun began as the battle for the race moved to the Courts.
Byles introduces us to a rich variety of characters forming the dramatis personae, from the wily Abraham Levi Goodman, master of skulduggery, to Lord George Cavendish Bentinck MP, one of the leading figures of the turf of the day. A measure of the wealth of information over which Byles pours to get to the bottom of the story is that he presents no fewer than 14 appendices, individual chapter notes and a lengthy bibliography. As a result, he surely has managed to write the definitive account of this affair. Not only is the identity of ‘Running Rein’ fully investigated, but the other issues arising from the amazing 65th running of the Blue Riband of the turf are also rehearsed in full – the tragic death of Leander (also suspected of being four, or even older) and the possible ‘nobbling’ of the first and second favourites.
For those interested in our stable, it’s interesting to see that one of the runners in the 1844 Derby was Sir Gilbert Heathcote’s Akbar. Markus Graff’s talented stayer of that name will, of course, have been named by or on behalf of the Aga Khan…..it would be interesting to know whether or not he was named after that runner, who, incidentally, finished seventh.
All in all, this is a book which can be strongly recommended to anyone who is either (a) interested in the history of the turf, or (b) seeking reassurance that racing is cleaner than it used to be!
Kingsley Klarion: The Monthly Magazine of Mark Johnston Racing
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Racing Post Sunday
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Thoroughbred Owner and Breeder Magazine
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Meon Valley News
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
Tony Byles new book about the fraud in the English Derby of 1844 is an intense read but Australian readers will recognise the swindle as being typical of many events both here and overseas. The detail that Byles has uncovered is remarkable for such a long ago event.
The planning that went behind substituting a 4yo Running Rein in the 3yo Derby was years of work and the subterfuge that went with it, transporting horses around the country and bringing in unsuspecting bystanders into the fraud is a remarkable web of deceit.
What is more remarkable is that, like with the Fine Cotton scandal here in Australia, the substitution seemed to be known by all and sundry in advance. In fact in this case the stewards were alerted to the scam in writing ahead of the running of the race but did nothing about it in the hope that the horse would not win and they’d be able to shovel it under the carpet.
Byles retelling of events that took place over 170 years ago and his placement of the characters, where they were and what they did is first class detective work. It takes a little while to get your head around it but as the action heats up towards the Derby itself it is hard not to keep reading to see how it all panned out.
In Search Of Running Reign is available at the Highstakes bookshop.
Garry Robinson, Winform (Australia)
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SHROPSHIRE AUTHOR UNCOVERS GREATEST SCANDAL IN RACING HISTORY
A Shropshire author is to explain for the first time the complete story of the greatest scandal ever to fall on the world’s most important horse race, The Epsom Derby, in a new book to be released in June this year.
Racing historian, Tony Byles from Madeley, Shropshire, uncovers new evidence to provide the complete story of how the 1844 Epsom Derby came to be regarded as the most infamous racing scandal of all time in his book, In search of Running Rein – The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby. While The Sport of Kings has been plagued by corruption since its birth, no other scandal before or since has matched The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Epsom Derby for audacity or infamy.
Byles explains how the racing world was duped when the race, eligible for three-year-old horses only, was won by a four-year-old horse – and therefore far stronger than its competitors – in a criminal scheme of creating an imposter thoroughbred, a four-year-old which would masquerade as a three-year-old. The conspirators sought to make a vast profit on the crime by betting on the four-year-old, a horse by the name of Maccabeus, who would act as an imposter for the genuine three-year-old, Running Rein.
The book uncovers the plot behind the event and how the conspirators would hide behind a patsy who would actually own the four-year-old in name to minimise their implication should their audacious plan fail. Byles brings to life the excitement of the race itself while the intrigue of the subsequent trial surrounds the conclusion of the story and the fate of the conspirators.
How Byles came to write the book is a story in itself. Entirely by chance, Byles’ own daughter found the previously forgotten legal case notes of the scandal’s trial while employed at Newmarket Racecourse, the home of UK flat horse racing. The find set Byles on an eight-year trail of research, including locations as far afield as Russia and Poland, to piece together the complete circle of events.
“As the world’s most important horse race, the Epsom Derby had always fascinated me, and none more so than the most infamous running of the event in 1844,” says Byles.
“While the story will fascinate racing fans, it is a saga of scandal, risk and corruption that should intrigue a far broader audience.”
“I greatly enjoyed Tony Byles’ account of the amazing 1844 Derby,” says nine-times winner of the Epsom Derby, Lester Piggot.
“How it came to be written in the first place, thanks to Gina, is quite a story in itself and the subsequent eight years of research has resulted in a fascinating read.”
In search of Running Rein – The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby, will be published on 3 June 2011 by Apex Publishing, and will be available from Amazon.co.uk, amongst other good book stores. For more information, visit http://www.1844derbyfraud.com
www.shropshirelive.com
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It’s the nicest looking book I’ve seen in ages, that’s without even mentioning the superb research Tony Byles did and the excellent writing.
www.bloodlines.net
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IN SEARCH OF RUNNING REIN
www.zmdom.com.pl
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Kent on Sunday
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BOOK REVIEW: THE RUNNING REIN DERBY
In Search of Running Rein: The Amazing Fraud of the 1844 Derby, by Tony Byles. Foreward by Tony Morris. Published 2011 by Apex Publishing Ltd, Essex, England. [Available through Amazon.com here in the States as a hardback or as a Kindle ebook.]
The history of the “Running Rein Derby,” as the 1844 renewal of the Derby at Epsom is better known, could not be more sensational if written as a script in Hollywood. With this story’s many bizarre twists, Hollywood producers would more likely reject it than take it on as a project. Although nearly unbelievable, this strange story really happened.
And although the major facts of the conspiracy to win the Derby with a 4yo are relatively well known to racing historians, author Tony Byles enlarges the tale with such a degree of detail as I’ve never before found in a racing history. Byles was signally aided in this plethora of added factual material by the finds of a manila envelope held in storage at Newmarket that was filled with original documents from the investigation into the 1844 Derby and then a contemporary “50-page document of case notes” about the race from Weatherbys.
The principal facts are that Levi Goodman bought a yearling colt from the first crop by the (later) important sire Gladiator in 1841 and another yearling colt by the lesser stallion The Saddler in 1842. Goodman switched the identities of the colts, racing the Gladiator colt as a 2yo and 3yo under the identity of the colt by The Saddler, registered under the name of Running Rein.
Goodman’s goal was to make a killing by betting on the colt in the Derby with the knowledge that he had an advantage unknown to most of the rest of the public.
Despite many kinks in the plan, Goodman was successful in the primary goal, and Running Rein won the Derby. But the devious ship was foundering even as the perpetrators sailed into the harbor of their criminal resort. Word had gotten out that Running Rein was not a 3yo, important figures on the turf had tried to prevent the colt from starting in the race, and shortly after Running Rein finished the Derby in the lead over Orlando by three-quarters of a length, the latter colt’s owner appealed the result to the courts.
Lord George Bentinck, an important breeder and owner in addition to becoming an important member of the British government, was central to unraveling the convoluted swindle that Goodman had organized.
And Goodman’s efforts were not the only ones exposed as fraudulent in the 1844 Derby. Another colt was declared over age, and the favorite and second-favorite apparently were doped to impair their performances.
As Morris writes in his foreward to this gripping saga, “I have waited over half a century for the full story of this scandalous and intriguing affair, and take my hat off to Tony Byles for the prodigious research he has undertaken in this comprehensive account.”
Among the stunning information that Byles imparts is that the Jockey Club had every reason to know that Goodman was attempting fraud but chose the path of least resistance. The result was the most scandalous sporting event of the 19th century.
It is a tale of racing that “shook the nation more than a century and a half ago,” Morris wrote, and it is one that is guaranteed to hold the interest of modern readers and sports fans, as well.
www.fmitchell07.wordpress.com
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