Low life
Part and parcel
Jeffrey Bernard
One of the more boring, sickening and sad things about becoming a more and more middle-aged hack is the business of having to write more and more obi- tuaries. Of course, you don't actually have to write them but they become obligatory in ways because you either liked the person who's just snuffed it or you're frightened you're next in the queue. Heaven and hell must be as overcrowded as the 7.30 a.m. from Chislehurst to Charing Cross. Last Monday, Brian Taylor died in Hong Kong after a fall at the Sha Tin racecourse from a pig of an animal that dropped the French jockey, Philippe Paquet, last February on the same course during an exercise gallop. Paquet has been in a wheelchair ever since. Perhaps he's lucky, whatever that means. But Brian Taylor, who won the 1974 Derby on Snow Knight, was a nice chap. He was a sort of domestic-looking man who nearly always had a pipe in his mouth when he wasn't actually riding and he was a crack shot with a 12-bore too when he wasn't riding. We had a few jars together from time to time and we once got a little sloshed together at Newmarket many years ago and proceeded to play a lunatic game of clock golf for £20 a hole on the lawn of the Subscription Rooms there.
My first racing hero, Manny Mercer, fell off a horse at Royal Ascot going down to the start, got kicked in the head and died at once. I suppose it's part and parcel of the business. That was years ago. His brother Joe is happily still going strong, but people in bars and pubs and clubs have been mouthing off about how Silver Star, the one that dropped Brian Taylor, should be put down. The horse that killed Manny Mercer, Priddy Fair, wasn't put down and why should he have been? I can't see why an animal as daft as a horse should be a particular respecter of human beings.
One of the most vicious and frightening things I've ever witnessed was a horse in the unsaddling enclosure at Newbury after a race, Ubidizzey, turning savage and trying to kill the stable lad. Half a ton of the monster literally knelt on his chest and tried to chew the boy's head off. A couple of policemen and the horse's trainer knocked seven kinds of shit out of the animal to get him off the lad. I seem to remember — I may be wrong — but I think Ubidizzey was barred from racing in Europe after that and had to be exported. Where to? You've guessed it. Hong Kong.
I once interviewed a horse who stood at the Fawley Stud near Lambourn called Supreme Sovereign. He was savage and had been so for years. The sight of the thing made the hair on the back of your head stand up. He was seriously bonkers. No one could go near him and they used to sling his grub through the door of his box. Oddly enough, he was a very good stallion and got a 1,000 Guineas winner, and was very, very gentle with the mares he co- vered. But as I say, he was mad. The vet, who had to see him, discovered that he'd been made savage by a stable lad in Ireland years previously who had the crazy habit of throwing buckets of water over him. Sup- reme Sovereign, he realised, was terrified of water and he found he could approach the horse without getting killed by splashing his hands in a pail of water. The horse simply loathed the sound of water being disturbed. But they even had notices all round the yard saying 'Beware. Danger- ous Horse.' He was very nearly white and he curled his upper lip like the George Stubbs horse being attacked by a lion, but his lips went back with fury and not with fear.
The only other thing I've seen so disgust- ing and frightening was a sergeant in the Scots Guards who kept me banged up in a Scotland Yard cell for 48 hours while awaiting an escort to take me back to Catterick after I'd overstayed my leave. That was in 1951. I slept on a wooden bed and he kicked me every three hours to wake me up and scrub it. Then I'd have to wait two hours for it to dry before I could get to sleep again. During those two hours he'd belt me around a bit. But it's all part and parcel, isn't it. Poor Brian Taylor gets killed. The Queen's trainer, Dick Hem, broke his neck outside hunting last week and a horse fell on Barry Hills at the same sport. Dear God, how lucky we are. The worst that can happen in a betting shop in Soho is to be tapped by an Italian waiter for a fiver.
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