Who was Jack the Ripper?

Did Archer-Shee steal the postal order?

Who thought up 'Trodmore' and did anyone profit from the mythical meeting?

Three of the more interesting mysteries from the pre World War I era.

The quick answers are: "don't know", "no, but he changed it at the post office as a prank" and "those that knew didn't let on".

And anyway what do we know about Trodmore?

Firstly the meeting was supposed to have been run on Monday 1 August 1898. This was the old Bank Holiday Monday before the proliferation of such things and the 40 hour week made the last Monday in the month a more rational day.

On that day due to be run was the Hurst Park Holiday Handicap worth £440, not a bad prize in those days, plus six other races. The population of Newton Abbot had a jumping programme and at Birmingham' s recently opened Bromford Bridge course there was the first day of a two day meeting. In what was a very full day's sport the denizens of the Ridings could journey to Ripon.

Over the water at Baldoyle the Duke of Wellington, the four legged holder of that title, was to win the Holiday Plate. If you fancied the Duke you could get 6/4 to your money as the local talent, in what was 'the getting out stakes’ went for Sunny Shower the even money favourite.

Incidentally they could have done with some showers, sunny or not, at Birmingham where it was reported by the McCall's man as 'hard going'. Though whether this was the state of the ground or winner finding or both is conjecture.

That was the Monday. But lets backtrack to Saturday.

It had been Goodwood week and the nobility having had a strenuous time on the Sussex Downs decreed that Alexandra Park should be the only place of equestrian entertainment. One might ask ‘had it been a bad week for the backers?’ Because that could have provided a sort of motive for what was to follow. There would be no settling on the Monday so some ready cash to play up would have come in handy.

In fact it had not been too bad a week to judge by the returns. A 100/7 shot Altesse had won the Stewards Cup but by and large the well supported horses had a good run. In the last race of the meeting though 3/1 was laid on No Trumps only to have Otto Madden pop up on the Sinopi 10/1 outsider of three.

So to lovely Alexandra Park. Perhaps not lovely but fairly rural. Highgate Village was still a village and there were plenty of trees and lots of grass in the vicinity. Politicians had not ordered that the only thing that mattered was the motor car and roads were in proportion. The race-course then was just over thirty years old, in its prime. On its opening in 1868 the Illustrated London News sent an artist to record the event. His finished picture shows a commodius and pleasantly proportioned stand and large crowd. The course itself was somewhat wider than in later years.

Those that remember the old place before a mixture of greed, snobbery and Fleet Street vitriol closed it may consider that the cast iron in '98 was still well painted, the pointing on the brickwork was pristine and the floorboards were still in place. It may be assumed that the clock that stood on the mantle in the Tatts Stand was attended by a guard of some kind this being the heyday of 'the Boys'.

Alexandra Park had reached its level. Ten years before the Sporting Life had said of the Wood Green Ascot; "No attempt is made by the management of this increasingly popular resort to go in for what may be termed high class sport". Well maybe. Just as well the reporter concerned could not see what has happened to the game 100 years on.

Saturday 30 July 1898 was a fairly routine afternoon in North London. They laid 33/1on Ugly, winner of the All-Aged Regulation Plate, one of the FIVE 5 furlong races on the card. I think even I with a press pass would have got rather bored with a nap hand of sprints. There was no rush to file copy so a convivial time could be had in the intervals between races. With five dashes up the frying-pan handle these intervals would be be of the maximum. And it was in one of these intervals that the idea was formed.

By the time Huntress landed the odds of twos on to bring down the curtain on another week the idea was formed. What was better than a meeting where you knew the results before hand? And knowing the results why bother with the tiresome business of inviting entries, printing racecards, advertising etc. Or even running the races. Especially when you had the means to publicise the 'meeting' in your own control.

In the hansom to the station, and the train to the heart of London the idea was was worked through. On the way home to south of the river a call is made at the Kings and Keys. This hostelry was but a door or two away from ‘The Sportsman’ and who should be there but a sub-editor collegue. This sub-editor is doing what all sub-editors do when not at their desk. That is to say he is enriching the shareholders of one of the breweries.

The idea is trotted out and embellished as the glasses empty. A card could be thought up, left for setting among the reports of that day's racing, and other news, without the compositors who came on duty Sunday night knowing who supplied the material.

What is more the compositor would not have to be given a cut of any proceeds. There was the rub. How to profit from the scheme? At this point enters the reporter who specialises in the green baize cloth and events thereon.

Up to now it has been a prank. The thought of profit a minor item. A few sovereigns maybe. But now the vista of wealth, or if not that a little high priced fun at Monte in the winter, looms. How much can you get on 'ready'? Who else is to be let in? The first thing to do is go to the office make up the card and put it among the other copy. A name? No good using a proper place so make up a name sounding fairly rural and for heaven’s sake check in the gazetteer you have not picked somewhere that does exist! Trodmore. That will do.

Sunday dawns. So does the hangover. So does the realisation of what happened LAST NIGHT.

An urgent conference is what is needed. So after the Sabbath familial duties that not even a Victorian racing writer can dodge it is back to the Kings to try to halt the juggernaut. But its too late!

The billiard man informs his partners that he has pawned all he can and the street corner bookies are going to be crippled. The Sub has arranged to handle the results side of the matter and any exes that had been earmarked for sending a boy to a remote Post Office to telegraph the ‘results’ would not be needed. Drinks all round at this news!

The Sub now seeks to spread the stakes about; a fiver here and a tenner there, and averaging two to one for his money [no sense in being greedy] the suburban villa and the red-head from the Criterion can be his. Like the man who visits an Irish chiropodist the journalist, the man who actually thought up the whole thing, realises his fate is in another's hands. He had better lie back and enjoy it.

A common story is decided upon. Trodmore has to be near a country place that can be confused with another to buy time in case of problems.

Widely spaced places with the same name? How about St Ives. One is in Cornwall and one in Cambridgeshire so thats fairly far apart. And about getting money on. Mix up some selections for the away meetings with the certainties. Under pain of pain do not go in for doubles and trebles. Nice single events are what is required. The glasses are drained. The Sub goes to the office. The turn of the century Clive Everton to see what else may be ‘popped’. And the scribe, home.

Hurst Park has joined the majority. I remember the sadness I felt when I heard it was to be sold up for bricks and mortar. Even as a child I could not understand it. Close a racecourse to build houses! Goes against nature. Still some good did come out of it as an aquaintance got to the scene with a horse box and removed as much of the decorative ironwork as she could. It stands now at an isolated Surrey farmhouse.

It would have been better for the triumvurate if the couse had been shut 64 years earlier as shortly after Huntress took the opener at 11/8on an event happened that caused the whole scheme to unravel. It was the same Huntress that won the last on Saturday at A P.

Charles and George Somers were bookmakers. They traded in what was even than an old fashioned style. They eschewed the chalk, joint and clerk and cruised the ring each with a ledger on which was emblazoned Coulson and Co. Using their contacts to the full they made a living. And not a bad living at that.

It is George that interests us. A talented man. Very good at billiards. Won the Victoria Club Committee Cup three times. No mug George. When he sees a face he knows not unconnected with his night-time hobby he nods and the client produces a paper with five selections inscribed thereon. "Lay us these George to a tenner each S.P.". A glance, a quick "You're on", the paper disappears into the bookie's pocket, the cash to his wallet and the billiard reporter into the crowd.

The events of the day are played out. The pencillers have best in the final event the mile Welter Handicap. Only those who subscribe to the 'back the outsider in a three horse race’ system draw as a 50/1 shot Sutton ridden by Mr Hoboken beats Worsthorne [s.p. 15/8on] a length.

Messrs. Somers go home to dine and make up their accounts for the day. Difficulty is experienced in finding some of the runners they have laid and it is only after combing The Sportsman that in an obscure corner the card for Trodmore is found. All things considered not a bad day.

The gilt is somewhat off the gingerbread next morning though. The tenner selections from the hack fall into two well differentiated groups. The first consists of two selections for the Ripon meeting they are, to mince no words about it, stumers. The second is three gems. Winners at twos, threes and fives at Trodmore. At least thats what The Sportsman says. What about The Sporting Life? As the legal eagles have it, The Life is silent on the matter.

It may be now, on rising, that the conspiritors having pre-celebrated events realise that had it been a properly planned operation they would have tied matters up with their confreres on The Life. After all some bookmakers only pay out on the results as in the Life. Nothing to be done about it now apart from bluffing it out. And get in all the money possible before the crash.

George Somers like the well trained bookmaker he was waited for the winnings to be claimed and who should be in the ring at Brighton on Tuesday? Correct. "Thats £130 you owe me George". Mr Somers prevaricates and then follows up the straight left "Not till I see the results printed in the Life" with the right cross "and where the Dickens IS Trodmore anyway?" Somers is referred to St Ives. Somers telegraphs both the home of the stannaries and the fen country. He telegraphs the local Post Office and, you might think unsportingly, the local constabulary. The enquiry is short and to the point:

We know the answer. And shortly did Somers.

This being life with the lower case ‘l’ rather than the upper case, things are messily proceeding. The street bookies in the main are paying out. So are some of the legit firms. The Life's office if not being inundated with queries as to the Trodmore returns is at least being pestered. A helpful subeditor therefore clips from The Sportsman the results, marks them up and sends them via a copy boy for setting. And again this being 'life' we meet the all-thumbs compositor and the semi-blind proof reader. One sets 5 to 1 as 5 to 2 for one winner. The other fails to spot it. The presses roll on Wednesday's edition.

Wednesday's edition hits the streets. And something else hits. Confusion reigns. And whenever there is doubt the bookmaker's sachel closes.

Were you to have been at one of the main line stations about this time you would have seen a somewhat worried looking man hastening for a dark and empty compartment. Whether his destination was St Ives or elsewhere is not known but it is recorded that his health did not improve for same time and his shadow was not seen in Fleet Street for many a day.

The sub and billiard reporter stood their ground. Whether Somers ever returned the £30 owing on three 'non-runners' is not recorded.

That was the best known ramp racing has seen. Best known as it was done, as it were, in public. What, was the bottom line? How much was taken? Well lets not beat about the bush, how much was stolen from the books?

A lot of the money was not claimed that was 'won' from credit bookmakers. It was said that many bookmakers paid out substantial sums. I cannot believe that. The whole thing was thrown together. If it had been a genuine money-making scheme some if not all the loose ends would have been tied up.

Even that most sensitive of instruments the bookmakers grapevine could not have reacted quickly enough IF ONLY the card and results had been placed in The Life.

It is highly unlikely that anything was committed to paper so it is doubtful now, more than 100 years on, that the full story will ever be told. It could be that in some attic the original draft of the card and results exist but it is more likely that as soon as the police offered a £100 reward 'for information received’ the fireplaces of Victorian London were given a boost. The amount of reward, no doubt contributed by the bookies, shows that no great blow was dealt them.

Alexandra and Hurst Parks are gone; the consplritors are gone; the horses including Huntress are long gone. But there will be racing tomorrow .....................