WHEN RECORDS ERR

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 15, 19 January 1933, Page 6

WHEN RECORDS ERR

TAMBOURIAirS CUP RIDER

DERRETT REMINISCENT

When reference has to be made to records of past events, oue usually feels quite justified in accepting the information therein contained. It may possibly hap- , pen, however, that the record is not correct, particularly in detail, and one must ,-then be very fortunate to have the mistake discovered, especially when the years elapsing have climbed to over half a century. . So in writing up recently the story of the second recorded Wellington Cup (named as the 1875 Gup), it was stated that the winner, Mr. D. O'Brien's Tambourini was ridden by O'Brien himself.' The record of the race certainly shows O'Brien ? s the rider, and so also does the report i° ™.?ost" of that d"to (3 rc i D ecem . per, 1874). O'Brien, however, was not *n the saddle that day. It was R. ("Bob") Derrett. ■ ~ ' Derrett is at present a visitor to Welimgton for the Wellington Meeting which opened to-day. He is now well into the seventies but he is hale and hearty still, witu all his old, keen sense of humour and a wonderful fount of reminiscence to draw* upon He rode his-first horse at Cnristehurch m November, 1870, he says 3ust ax months later than the late R J .Mason. In the years that followed' he ■was to become one of Xew Zealand's premier horsemen. "The ride on Tambourini was a chance one for me that day," he said; in a conversation. "I did not get it till just beiore the race, because Dan was too sick to come down,to the course. That's probably why.it was afterwards reported erroneously. ... "I was then in Dan O'Brien's employ Charles in the first race, a Maiden Plate run over a mile and a half at weight-tor: »h!'i i V°' year;olds were ™ tQ°se days the race, Lough Neagh-,- carrying 5 stone Sw? if + °k to° So6d ior the rest oilt: <?£? hZ^ e w-ay at Present. : t - J- iI(sV?P was die next race, and when I .unsaddled the Maiden Hate the late:' Charlie' Dawson, a friend of Dan's came over to me and said he had just lef£ 0 Bnen, who had had a bad turn. A doctor gs^at^ a^at Win'Hadlle? 6 *.'*' Us » • 7rTt m jO«rini' who was tljea a six-year-A^lßc^P^oa of the race in "The Pest" -on h verya^v Wpth^ Ta^°^i indeed by Mr PFT Premiei"' .wh ° ™as owned mmmm ■^7 heileT^ \ s^y in that. Maiden Plate «nanged to FishhooK, and he turned n»f Z&ffiS" *& sg byJnr dih ea rir muz ■m e blood.from KiMraWrtk f 3 '%°£."Z*i£ > '""■ "4 «"™ rigl t:eCOtdS mSy h*™°*S> and "B?b»

'■There's just another little story I-would 6 ,yi\to tell y°ur readers» Dlrrett concluded, "and that is that 'l%f Walker rode Lough tfeagh at the Par^'wis r cn, c of the'lightest boys that havet ever ,sat a saddle, in this country. His father fighter than Kitchener was in the days /yhen he.rode Red Deer toi,victory with '£«mi- stone in the Chester Cup. I don't keally know how they would have CO mRTt 1 bu* Talf haa to make up weightTo bide Lough Neagh at five stone. That was. ia twp-year-old's weight at a mile and a Cayg »n d?r the weight-for-age scale of those