Best Australian Racing Stories (15 page)

His Toowoomba record therefore stood at 11 wins from 19 starts—impressive, but not sensational, and certainly not the sort of credentials upon which many turf experts would later base their judgement that Bernborough, of all Australian thoroughbreds, was the greatest.

In later years many people closely associated with the Bernborough camp, which won a lot of money knowing when to back the ‘one day on—one day off ' champ, revealed details which give reason to believe Bernborough could have won all those Toowoomba races in a canter.

Part 1 The Daylate–Brulad ‘ring-in' scandal

The background to Bernborough's restricted early racing went back to Queensland's infamous Daylate–Brulad ‘ring-in' scandal, when the Queensland Turf Club's investigation led to the life disqualification of Oakey farmer Fred Bach.

In December 1938 a horse named Brulad, owned by Bach and trained by Con Doyle, flashed home at double-figure odds to run third behind Tollbar in the QTC Champagne Stakes at Eagle Farm. A week later the bay gelding, by Brutus out of Lady Chillington, was heavily backed at 3 to 1 and won the 5-furlong Oxley Handicap at Eagle Farm, despite badly missing the start. The time, 61.5 seconds, was the fastest registered by a two-year-old for the season.

Brulad was sent for a spell, returning in February 1939 for three disappointing unplaced runs. Then the horse began to show form. He ran third at Eagle Farm, before being well supported and defeating the odds-on favourite, top colt Brisbane River, in the 6-furlong Juvenile Handicap at Eagle Farm in April. After that win, Fred Bach was offered £1000 for Brulad but refused to sell.

Brulad was beaten in his last three starts of that season and then, as a three-year-old, failed to show any form and was beaten in six successive starts. The horse was now in the stable of Clive Morgan, who sent the horse back to Bach in February 1940, suggesting he needed a long spell. Morgan never saw the horse again and Fred Bach told the trainer that Brulad had died. The same year a four-year-old brown gelding, Daylate, by Listowel out of Fernie–hurst, was registered in the ownership of a certain J. Jackson.

Daylate's first start resulted in a second place in a Hack Handicap at Warwick, in October 1940. A month later he won easily at Bundamba. Fred Bach was at the course and backed the horse for a small fortune. ‘If I had one win a year like I had at Bundamba,' Bach later boasted, ‘I would be thoroughly satisfied.' Daylate then ran third at Bundamba and fourth in a Trial Handicap at Eagle Farm.

On 4 January 1941, Daylate ran in another Trial Handicap at Eagle Farm. Leading jockey Russell Maddock was engaged and the horse was heavily backed in the betting ring. A mysterious ‘Lady in Black' was reputed to have collected more than £1000 in winnings from bookmakers in the on-course betting ring alone. In 1941 that was enough to buy a couple of modest suburban homes in Brisbane.

The horse raced with the leaders until the 2-furlong mark and then dashed clear to win easily, beating a horse called Bullmar who was ridden by a youthful George Moore. Years later Maddock revealed, ‘I was asked only the night before the race to ride Daylate by the owner.'

No hint emerged that day of any behind-the-scenes drama, but the following Saturday QTC chief steward J.J. Lynch, accompanied by two racecourse detectives, arrived unannounced at the Doomben stables of Daylate's trainer J.H. McIlwrick. The news spread like wildfire that authorities had made a thorough examination of Daylate.

A reporter tracked down Lynch and asked him why he had inspected Daylate. ‘I cannot discuss that with you,' came the stern reply. It was also reported that two unnamed trainers, later identified as Con Doyle and Clive Morgan, who had previously trained Brulad, had also been asked to examine Daylate.

Neither trainer would make any comment but the rumour spread that Daylate bore a remarkable resemblance to Brulad, which Fred Bach had officially certified to the QTC office as being dead. Then Daylate suddenly disappeared from McIlwrick's stables.

What had happened was that a country steward named Steve Bowen, enjoying an off-duty day at Eagle Farm, had raised initial doubts about Daylate's identity and declared the winner was in fact Brulad. Similarly trainer Morgan told racecourse detective Charles Prentice that Daylate was Brulad. Prentice was at first dubious, but Bowen maintained he was certain because Brulad had a particularly unusual mane, which hung in three sections across his neck whenever the horse tossed his head—Daylate's mane fell in the same distinct pattern.

So Prentice and stewards Lynch and Williams set off in search of the mysterious owner of Daylate, ‘J. Jackson', who had a postal address at a cattle station near Bowenville. When Prentice asked to speak to Jackson, the station mistress told him that all correspondence for J. Jackson was in fact handed to a Mrs F. Bacon, who was Fred Bach's daughter.

Meanwhile a policeman turned up at Bach's property near Oakey one night but was mysteriously shot at and wounded. Fred's son Jack was later tried for the crime, but acquitted—he had an alibi to prove he wasn't at the farm that evening.

When Prentice and his companions went to Bach's farm, Fred Bach wasn't there, but his son Jack told them Brulad's body had been burned after the horse had died. Prentice later officially reported, ‘It was learned that the horse called Brulad had returned from Brisbane in a sick condition and subsequently died on Mister Frank Bach's property at Blaxland. Mister Jack Bach said he saw Brulad when the horse was dead and assisted his brother to burn the carcass.'

When Prentice went to see Frank Bach, however, Frank said he knew nothing about Brulad and had not helped Jack burn the carcass of any horse. It was when Prentice returned to Brisbane that Daylate suddenly disappeared from McIlwrick's stable.

Prentice, one jump ahead, had decided to ‘stake out' the stables and caught Fred Bach absconding with Daylate. At about 10 p.m. he saw Fred Bach enter the yard. At 10:15 p.m. he heard ‘knocking and hammering' and a few minutes later Bach led Daylate from the property. When he'd gone about 50 yards Prentice intercepted him and said, ‘Good night'.

When Prentice asked his name Bach replied ‘Jackson', but Prentice retorted, ‘You are Fred Bach.'

Bach then said, ‘You are Mister Prentice, how are you?' and shook hands.

When Prentice asked, ‘Why are you mixing yourself up in this sort of thing?' Bach appeared ‘flurried' and said Jackson was down the road. Prentice saw two cars further down the street and in one were two men who refused to give their names.

Eventually Bach confessed, ‘Now you've got me. There's nobody else in this. There is only me. I am Jackson. I suppose I'll get life. I'll take full responsibility for everything.'

At a subsequent QTC enquiry Fred Bach denied he had admitted being Jackson and refused to answer most questions. A CIB handwriting expert testified that the same person who had signed nomination forms for Daylate in the name of Jackson had also signed nomination forms for Brulad in the name of Bach.

On 20 January 1941, QTC stewards disqualified Fred Bach for life. The ban also applied to his son, Jack.

Part 2 Bernborough's mysterious ownership history

Fred Bach had two sons, John (known as Jack) and Frank. In 1940, some months before the Daylate–Brulad controversy, Jack had purchased the old mare Bern Maid, with a foal at foot, at the Rosalie Plains Stud dispersal, for 150 guineas.

Bach subsequently claimed to have sold the foal to A.E. Hadwen but, when the horse was entered for a two-year-old event in Brisbane in 1942, QTC stewards rejected the nomination. An official reason was never given but it was generally accepted that it was because of the colt's connection with the Bach family. Officials believed that the real owner was still Jack Bach.

The horse was then sent to Sydney, ostensibly by Hadwen, and trialled at Rosehill, but the AJC affirmed the Brisbane ban and refused any nomination for the colt. So Bernborough was banned from racing on any of the major tracks across Australia.

Only the Queensland country course at Toowoomba accepted the bona fide of Bernborough's sale. This they did after an enquiry, allegedly conducted by Darling Downs steward George Kirk, into the authenticity of a receipt signed by J.R. Bach for the sale of Bernborough to Hadwen for 140 guineas.

Hadwen said he bought the horse on 22 June 1940, after asking Bach to find him a good horse. Bernborough was then purportedly leased to trainer J. Roberts and raced solely in Toowoomba for four seasons, winning 11 races under often enormous weights.

Finally, in October 1945, the champion was sent to Sydney as a six-year-old, to be sold at public auction. Flamboyant restaurant and nightclub owner Azzalin Romano duly purchased him for Harry Plant to train at Randwick.

Romano had been told to purchase the horse by Plant and paid 2600 guineas for him. After the sale to Romano the QTC lifted its ban on Bernborough. Hence the champ raced on city tracks only in his sixth and seventh years—winning 15 of his 18 races in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, at distances from 6 furlongs to one and a half miles.

Bernborough was a six-year-old bay stallion, then, when jockey Athol George Mulley first rode him. Mulley later recalled, ‘Bailey Payten, to whom I was apprenticed, told me there was a very good horse from Queensland to come up for auction. He said he would like to buy him. He was prepared to pay up to £10,000 or, being conservative, at least £5000.'

Payten told Mulley,‘I could afford to buy him, but it wouldn't matter how much money I've got he can't be bought, so I won't worry.'

Years later Mulley explained this cryptic comment by hinting that Romano was not the sole owner of Bernborough and told of an argument he overheard between the two men concerned late one night when trainer Harry Plant was not present.

‘My old boss, Bailey Payten, always maintained that there was no chance of anyone else ever buying Bernborough when he was put up for auction in Sydney,' Mulley said. ‘He said that too many influential men of the day were involved and suggested that a certain bill of sale would have made interesting reading.'

Author Frank Hardy later wrote that Mulley told him, ‘There was a mystery about the sale. Over the years, at parties, listening to various conversations, I gathered that certain important people in Sydney had arranged the sale and that apparently the original Queensland owner still retained a half-interest in the horse.'

Whatever the secret manoeuvrings away from public view, Bernborough was sold at public auction in October 1945 for 2600 guineas and duly arrived at the Randwick stables of trainer Harry Plant, a former Queensland buckjump champion and onetime professional horse breaker. Bernborough had previously raced on only one track—Clifford Park, Toowoomba.

Part 3 A true champion

At his first Sydney start, in a Flying at Canterbury on 8 December 1945, Bernborough met severe interference and finished on the heels of the placegetters. Plant, who'd trialled the horse in secret and knew he had a champion, had told Romano to plunge heavily. Romano backed the horse to win a proverbial fortune, lost the lot, and insisted Plant replace jockey Noel McGrowdie.

Then followed Bernborough's legendary sequence of 15 straight wins under huge weights, ridden by Athol George Mulley. The sequence began with a Sydney treble in the Villiers Stakes with 9 st 2 lb (58 kg) by 5 lengths; the Carrington Stakes, with 9 st 6 lb (60 kg); and the Australia Day Handicap, with 9 st 5 lb (59.5 kg).

Mulley was 21 when he first rode Bernborough to victory in the Villiers at Randwick on 22 December 1945. He had begun riding less than four years before, at age 17.

‘I was approached to ride Bernborough just for the one race and I took the ride only for one simple reason—I didn't have a riding engagement for the Villiers,' Mulley later recalled. ‘I didn't know I was taking the ride on a champion. I rode him in trackwork at the old Victoria Park course before the Villiers and he was a big strong horse. He had beautiful shoulders. He measured 17 hands and 1 inch, the same height as Phar Lap, but he was better balanced than Phar Lap. Bernborough's conformation was perfect.

‘I found out afterwards that he measured 67 inches from his ears to the top of his withers, and exactly the same from the top of his withers to his tail; that is a perfectly balanced measurement.' Later Bernborough's full galloping stride was measured at 27 feet (8.2 metres), 2 feet longer than Phar Lap's stride.

‘That first day at the track I noticed how well balanced he was and that as a walker he was terrific,' Mulley said, ‘and he had a marvellous temperament for a stallion. But if I told you I knew how good he was, I'd be telling a lie. Nobody knew then.

‘I obtained my first feeling that Bernborough was a champion when I won on him in the Villiers. There were no starting stalls in those days, it was a stand-up start. He was second last on settling down and about eighth at the turn and, when I called on him, that's when I first noticed how he dropped his off-front shoulder. I pulled the whip, but I didn't use it, just waved it at him, and a furlong out he leapt straight to the lead and won by 5 lengths. And I knew I had ridden a champion racehorse.'

Mulley was given the mount again for the Carrington Stakes, over 6 furlongs, which Bernborough won carrying 9 st 6 lb (60 kg) in 1 minute 10.25 seconds.

And so it went on, 15 consecutive times, until Bernborough and Mulley were household names throughout Australia.

After his three Sydney wins Bernborough headed for Melbourne and the big autumn races. He won the Futurity Stakes by 5 lengths carrying 10 st 2 lb (64.5 kg) and the Newmarket Handicap with 9 st 13 lb (63 kg). Mulley later told how he was offered £5000, a fortune in those days, to ‘pull' Bernborough in the Newmarket.

After the Futurity triumph Romano rushed up to the 21-year-old Mulley and declared, ‘Georgie, my boy, I am proud of you. Name anything you like and I'll get it for you. I will even let you marry my daughter!'