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New home for races

One thing which we all take for granted these days is adequate street lighting.

A field of 54 runners were put forward to contest seven races (three hurdles and four steeplechases), with such locally inspired names as the Rolleston Maiden Hurdle and the Westhorpe Selling Steeplechase.

Prize monies ranged from 25 to 40 sovereigns with the winner of the first race being won by Mr W. Gale riding a horse called Jessie Soden.

The Advertiser reported that the event was very well attended with many of the local gentry in evidence making it a "capital augury of what may be expected" in the future.

Regarding the course itself the paper noted that: "The riders had not a word to say except what was complimentary. As for the general public, they expressed themselves in terms on unmeasured approval."

The opening of the new racecourse at Rolleston was thus heralded as a great success by all concerned - a position which contrasted sharply with that faced by the company just a few months before when their previous venue (located at Southwell itself) had been closed down amid allegations of poor safety and maintenance.

It has been suggested that horse racing developed in Southwell from the time when tenants of church lands would gather in the town to pay their rents.

Here they would amuse themselves by testing the abilities of their horses by running informal races on Burgage Green. By 1853 this Whitsuntide custom had become so far formalised as to number among one of the county's most heavily attended social occasions.

Special excursion trains were laid on from Nottingham, Lincoln and Newark and in 1856 more than 1,300 people attended the event.

The whole occasion had taken on a carnival atmosphere with tents and sidestalls selling refreshments and travelling showmen setting up their boxing booths.

In 1886 Burgage Green was proving no longer sufficient to contain the races and a new racecourse was constructed a little way to the west on land bordered by the Ropewalk and Lower Kirklington Road.

This gave a race circuit of about 11/2 miles. A grandstand was built, followed by a second in 1890 when the annual Whitsun meeting was extended to two days.

The new course continued to attract large crowds for a number of years and in 1892 an autumn meeting over hurdles was introduced, further boosting the company's receipts.

In spite of these developments, however, by 1897 attendances (and entrants) appear to have declined sharpely and in October of that year, an inspection by the National Hunt committee raised concerns over safety and it was decided to withdraw the company's licence.

According to one source the circuit was said to cross the public road in two places, and although turf was laid on racedays, one jockey had already lost his life negotiating this curious arrangement.

The search to find a new venue in time for the spring 1898 meeting was immediately commenced and with remarkably alacrity favourable terms were negotiated for a site only a few miles away at Rolleston.

The new course - that which today is known as Southwell Racecourse - was conveniently situated only 100 yards from Rolleston railway station (by which method, it was calculated, most visitors would arrive).

It was laid out in a triangular shape over 11/4 miles: one fence was located at the apex, and two jumps apiece on each straight.

Inevitably the bends were a little tight, but the ground was level with a sandy subsoil leading to excellent turf. A 1,200-seater wooden grandstand was positioned so as to provide racegoers with an uninterrupted view of the entire course and the whole arrangement was serviceable (if not completely finished) by the time of the inaugural meeting on May 16, 1898.

Describing the new course for the first time the Advertiser said: "It is very prettily situated, and has for its background the charming little village of Upton, whose red-tiled houses rise out of the greenery on a hill to the north east."

Meetings continued to be held by the Southwell Racecourse Company right up to the second world war when the course was requisitioned by the RAF for use as a storage depot.

Racing recommenced in 1946 and with people eager to seize any opportunity of relief from wartime austerity, new attendance records were reached with sometimes up to 10,000 people turning up to a race meeting.

As the decades passed, increased ease of road travel brought the course in reach of many more people, and horses too began to arrive from stables much further afield.

A broader mix of entrants began to endow the course with a national reputation and by the early Seventies the number of meetings had risen to 19 a year.

Improvements at the course had also been instituted in 1965 with the start of a £90,000 investment programme including a new grandstand, club stand and re-siting of the parade ring.

TOP: A large crowd attended this meeting at Southwell Racecourse.
The picture was taken more than 60 years ago. It is thought the group of people standing in a circle in the foreground may have been watching a cock fight.

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