England -- Social life and customs; Gambling -- Great Britain
At an early period of the examination of witnesses, Mr Baron Alderson
expressed a wish that he and the jury should see the horse; and Mr
Cockburn said he had no objection. On the cross-examination of William
Smith, a training groom residing at Epsom, it came out that the horse
had been smuggled out of the way, that it might not be seen by the
defendant’s agents. The Judge, animadverting on this, and on the
evident perjury of the witness, said it would be better that the horse
should be seen by him and other parties. The Solicitor-General, who
appeared for the defendant, was anxious that the horse should be seen
by veterinary surgeons. To which the other side objected, maintaining
that the mark of mouth, by which alone these surgeons could judge of
the age of a horse, was a fallible criterion.
On the conclusion of the evidence for the plaintiff, the
Solicitor-General, in addressing the jury for the defence, denounced
the case as a gross and scandalous fraud on the part of the plaintiff.
The case of the defendant was, that the horse was not Running Rein at
all, but a colt by Gladiator, out of a dam belonging originally to
Sir Charles Ibbotson; and that it had the name Running Rein imposed
upon it, being originally called Maccabeus, and having been entered
for certain stakes under that designation. But his allegations were
against Goodman, not against Mr Wood: the former had entered into a
conspiracy with other persons to run horses above the proper age. The
Gladiator colt had been entered for races, under the name of Maccabeus,
before Goodman purchased him; and to run these races while the colt was
in training for the Derby, for which he was entered as Running Rein,
Goodman hired an Irish horse, which he disguised as Maccabeus, though
a year older than that horse. The Gladiator colt, the _soi distant_
Running Rein, when he ran for the Derby in 1844, was four years old,
the race being for three-year-old horses. After hearing some evidence
in support of these statements, the case was adjourned till the
following day.
The next day, when Mr Baron Alderson took his seat on the Bench, a
conversation ensued between Mr Cockburn and the Judge, respecting the
production of the horse. Mr Cockburn asserted that it had been taken
away without Mr Wood’s knowledge, and thus it was out of his power to
produce it; he felt it would be vain to strive against the effect which
must be produced by the non-production of the horse, after the remarks
of the learned judge on that point. After some more conversation,
however, the case proceeded, and two witnesses for the defence were
examined, whose evidence went to prove that Running Rein was, in fact,
the Gladiator colt. Mr George Odell, a horse dealer at Northampton,
said he could swear to that fact; the colt had two marks on one leg.
Mr Baron Alderson remarked—“Now, if we could see the horse, that
would prove the case. Who keeps him away? It is quite childish to act
in this manner.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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