Renowned bloodstock writer Tony Morris with the 24th in his series celebrating 100 horses instrumental in shaping the Thoroughbred.
Emilius, b c, 1820, Orville – Emily, by Stamford
Henry Rous, recognised as the ‘Dictator of the Turf’ in the third quarter of the 19th century, was a firm believer in the improvement breeders had wrought in developing the athletic horse.
In the preface to his 1850 publication On the Laws and Practice of Horse Racing, he demonstrated how the Thoroughbred had become vastly superior to its Arab ancestors, and opined that it was still improving. He famously – infamously, some said – asserted that ‘the form of Flying Childers might not now win a £30 plate, winner to be sold for £40; and Highflyer and Eclipse might pull through in a £50 plate, winner to be sold for £200’.
Such belittling of the achievements of those champions from the 18th century was regarded as heresy by many, and it might be argued that Rous was not comparing like with like. Eclipse and Highflyer flourished in an era when most races were contested over long distances, so stamina was the principal attribute required. Times had changed by Rous’s day.
However, while a number of the progeny of those unbeaten champions proved adept at the distances over which their sires excelled, many turned out to be effective for the new regime of racing, in which careers started earlier and the greatest rewards tended to be for horses accomplished over shorter journeys.
Extraordinary toughness
Eclipse had around a dozen sons who might be realistically described as successful sires. One of them was King Fergus, who won seven times in the colours of Dennis O’Kelly and whose most notable achievement testified to extraordinary toughness and endurance. On the day of the first Derby, in 1780, King Fergus featured in a race contested in 4-mile heats; he won the first of them, finished sixth in the second, then won the third and deciding heat.
The reward for his exertions over 12 miles was a purse of £50.
O’Kelly lost interest in King Fergus when he fell lame as a 6-year-old in 1781; there were clearly many better sons of Eclipse around, so he let him go to Ireland, and never expected to hear of him again.
In fact, King Fergus was put back into training to finish second in the Lord Lieutenant’s Stakes at the Curragh as a 9-year-old, by which time he had served two seasons as a stallion, getting stock which found favour with Irish breeders. He had been repatriated to England by the time his son Honest Tom became recognised as a champion on the Irish Turf.
For his first season at stud in England, King Fergus covered in London, but it was after his transfer to Yorkshire that he began to achieve real renown. There he got three St Leger winners in Young Traveller, Beningbrough and Hambletonian, all bred by John Hutchinson, and in 1797 he headed the sires’ list, a feat that Eclipse never accomplished.
Hambletonian was the best of that trio – and probably the best horse foaled in the 1790s – but Beningbrough was his superior at stud, where he got a star in Orville, another St Leger winner, and a rare one in that he continued in training until he was 8, showing top-class form to the end, especially ove extreme distances.
Henry Rous was elected to the Jockey Club in 1821, by which time Orville was already making a significant contribution to the improvement of the breed, having reigned as champion sire for the first time in 1817. He was 20 years old at the time of the cover that resulted in Emilius, who was largely responsible for his sire’s second title in 1823.
That colt’s owner-breeder, John Udney, was born in Italy during his father’s term as British consul in Livorno (Leghorn), but the family estate was in Scotland, near Aberdeen. A member of the Jockey Club, he enjoyed significant success as a patron of Robert Robson’s Newmarket stable after registering his pea green colours in 1811. They were carried prominently that year by Truffle, a brother to Oaks heroine Morel whose only defeat in five outings as a 3-year-old came in a level weights match against Derby victor Phantom.
Udney had his first wins at classic level when Corinne scored in the 1000 Guineas and Oaks of 1818, and there were near misses to come with Abjer, a son of Truffle whose only career defeat came as runner-up in Sailor’s 1820 Derby, and with Ibla, second in the 1821 Oaks. She died in a race accident at 4, just before her half-brother Emilius rose to fame.
Like most horses of his era, Emilius had a pedigree with multiple crosses of both Eclipse and Highflyer. The formula was not one that provided a guarantee of success, but rather one that was hard to avoid. However, those elements combined effectively in the mating of Orville and six-time winner Emily to deliver a well-made, compact, muscular colt with straight hindlegs, whose least attractive feature was the common head inherited from his sire.
Emilius made his debut in the first class of the Riddlesworth Stakes on the opening day of Newmarket’s 1823 Craven meeting. He won that mile event, having started a strong favourite at 5/4, and presumably impressed, as three days later he was the only one of 11 entries to turn up for another mile contest, the Dinner Stakes.
The colt’s engagement in a ten-furlong sweepstakes at his home course at the end of April again resulted in no test of his merits, as Udney and Lord Exeter, owner of Fanatic, the only other entrant remaining from six subscribers, agreed not to compete and to divide the forfeits between them.
One crack of the whip
Emilius was heading for the Derby with little experience of racing, and among his ten rivals at Epsom were Nicolo, Talisman and Cinder, the first, second and third from the 2000 Guineas. Nicolo, the only twin ever to win a Classic, had more recently gathered further laurels in the Newmarket Stakes.
However, Nicolo was easy to back at 10/1 on Derby day, and for sound reasons. Tancred, his stable-companion in Joe Rogers’s yard, was known to be his superior at home, while Emilius had a much higher reputation than Talisman and Cinder, his fellow contenders from Robert Robson’s stable.
Emilius and Tancred were backed virtually to the exclusion of the rest, the former quoted at 5/4 and 11/8, the latter at 6/4 and 13/8. Emilius made the running and maintained command until Tancred gained the initiative at Tattenham Corner, but the favourite’s veteran rider, Frank Buckle, kept his mount handy under restraint. Well inside the final furlong one crack of the whip sufficed for Emilius to regain the lead and win by a length.
Emilius was the fifth and last of Buckle’s Derby victories, 31 years after his first. It was the seventh such triumph for Robson, setting a record which would endure for nearly 200 years.
The next engagement for Emilius was in a sweepstakes over a mile at Ascot, where he trounced a solitary rival as a 6/1 on shot before being withdrawn from public gaze until the autumn, as was common practice at the time.
The colt’s return to action came in Newmarket’s Grand Duke Michael Stakes, a valuable contest over a mile and a quarter at the end of September. There were 25 entries, but when it became known that it would be a target for Emilius, opposition began to dry up.
Any amount in hand
The colt had only five to beat on the day, one of them being regular victim Nicolo, who fared no better than before. Zinc, making her autumn resumption after victories in the 1000 Guineas and Oaks, gave an honest display for second place, but Emilius, as usual idling and exerting himself no more than was necessary, had any amount in hand at the finish.
If there was an arguable case for Derby also-ran Cinder to turn out as the only rival for Emilius in a valuable sweepstakes at Newmarket’s second October meeting, it must surely have been about the race’s 2-mile distance. The champion dismissed any doubts over his stamina, winning as he liked.
Emilius was unquestionably a 3-year-old of real distinction. He was nothing like so good as a 4-year-old.
Unbeaten and supposedly unbeatable, he had his first 1824 start in a match at Newmarket’s First Spring meeting. His opponent was the 6-year-old mare Augusta, who had won the Oaks in 1821 and was fresh from a victory in the King’s Plate for mares three days before her encounter with Emilius. The mare was required to give the colt 6lb, which seemed to make his success all the more inevitable, but on ground heavier than many could remember over the Rowley Mile course she claimed the spoils by a length.
Followers of racing in the 1820s could be as fickle as those of our own era. The defeat caused many to believe that Emilius had deceived them, and they began to question the merits of the horses had beaten. Sadly, the former champion’s subsequent form could be interpreted as support for the views of the doubters.
Loss of faith
Emilius was not seen on a racecourse for five months after his loss to Augusta. Then he started at only 5/2 on for a match against a nonentity at Newmarket, a sure indication that the public had lost faith in him, but his win restored belief up to a point.
At the second October Meeting at Newmarket he was backed at 11/8 on for a match over a mile and six furlongs against Bizarre, who had won twice at Ascot, including the Gold Cup. He suffered a second defeat, just in part excused by the fact that he was trying to concede that talented rival 7lb.
Emilius made his exit from racing after a career-worst effort as last of seven in the Audley End Stakes over that same 14-furlong course in November, when his failure seems to have been expected, as he started only fourth in the betting.
It is clear that Emilius was never the same after his loss to Augusta on ground resembling a bog, and there was a suspicion of physical frailty in his subsequent performances. Even his owner-breeder had lost faith at the end, hastily selling him to Thomas Thornhill for 1,800gns.
Although his time on the Turf ended badly, and some would denigrate him for that reason, close examination of his record definitely establishes him as an genuinely gifted 3-year-old, among the very best to have raced in Britain up to that time.
Emilius started his second career at Thornhill’s Riddlesworth Stud near Thetford in 1825 at a fee of 15gns. He enjoyed the patronage of several leading breeders, and he was off the mark as a sire in 1829 with eight individual winners – three 3-year-olds winning six races between them and five juveniles accounting for six more. That was a fair start, but there was much better to come.
Among those who visited Emilius in his debut season was an impeccably-bred mare owned by Sir John Shelley, MP for Lewes. Cressida was a sister to Derby and Oaks winner Eleanor, and to Julia, dam of Derby victor Phantom; moreover, she had already delivered a 2000 Guineas winner in Antar. And, as luck would have it, the union bore no fruit.
Fortunately, Shelley was keen enough on the mating to send Cressida back to Emilius in his second season, and the outcome was a colt sold into Bill Chifney’s stable as a 2-year-old for 1,000gns. Named Priam, he acquired a tall reputation months before his debut, featuring among the favourites for the Derby throughout the winter. On the big day he won easily in a field of 23 to remain unbeaten in three starts.
Indeed, he only ever suffered two defeats from 16 starts between 3 and 5 years. He ran second of 28 runners in a St Leger contested on heavy ground, and third in the Craven Stakes – a result never satisfactorily explained – in his final season. He was the best racehorse anyone had seen in half a century of Classic racing, and some of those closest to him stuck by that view for the next half-century.
Emilius headed the sires’ list in 1830, largely thanks to Priam, and he topped the table again in 1831, when two notable 3-year-olds added to Priam’s contribution with sterling efforts of their own. Riddlesworth won the 2000 Guineas and chased home Spaniel in the Derby, while Oxygen became her sire’s third Classic scorer in the Oaks.
Effortless victory
The fourth winner at that level came along in 1834, and he was a colt whom some ventured to suggest was superior even to Priam. That was Plenipotentiary, a rich chesnut who tended to carry a lot of condition. Though unraced at 2, he gave his connections reasons for confidence in his merit and he was third favourite for the Derby at the turn of the year.
In fact, Plenipotentiary was to dominate an excellent crop of 3-year-olds. He began in April, trouncing three other debutants over the Rowley Mile, a performance which would have won more plaudits if the previous race, the Riddlesworth Stakes, had not been won in scintillating style by the impeccably-bred Sultan colt Glencoe.
Two days later at the same Newmarket meeting Plenipotentiary and Glencoe were the only contenders for a sweepstakes over the Rowley Mile, the latter a strong favourie at 6/4 on. That race proved a revelation. Glencoe led at a cracking pace, but could never get away from Plenipotentiary, who travelled sweetly, well within himself, took command soon after halfway and bounded clear for an effortless 4-length victory.
Most witnesses to that performance reckoned they now knew the Derby winner, and they were right. Bill Chifney was one who remained unconvinced, and he suffered a severe hit in the pocket when his charge Shilelagh – whom he had reckoned superior to Priam – ran second at Epsom, where Glencoe finished third.
After a walkover in the St James’s Palace Stakes, Plenipotentiary went for the St Leger, in which he ran abysmally, finishing tenth of the 11 runners. There is little doubt that he was got at. He returned at 4 for two wins at the Newmarket Craven meeting, one over ten furlongs – the other a sprint at less than six – and was then pointed towards the Gold Cup.
Full set of Classic wins
The colt arrived early at Ascot as a hot favourite and had a gallop there, but was sensationally withdrawn on the eve of the race. His owner cited a leg injury, an excuse that few of his backers believed, and in his absence Glencoe proved a ready winner. The Goodwood Cup was announced as Plenipotentiary’s next race, but it went by without him and he was not seen on a racecourse again.
Emilius had the 1000 Guineas winner in 1835, Preserve’s triumph, en route to second place in the Oaks, meaning that he had got winners of every Classic bar the St Leger, and in 1837 her brother Mango completed his set.
There were to be two more winners of the 1000 Guineas in Barcarolle (1838) and Extempore (1843) and a narrow miss in the 1839 St Leger with Euclid, who ran a dead-heat with Charles The Twelfth, but was defeated in the run-off.
Daughters of Emilius also earned Classic honours as broodmares, Stamp and Equation delivering 2000 Guineas heroes in Fitzroland and Diophantus respectively, Exotic being dam of 1000 Guineas victress Lady Orford, and Elphine dam of St Leger winner Warlock.
Emilius survived until he was 27, but even then it was still not time to tell his life story.
In the year after his death a colt exported in utero to France, Gambetti, notched a Classic double in the Poule d’Essai des Poulains and Prix du Jockey-Club. And almost the last mare he ever covered produced Sunrise, whose son Succes won the Prix Hocquart as late as 1874.
Henry Rous retired from the Royal Navy as a Captain, and without ever going to sea after 1835 advanced to Rear Admiral in 1852, to Vice Admiral in 1858, and to Admiral in 1863. The progress he recognised in the Thoroughbred racehorse had more logic about it, and we can see that what holds good in the 21st century held good in the 18th and at all times in between.
Great triumvirate
Regression to the mean ensured that the absolute superstars of the breed, such as Eclipse and Highflyer, could never sire runners as good as themselves, just as we discovered in the cases of such as Man o’ War, Secretariat and Sea-Bird. And we cannot doubt that Frankel will come into the same category.
The superstars can – and often do – make important contributions by getting stock better than the average for the breed, while no less significant are those horses who rank a little below the top level but are capable of getting progeny better than themselves. There are countless examples in both categories, some that Rous might have identified in his day, and many more familiar to our generation.
Emilius was the best son of his sire, and an obviously high-class performer. He got more than his share of good runners, including a couple whose achievements exceeded his own. Priam and Plenipotentiary were probably the two best horses seen on a racecourse since the dawn of the breed, and were subsequently joined by Bay Middleton to form the great triumvirate of the 1830s.
Some disappointment was expressed over the fact that Emilius did not establish a significant dynasty, his male line soon petering out. In fact, his chances of success in that regard were few, given that Priam, Riddlesworth and Mango were all soon sold abroad, while Euclid died young. Everything depended on what Plenipotentiary might achieve, and he proved a poor sire.
Priam actually represented Emilius well at stud, as he was Britain’s champion sire in both 1839 and 1840, getting three winners of the Oaks in Miss Letty (1837), Industry (1838) and Crucifix (1840), the last-named also accounting for both the 2000 and 1000 Guineas. After his sale to America for 3,500gns in 1837, he ruled as leading sire there – by races won, rather than by prize money – on four occasions. In both countries his fillies were better than his colts.
Thomas Thornhill died in 1844, leaving instructions that Emilius should never be sold, but they were ignored when Lord George Bentinck discovered the old horse in a sorry state and bought him privately with a view to restoring him to full fitness. Bentinck then leased him to Easby Abbey Stud, where he stood for a fee of 16gns. He died in September 1847 after choking on a meal of poorly prepared oats, which he was unable to masticate.
Admiral Rous died in 1877 at the age of 82, and one has to wonder which horse he would have identified as the best in his lifetime. It surely would not have been one from long ago, so perhaps he would have opted for Gladiateur, the French-bred Triple Crown winner of 1865.