Horse racing superstar's final resting place in stately grounds

So special was the horse that it was buried in the grounds of Streatlam Castle, in Teesdale.

The castle, as Echo Memories told last week, was demolished in 1959, but the memorial to West Australian still stands.

The Streatlam Stud was started in 1792 by John Bowes-Lyon (1769-1820), but it was his illegitimate son, John Bowes (1811-1885), who really made the stud's name.

His line of top quality horses - which is as complicated as the Bowes-Lyon family tree - began with Gibside Fairy, which was born in 1811.

The filly won a race at Catterick but was unplaced in the St Leger and so retired to the stud.

One of its daughters was Emma. In 1832, Emma foaled Mundig, which won the Derby in 1835. In 1840, Emma foaled Cotherstone, which won the Derby and the 2,000 Guineas in 1843. And, in 1843, Emma foaled Mowerina who, in turn, gave birth to West Australian in 1850 (West Australian's father was called Melbourne, which probably accounts for its name).

West Australian won nine of its ten races. Its finest year was 1853, when it won the Triple Crown - a feat only achieved by 14 other racehorses, the most recent being Nijinsky in 1970. For good measure, West Australian also won the Ascot Gold Cup.

At the end of its racing career, West Australian was sold by John Bowes to the Duc de Morny, who took it to France. But when the horse died in 1870, it seems that John Bowes brought it back and buried it in the grounds of Streatlam Castle.

THERE is another historic horse buried in this area. It is Underhand, born in 1854, which became the first horse to win the Pitmen's Derby at Newcastle three times.

So famous was Underhand that it featured in a Geordie song about a jockey called Joey Jones.

The song was written by George Ridley, the man who wrote The Blaydon Races: "Noo when the horses started, An' was cumin past the stand, Sum shooted oot for Peggy Taft, And some for Underhand."

Underhand was bred in Croft by Thomas Winteringham, the owner of the Croft Spa Hotel, and it is believed to have been buried in the field beside the hotel.

THE village of Stainton lies beside the Streatlam estate, and the two have close connections.

When Sir William Bowes rebuilt the castle in about 1700, he did so using light sandstone quarried at Stainton. The quarry still mines the same seam today.

When John Bowes' stud was at its peak, the population of the village exploded from 272 in 1801 to 373 in 1841.

Again using Stainton stone, Bowes built many houses in the village for his estate workers.

But Stainton was his undoing, because his father, John Bowes-Lyon, became too friendly with the daughter of a gardener from the village. John Bowes was the result, and because of his below-stairs illegitimacy, he was cut off by the rest of the Bowes-Lyon family. The links between the castle and the village have endured over the generations. Older villagers remember going to dances held in the brick Army huts of Streatlam Camp during the Second World War - several local lasses met their husbands there.

They also remember using Broomielaw station, the Bowes family's private halt on the Barnard Castle branchline.

"In the 1930s, the village children went on an annual Sunday School outing to Redcar and I can remember that we walked down to the station, and they had to send a message into Barnard Castle to get the train to stop and pick us up," said a villager.

Incidentally, John Bowes was so proud of Broomielaw station that he named one of his horses after it. Broomielaw won the Chester Cup and the Prince of Wales Stakes.

EARLY in April, Echo Memories was investigating the Salters Lane Open Air School, in Harrowgate Hill, Darlington. It opened in 1929 and was distinctively rebuilt, with bug-eyed classrooms, in 1952. Within the next few years, it is to be demolished, and replaced by an "education village" in Haughton.

Geoffrey Cole, of Darlington, attended the school from 1949 to 1959. He was a "nervous asthma" sufferer.

"It was a nice family school," he remembers.

"There wasn't so much pressure. The rules were very relaxed and it was more about health than education."

The school day started with Ovaltine, and "if the weather was nice you stayed in the playground all day, although some people were told by the headmistress (Miss McLevy) to stop if they were over-exerting themselves".

If the weather was bad, there was "sunray treatment".

"You wore glasses and sat on a form with a sunray machine facing you. After it, you would have a shower," he recalls.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the day at school was the hour nap between 1pm and 2pm, after lunchtime milk.

"You would put your little camp bed out and lie down on your right-hand side," remembers Geoffrey.

"There was one teacher in the middle of the hall and if you didn't lie still or you talked, you got into bother. At 2pm, you put your bed away and went back into your classroom until 4pm. Then you had your milk and got your coat."

After finishing at the open air school, Geoffrey attended the technical college for three months and then became a joiner for Wimpey. He worked there for 26 years, and now works at Magnet.

ANOTHER open air pupil was Laurie Connor, now 81 and living in Worcestershire, although he regularly visits his home town. He attended between 1929 and 1932, after an operation for fluid on the lung when he was ten.

"We used to do needlework and gardening, and we had to stand up and read to the class, but I don't remember doing any maths," he says.

"I wasn't allowed to go to any other school. My doctors said I needed plenty of fresh air."

LAURIE Connor also solves one of the riddles in Darlington's most mysterious murder.

In August 1990, Ann Heron was killed while sunbathing in the garden of her Aeolian House, near the Morrisons supermarket, on the road to Middleton St George. It was a brutal murder, and remains unsolved.

But why Aeolian? Aeolus was the Greek god of the winds.

He was also associated with wind-powered music, especially the Aeolian harp which, if hung outside a window, plays in the wind.

Laurie can complete the connection between the Greek god and this corner of Darlington. His great-uncle, Jack Johnson, built Aeolian House about 1934.

He was a stonemason by trade, following in his father's chisel marks.

In fact, his father's yard had been on the corner of Priestgate and Crown Street until 1915, when The Northern Echo's offices were built on the site.

Made homeless by the newspaper, the Johnsons moved to Parkgate.

The mystery of Aeolian, though, is solved by Jack Johnson's social life. He was a founder member of the Aeolian Quartet, a group of male singers renowned in south Durham in the decades before the Second World War.

The Aeolian Quartet was formed in 1906 by Jack, his nephew James Johnson and two friends, Frank Cook (pianist) and Fred Bradley. On New Year's Day 1908, they carried off all the "premier honours" at the Middlesbrough Eisteddfod.

Immediately, Sir William and Lady Eden, of Windlestone Hall (see the Echo Memories series of 1999) signed the quartet up as star attraction at their New Year Charity Ball on January 4. (Sir William's fourth son, Anthony Eden, the future British Prime Minister, would have been 11 at that time, so was presumably asleep upstairs somewhere.) It was held in "the east hall, which had been temporarily adapted as a theatre, with a proscenium, drop scene etc, for the express purpose of the production of a series of tableaux, vivants, a comediette etc," reported a local newspaper.

"A special treat had been provided in the engagement of the Darlington Aeolian Prize Quartette."

The following year, the quartet won their greatest prize at the Blackpool Music Festival. It is also believed that the Aeolian went on to cut a disc on the Winner label.

Jack Johnson died in 1937 in his mid-sixties.

Last year, his Aeolian House was converted into a pet cemetery and kennels.

A MONTH ago, when we were in Newton Cap, we published a picture of Toronto Football Club when it won the Auckland and District League championship in the 1908-09 season.

George Hull, of Spennymoor, spotted his grandfather, John George Dickenson, third from the left on the third row.

Toronto FC must have been a force to be reckoned with in those days, because Mr Hull has medals which show his grandfather won the Nursing Cup in 1905, the Wear Valley League, the Shildon Nursing Shield in 1910 and 1912, and the Auckland League in 1912.

John George Dickenson was born in Gomer Terrace, Newton Cap, in 1882, and worked in the mine. He later became a gardener, working for many notables in the Bishop Auckland area, then greenkeeper for Cockton Hill Bowling Club. He died in 1960.

If you have any information or memories on any of the topics in this week's column, please write to: Echo Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington, DL1 1NF, email chris.lloyd@nne.co.uk or telephone (01325) 505062.

Published:23/04/2002