Down Memory Lane: A racing certainty that horse play was a real spectacle

Thundering hooves shook the ground below Tomnahurich’s leafy hill, more than two centuries before the cemetery was laid out there. It was horses before hearses as races were held round “the hill of the fairies”.

From the 17th century Inverness staged regular races round Tomnahurich and the open plain of Dalneigh, which means “horse meadow”.

This year marks the bicentenary of the new racecourse being laid out at Dunaincroy, west of the main road at Dunain Mains.

The Wardlaw Manuscript mentions races at the base of the hill in 1662. On May 24, 1662 the race began at Ballifeary from the town gate, at the west end of the bridge, around Tomnahurich and back.

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Provost Alexander Cuthbert and magistrates led a procession of townspeople and hung the main prize, a silver cup with blue ribbons, from the port, along with secondary prizes of a saddle and a sword. This Inverness Silver Cup was the highlight of the two-day, two-programme under the patronage of Lords Huntly and Lovat and the Marquis of Huntly.

Lord Lovat won the first race by coming from the rear in the last half mile to snatch the silver prize from Captain Miles Mann’s steed, with the Laird of Grant owning the third.

The following day was won by Baillie Finlay Fraser, who represented Inverness at the Scottish Parliament.

In the 19th century, the need grew for a proper racecourse and Dunaincroy, west of the canal, was identified, with an oval-shaped course created of a mile in circumference. Dunaincroy stood within Dunain estate and the “Croy” bit, as with the village of that name, is Gaelic for “hard”.

The meeting in October 1823 was a three-day affair coinciding with the Northern Meeting. The Lord Lieutenant of Inverness-shire put up a £50 prize for a race for horses from the local counties but this two-mile race was a walkover for Shepherdess, owned by Simon Fraser, later an MP and sixth Lord Lovat.

The same owner landed the Post Stakes with Clanchatta while the Northern Meeting Stakes was won by Mr Farquharson’s Meeta.

The following year the first day’s winner was Richmond, owned by Mr Fraser, with Mr R Taylor’s The Beacon in second place. The Beacon, however, won the two-mile Macaroni Stakes next day.

Simon Fraser was successful again on the third day when his horse Richmond, ridden by William Boynton, became first winner of the Marquis of Huntly Trial Stakes, beating The Beacon, with Lord Huntly’s horse third.

The following year Fraser donated an Inverness Gold Cup, entries for Northern Meeting members only.

On September 26 and 27, 1826 Fraser’s Richmond won the Gold Cup from Lota and Balmain, the Handicap Plate from Balmain and the Ross-shire Plate from Falstaff, in which horses ran two three-mile heats. Finally, Richmond was runner-up in the two-mile Ladies Purse. He’d run in five races covering 12 miles in two days!

The 1827 meeting saw the four-furlong Caithness Purse race won by Mr Bagley’s Peacock with the redoubtable Richmond second. The top race, for the Cromarty Gold Cup, went to Mr Fraser, but this time with Hartlepool, Richmond finishing third. Mr Davidson’s The Pantomime won the one-mile County of Ross 100 Guineas.

John Scott’s bay Ardrossan won both races in 1830, after which interest waned. There were pony races at the Longman from 1839 but Dunaincroy races continued to be a local day out right up to the start of World War II.

Beside Dunaincroy lies Racecourse Wood, its name an enduring link to the past.

– Sponsored by Ness Castle Lodges.