GAGOOLA AND SIMBA

Evening Post, Volume CXIV, Issue 19, 22 July 1932, Page 9

GAGOOLA AND SIMBA

Plchjington was the scene of a remarkable plunge, at the Birthday Meeting on Bth. June, 1931. Entered for '■■the Kothsay Trial Stakes was a colt named fGagoola,' who was described in the official book as being by Yetmah from: Dismay; .Few .people; had ever ; 'heard;6f the horsey orJpf Mr. H. Graham, who was "given as the owner, and there was great surprise 'when it was noted .that .the colt had been backed down from a long.-price ..to favouritism. '-/ViTho-is Gagoola! " everybody asked, but no one could-supply the answer'to the question. The curiosity of the public spread.'-'.to' the stipendiary stewards, but : the , '/mystery; horse" eventually took his .place in .the field. . When the field turned into the straight it looked s as if the great "coup would .be success- ; ful, for: Gajjbola; was slightly ft.front of Stephanite. However, Stephanite finished too fast for Gagoola and ■ the "gppdi;thing" came undone^ ir '■■■ Mr. Graham subsequently told the stewards that tho colt was as described ,in the; official, 'book1, and that he had been registered-in. Sydney, on 11th May. In,_another'statementj Mr. Graham said jin'at" 'thei colt,^'had'heen'1 trained' on a roogb farm taae'k at Cabraihatta, NewSouth Wales; and that, he had been so .impressed with his. form that he had

decided to take him to Melbourne. The race ho' had had on the opening day of -the meeting was the first in which he had ever started. Dismay, who was de- ' scribed- as the dam of Gagoola, was then .aged thirty years, so that she' ■would have been twenty-six years old , e.t the time of the alleged foaling. The "horse "disappeared •mysteriously immediately after the race, and events •then began to move with great pace, as the Victoria Eacing Club and the Australian Jockey Club were not at all satisfied' with'-the explanations given, and set inquiries going. All attempts to trace the horse failed, but a fortnight later Mr.' A. L. Ynille, of Sydney, Begwtrar of Racehorses, as the result of information' received from a shipping agent, went to. Cabramatta, fifteen miles south of Sydney, and questioned a man who took him'tb a heap of ashes - i» the bed of. a creek and said: "There 'is all that is left of Gagoola. Ho broke a'leg yesterday, and wo shot and bnroed him.','. The owner thereafter could not be found, and his £60 cheque for_ Gagoola's second at Flemington remained unclaimed. ' The suspicions that tlie horse was ether'than be was declared to bo wero not laid by this development, and it was not generally accepted that tho ashes shown to Mr. Yuille were those of the horse who had, raped as ,Gagoola., The hoiae was not branded. There was a

story that a similar horse had done & trial with Stately qfc War' ' wick Farm, very close to Cabramatta, just prior* to Gagoola's debut at Flemington. The horse was given as Boyal Wit, and no horse with that name ever subsequently raced. Stately 's pre-

sence in the trial was purely fortuitous, ■the maie's connections simply allowing ler'tp-go with-Boyal Wit as a galloping companion. A week after the alleged -destruction of Gagoola, inquiries wore opened re-

garding the whereabouts of the' racehorse ' Simba, who bad 'been sold in New Zealand to an agent for an Australian buyer in April, and had been ; shipped on Ist May_ from Auckland, but , «f,.,whom, -all trace had subsequently been lost. Simba was some time later produced, and Customs prosecutions followed, bat the V.B.C. and AJ.C. were • unable to satisfy themselves at the time

. that Gagoola and Simba were one and the same horso. a Simba again disap- ,, peared and reappeared, and in June last * no came into the. news once more •frhon he-was entered for, pony'racing at un- ' registered meetings, Imt was not accept- ' cd;' A week later anal sews came1 about

him that "he had broken a'leg in a ■ gallop and, had been destroyed. The re- \ mains of. the horse destroyed were inspeetei at the Doiling-downtworks, but a doubt evidently prevailed' that the rreaains might not have been those of Simba. Whether Simba is now dead or atjll ftllye, however, he .will t never- race sg»in—unless once more asa "ringer," jihonia he be still alive.

Simba. would now be rising five years bid. 'He is a brown colt by Lord Quex from Tressida, and he was sold early In April twelve months ago by .his frtrner-bredeer, ,Mr,. J. S. McLeod. His list race in the Dominion was when he J«a second to Tenterden in the Hawkcs Bay Stakes at the meeting held on the Trenthara course on 18th April last year. He war shipped from Auckland on Ist May,.consigned-to a Mr. J. Wilfcon, of Kensington, New South Wales, »nan« was taken delivery of by Mr. G. Quest at Sydney on sth May.