DERBY DREAMS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVI, Issue 67, 24 July 1913, Page 7

DERBY DREAMS.

VISIONS THAT HAVE BROUGHT

FORTUNES

Every year the Derby dream is forthcoming. But there are many authenticated cases. There is tho remarkable instance of Eleanor, who won the double event—the Derby and the Oaks—for Sir Charles Bunbury in 1801. The owner’s groom dreamt, long before the races, that he saw the filly running in both at tho same time, and ho never lost faith in this “vision,” though he died before his dream was realised.

One of the most remarkable dreams of the Derby was that of a sporting compositor on one of the London dailies. At the time of this prophetic printer’s dream the horse which was to win the Derby had not even been named, and he dreamt that he had been given a “take” to set up which ran: “The winner of the Derby has now received a name; it is Kisber.” Such was the name eventually given to the colt which won, to the comp’s unbounded delight.

Of the race of 1870 a remarkable story is told. The night before a jockey called Swift saw the finish of the Derby in a dream. He saw Kingcraft, which he recognised, pass the post a winner by a length and a half, followed by a dark brown horse which he could not identify, and with Macgregor, the favourite, a bad fourth. In spite of the jeering of his friends, to whom he told the story, he backed Kingcraft for every sovereign he could raise; and to his delight, as to the disgust of the scoffers, he saw his dream exactly reproduced—the favourite badly beaten and the despised Kingcraft winning a small fortune for him.

Shortly before the Derby of 1862, when Mr Snewing’s colt Oaractacus won a sensational race for the Blue Riband, a Scotch lady writing to her husband, then* in London, said:— “As I know you will bo going to see the Derby, I may tell you that in a dream last night I was there too, and saw the race. It was won by a horse which was ridden by a palefaced lad in a blue silk bonnet and white silk dress.” Such, it transpired, were Mr Snewing’s colors, and the pale boy who rode the horse, fetched the blue and white home in grand style.