Bamford & Norden October 2019

harm was coming to the townsfolk of
Rochdale. The race committee promised to
act to reduce the trouble that accompanied
the racing. However, the meet went ahead
although it rained so heavily that year that
the horses found the going difficult. One
horse named Bando, thought to have been
an old post horse for the stage coaches
that used to change at the Wellington
Hotel, fell and was so badly injured it was
shot on the spot, the story going that
Bando’s skeleton was kept at Faukner’s
smithy in town. This sad event further
discredited the race meeting.
There is some suggestion that the races
had been discontinued in the mid 1820’s
but an article in Rochdale’s first newspaper,
The Recorder, has it that the races were to
be revived in 1827. Certainly by 1845 there
was an appetite for racing on Bagslate
Moor with a first grandstand being built to
accommodate race-goers although no
immediate payment was forthcoming to the
builders. Notwithstanding that, a second
grandstand was planned, so there must
have been ambitions for further meetings.
In fact, a foundation stone was laid for
the new building and a Yeoman Band
‘just returned from Forin Parts’ as the
newspapers had it, played as bottles of
spirit were ceremoniously broken over
the stone.
so once again the races were discontinued,
the last meeting held in July 1850. Little is
left of the Bagslate Races but not only can
a colourful commemoration of them, ‘Hark
to Nudger,’ be seen in Touchstones
museum on the Esplanade but the Turf
Tavern on Edenfield Road reminds
passers-by to this day that Rochdale had
once been a home to the so-called sport
of kings.
If you have any comments about the
Bagslate Races, I’d be delighted to hear
from you and add them to a growing
Rochdale archive on the subject. Please
contact Gary Heywood-Everett at
garyheywoodeverett@yahoo.co.uk or
leave your comments by text or by
recorded message at 07745 201263.
Through the 1840’s however, racing at
Bagslate became more sporadic. Falling
gate receipts meant smaller prize money
and the field and the buildings where the
races took place fell into disrepair. In 1850
the builder of the first grandstand James
Pilling (who had also been Clerk of the
Course) secured payment at last, but this
had the effect of bankrupting the race club
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