It has been 54 years since the most dramatic incident in South African racing history, the shooting of the great Syd Laird-trained Sea Cottage.
SP reader and prolific poster William Milkovitch, like the rest of us firmly under lockdown, unpacked a hard drive labelled ‘2002 holiday in Cape Town’ from a metal biscuit tin this morning.He supplied the pics.
“I think I started doing a bit of electronic filing from actual pictures and paper cuttings kept in a scrap book and then scanned them up into a file. Look what I found,” said William today as he provides us with a pictorial walk down memory lane of the great Sea Cottage, who was shot from a concrete shelter, which still exists today, while walking under the Blue Lagoon bridge on the bright morning of June 10, 1966.
Sea Cottage the stallion visits Clairwood
David Thiselton told the story that a bookmaker from the Field Street “rooms” had allegedly approached the owner of the Monaco Club across the road and asked him to settle his considerable debt.
The bookmaker’s explanation had been the widely expected Sea Cottage July win, which would result in damaging losses to his business. The club owner’s alleged response was to ask what it would be worth to “stop” Sea Cottage.
The bookmaker’s alleged reply was he would forego the debt. A bouncer from the club named Johnny Nel then allegedly hatched the plan and agreed to carry out the dastardly deed. A few mornings before the shootings, “gangsters” who frequented the Monaco Club arrived on the beach at Blue Lagoon still dressed in their evening suits, purportedly to watch the gallops, and Nel was among them.
Sea Cottage’s white markings made him an easy horse to identify. The great horse was shot in the soft flesh of the hindquarters with a pistol and reared in fright.
Trainer Eileen Bestel was first on the scene and had the distressed horse walked back to the Newmarket Stables.
He made a remarkable recovery and appeared at the July gallops a couple of weeks later to tumultuous applause. He ran in the big race just three weeks after the incident and finished an unlucky fourth after being severely checked at the two furlong mark.
However, he famously won the July the following year carrying topweight and with the bullet still lodged in his hindquarter, deadheating with the lightweight Jollify, to whom he gave 27 pounds. Nel had been arrested less than a day after the shooting.
He had foolishly used his yellow convertible, one of the most conspicuous cars in Durban, to drive to and from Blue Lagoon and a passing fisherman had seen him speeding away.
The remorseful man was sentenced to three years, but was released due to ill health after one year and died shortly thereafter.
Sea Cotttage ended his career with 20 wins from 24 starts and was widely regarded as the greatest horse to ever grace the South African turf until Horse Chestnut arrived.
Sea Cottage with 61.5kg managing to get up and beat Atty Persse with 50kg in the 1967 Clairwood Winter Handicap
Sea Cottage’s old stable became a vendor stall in a section of the Stables used as a popular evening market.
Syd Laird had always been terrified somebody would “get to” Sea Cottage and had metal plates fitted over the air vents on the road side of his stable.
The now rusted metal plates can still be seen there today, on the road side of the market three stalls to the left of the main entrance.
Watch his last race here
