Rt Hon Baron James Thomas Archibald Douglas-Home 28th Baron Dacre
Rt Hon Baron James (Jamie) Thomas Archibald Douglas-Home 28th
Baron Dacre, (1952-2014), the nephew of the former British prime
minister Sir Alec, was a racehorse trainer in the 1970s and 80s
before becoming one of the UK’s most-respected racing
correspondents, notably for the Racing Post and Country Life
magazine.
Jamie Douglas-Home, born 16 May 1952, in Edinburgh;
died 8 May 2014, in Lockinge, Oxfordshire, aged 61, was latterly a
popular writer for The Field and The Oldie magazine. From his
stables outside the village of East Hendred, Oxfordshire, he trained
mostly National Hunt horses but also had success on the flat with
the handicap sprinter Lochtillum.
Although educated in
England, Jamie spent most summers on the family estate in
Berwickshire riding, hunting and shooting.
“Guns, beaters,
everyone loved him because he always had a cheerful word for
everyone,” said his friend, Christopher Wills.
“He was an
incredibly good shot. No pomposity, always rather understated in his
tweeds, always accompanied by his greatest loves outside his late
wife Christine and their daughter Emily – his cocker spaniels Mabel
and Martha.”
Jamie Douglas-Home never quite made it to the
top as a trainer. Colleagues say his yard suffered from a serious
virus in his first year and his string of horses did not recover in
time to make his yard profitable. But he was widely loved in the
profession by big names such as James Fanshawe and Henrietta Knight,
three-time Cheltenham Gold Cup winner with Best Mate.
His
father was William Douglas-Home – Sir Alec’s younger brother – a
politician who ran as Liberal Party candidate for Glasgow Cathcart
during the war and for Edinburgh South in the post-war years.
Controversial as a politician – he opposed Churchill’s
determination for an unconditional surrender by Hitler – William
later became known as a playwright, writing mostly comedies in an
upper-class setting.
He was descended from the Earls of Home
and the Lambtons, Earls of Durham. Jamie’s mother was Rachel Brand,
27th Baroness Dacre and daughter of the 4th Viscount Hampden. Hence,
Jamie took on the title 28th Baron Dacre when his mother died.
James Thomas Archibald Douglas-Home was born in Edinburgh. After
his family moved south to Hampshire, he went to Eton and later to
Bristol University.
There he maintained his love of horses
and began “riding out” – warming up and training thoroughbreds – for
trainer Bill Wightman at Upham, near Southampton.
Jamie’s
feel for horses won him a job as assistant to one of the UK’s most
famous trainers, Peter Walwyn, based in Lambourn, Berkshire, who was
twice champion flat racing trainer.
In the late 1970s, Jamie
set up his own stables at East Hendred, Oxfordshire, and in 1979
married Christine Stephenson, daughter of trainer Willie Stephenson,
the only trainer in the 20th century to have saddled the winners of
both the Derby and the Grand National as well as triple Champion
Hurdles winner Sir Ken.
Christine became the personal
secretary and “right-hand woman” to Henrietta Knight for more than
27 years.
“He was a kind, much-liked, fun-loving man,” Ms
Knight said. “Jamie mixed so well with people, was very intelligent
and was a very good writer.
He had a very good sense of
humour and was a very good friend. I know he was quite affected by
his wife Christine’s death. He was devoted to her.”
Another
friend, trainer James Fanshawe, wrote on his website: “So sad to
hear that a good friend, Jamie Douglas-Home, from my younger days,
has died.
“We all used to have such fun with him and his wife
Christine, especially during Royal Ascot week when a gang of us used
to stay with them. He was very amusing and the best host and he will
be missed by all his friends and [especially] so by his daughter
Emily. He and Christine were a fantastic couple. He was also a very
talented writer.”
Jamie Douglas-Home wrote several books, on
horseracing and on stately homes. They included Horse Racing in
Berkshire and Watching Monty, the latter written with the late
Johnny Henderson.
One of his best-known books was Stately
Passions: The Scandals of Britain’s Great Houses, which detailed
royal and aristocratic scandals, predominantly sexual, which took
place in Britain’s stately homes from the 16th Century until the
present.
Jamie’s wife Christine died in 2008, aged 60.
Friends said he never really got over her death.
He is
survived by their daughter, Emily, 31, heiress presumptive to the
title Baroness Dacre. Emily ran the Edinburgh marathon to raise
money for the John Radcliffe hospital in Oxford where her mother was
cared for before passing away.
Any contributions will be
gratefully accepted
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