Nick Ansell
1937 -2024
Major-General Nicolas Ansell, C.B., O.B.E., was a successful amateur rider during the early 1960s and, as Captain Nick Ansell, won the 1964 Grand Military Gold Cup on Threepwood (above).
Nicolas George Picton Ansell was born on August 17, 1937, the son of Colonel Sir Michael Picton Ansell, C.B.E., D.S.O., whose career as an international show jumper was put on hold when joining the 5th Inniskilling Dragoon Guards in the mid-1930s. Sir Michael became the youngest commanding officer in the British Army during World War Two, but was blinded and severely wounded in the hand during a friendly fire attack. Repatriated in 1943, having spent three years in a prisoner-of-war camp, he was invited to become chairman of the British Show Jumping Association. Despite his disabilities, he succeeded in transforming the sport's public image, restarting the Royal International Horse Show and introducing the Horse of the Year Show, both of which duly received prominent BBC television coverage.
Nick Ansell was the third generation of his family – following his father and grandfather – to serve in the same regiment, the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards, his grandfather having been killed in the first month of World War One.
Nick was educated at Wellington College in Berkshire, before entering Magdalene College, Cambridge University, from which he graduated with a Master of Arts (M.A.). He married Vivien Taylor on June 17, 1961. They had three children: Mark Picton (born 1963), Julian Threepwood (born 1964) and Clare Victoria (born 1968).
He rode a dozen winners under National Hunt rules, the first being on Polecat in a Wincanton novices’ hurdle in September 1959. The second came on the former top-class chaser Pointsman, who outclassed his lesser rivals in Sandown’s Grand Military Hunters’ Chase in 1962, winning by 30 lengths.
Captain Ansell rode seven winners during the 1963/64 campaign, beginning with two early season chase victories at Newton Abbot and Devon & Exeter on his horse Oakleigh Way. However, his best horse was Threepwood, on whom he won five times during that season. Four of those victories came in virtually identical three-mile amateur riders’ handicap chases at Newbury in October, November, December and February.
Unsurprisingly given their achievements at Newbury, Nick and Threepwood started odds-on for the 1964 Grand Military Gold Cupand landed the odds comfortably by five lengths.
Following a brace of early season successes on his novice chaser Soldier Boy, Nick rode Threepwood to victory in a Wincanton handicap chase in November 1964. They then finished third over the same course in the Badger Brewery Chase. Despite being unable to repeat any of their Newbury triumphs. Threepwood was made favourite for the 1965 Grand Military Gold Cup to repeat his previous year’s triumph. However, after making most of the running, Threepwood fell when leading at the first of the Railway fences on the second circuit.
Nick went on to become commander of the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoons between 1977 and 1980. He rose to the rank of Major-General and became director of the Royal Army Corps. He was made an O.B.E. in 1980 and was appointed Companion, Order of the Bath in 1992. He served as Justice of the Peace for Bideford and Great Torrington in 1994 and held the office of Deputy Lieutenant for Devon in 1996.
He became Clerk of the Course at Exeter racecourse in 1995, a position he held until 2002.
Nick Ansell died on Sunday, February 18, 2024, aged 86.
Nick Ansell’s winners under National Hunt rules were, in chronological order:
1. Polecat, Wincanton, September 17, 1959
2. Pointsman, Sandown Park, March 24, 1962
3. Oakleigh Way, Newton Abbot, August 28, 1963
4. Oakleigh Way, Devon & Exeter, September 4, 1963
5. Threepwood, Newbury, October 24, 1963
6. Threepwood, Newbury, November 30, 1963
7. Threepwood, Newbury, December 28, 1963
8. Threepwood, Newbury, February 14, 1964
9. Threepwood, Sandown Park, March 13, 1964
10. Soldier Boy, Devon & Exeter, August 19, 1964
11. Soldier Boy, Fontwell Park, September 1, 1964
12. Threepwood, Wincanton, November 19, 1964
13. Ancient Lawyer, Sandown Park, March 30, 1976
