Born on December 5, 1930, Eric Campbell began his career on the Flat before rising weight determined that his future lay over jumps.
He began his apprenticeship with Tadcaster trainer Tom Hall in 1945. He had his first ride in public on a two-year-old filly named Winter Rose at Pontefract on October 2, 1946, finishing seventh. He rode his first winner, Middling, in an apprentices’ race at Carlisle on July 3, 1947.
After Tom Hall’s death, Eric moved to Middleham and became apprenticed to the late trainer’s brother Sam Hall. He worked for Sam until 1952 when he temporarily left racing to complete his National Service.
He returned to racing in 1953 and went to work for Major Calverley Bewicke in Northumberland. Although still riding on the Flat, Eric began to struggle with his weight and decided to become a jump jockey. In 1955 he moved south to Manton to work for George Todd, for whom he had his first ride over hurdles. Also that year, on June 25, 1955, he married Jean Egdell. She gave him two sons, Ian and Ross, and a daughter, Christiane.
Three years later, Eric returned north and joined Tommy Robson’s stable at Greystoke, near Penrith. He stayed there for nine years.
Eric, who listed his hobbies as tennis, gardening and poultry keeping, gained his most important success on a grand hurdler called Miserable Monk, on whom he won Manchester's Victory Hurdle in 1960 in record time.
He enjoyed his best season in 1960/61 with ten winners. Four of those victories came on Tommy Robson’s three-mile chaser Cockbridge, comprising three early season wins within a month, including the Perthshire Challenge Cup, and culminating at Sedgefield on Boxing Day. He also won twice on four-year-old hurdler Curtain Time, at Manchester in March and at Carlisle on Easter Monday.
He scored another Easter Monday success in 1962 on the Robson-trained Border Strife in the Durdar Handicap Hurdle at Carlisle. He did so again in 1965, this time on Denis Yeoman’s The Treatment on Uttoxeter’s Easter Monday card, one of just four winners he rode that season.
Eric turned to training in 1968, based at Clifton, near Penrith. He paid 100 guineas for the yearling Roe Head and won with him at Catterick on May 21, 1969. He enjoyed moderate success and combined training with riding for a short time before relinquishing his trainer’s licence in 1970.
He went to work for trainer Tommy Craig at Dunbar as head man. The following year, after turning 40, Eric decided to hang up his boots and had his last ride for Tommy Craig on Hedingham in a four-year-old novices’ hurdle at Ayr on February 6, 1971, completing the course, albeit in last place.
His final move in February 1971 brought him to Newmarket where he began a nine-year association as head lad for trainer Ryan Jarvis. When Jarvis retired, Eric had a short period with Mick Ryan and then settled as head man for Robert Williams for the next 15 years until retiring at the age of 65. By then, his son Ian was training in his own right, so Eric helped him out with a few horses and also rode out for Giles Bravery until 2004.
In recognition of his contribution to the sport, the ‘Eric Campbell Lifetime in Racing Handicap Chase’ was named in his honour at Towcester on October 28, 2007.
He died in Newmarket on March 29, 2014.
