Born into an aristocratic family in Brussels on 5 May, 1880, Adrian Carton de Wiart was sent to boarding school by his English stepmother in the early 1890s.

Much to his father's fury, he left Balliol College, Oxford, 1899, to join the British army fighting the Boers, enlisting under a false name.

He was invalided out shortly afterwards having been wounded in the stomach and groin.

A keen sportsman, he became a fitness fanatic after being wounded and started riding in military races, winning one such event in 1908.

He later owned several horses over the jumps and registered his own colours.

Aged 66, and after many further exploits abroad, he retired from the Army in 1946.

During his retirement, he slipped on matting coming down the stairs. He broke his back and several vertebrae. While in hospital, doctors removed a great deal of shrapnel from his body.

In 1949, his wife died: two years later he married the singer Joan Sutherland, over twenty years his junior. Joan herself was a divorcee: her son, Fergus Sutherland, became a trainer of horses. He won the 1996 Cheltenham Gold Cup with Imperial Call.

Adrian Carton de Wiart spent his retirement in Ireland, salmon fishing and hunting snipe.

He died on June 6, 1963, aged 83. He is buried at Caum Churchyard in Macroom.