National Hunt jockey Morton Derek Bolton – known by his second Christian name – is arguably best recalled by a spectacular photo (above) that appeared in the Daily Mirror the day after a race in which he’d ridden, although Derek wasn’t actually named in the caption.
The race was the Rottingdean Maiden Chase at Plumpton on January 17, 1968, an incident-packed contest in which three runners were out of the race by the second fence. The photo showed a horse named Campaign having refused at the fifth, an open ditch, and shot jockey Jimmy Fox over to the landing side. In refusing, Campaign had badly baulked the grey mare Flying Leaf, the photo capturing the moment when she was in the process of being brought down and just about to nudge Fox off the fence, while her own jockey was suspended in mid-air above her. Such was the startling nature of the incident, the photo also made it into the Tote Racing Annual’s ‘Pictures of the Year’ section with the caption ‘Taking the Plunge at Plumpton’.
Flying Leaf’s jockey, the one whose name was not mentioned, was Derek Bolton. But no doubt he would prefer to be remembered for the seven winners he’d ridden by the time of that fall, all of them trained by his brother Mick Bolton, who was based in Lewes.
Born on 4 August 1938, Derek was apprenticed to Matt Feakes. He took out a jump jockey’s licence in the 1963/64 season, riding his first winner on 25-1 outsider Whipper-In at, ironically, Plumpton, in division one of the Chailey Novices’ Hurdle on January 6, 1964. His second success also came at Plumpton, this time on another of his brother’s novice hurdlers, Jumping Toy, who dead-heated with Owen McNally’s mount Mishgar.
Juvenile hurdler Semarames provided Derek with his sole success of the 1964/65 campaign when scoring at Windsor in November. He rode two winners the following season, both at Fontwell Park in October, aboard handicap hurdler Jumping Toy and juvenile hurdler Markus.
Having gone over a year without another winner, Derek finally ended the drought when 20-1 shot Rawa Ruska obliged in division one of the Hever Four-Year-Old Hurdle at Lingfield Park in February 1967. They followed up over the same course and distance two weeks later. That proved to be the last winner of Derek’s career. He rode on for two more seasons – memorable mainly for the aforementioned spectacular fall at Plumpton on Flying Leaf – before relinquishing his licence in 1969.
Derek Bolton’s winners were, in chronological order:
1. Whipper-In, Plumpton, January 6, 1964
2. Jumping Toy, Plumpton, April 18, 1964 (dead-heat)
3. Semarames, Windsor, November 20, 1964
4. Jumping Toy, Fontwell Park, October 12, 1965
5. Markus, Fontwell Park, October 26, 1965
6. Rawa Ruska, Lingfield Park, February 24, 1967
7. Rawa Ruska, Lingfield Park, March 8, 1967
