Ewart Barker

Ewart Barker

1884 -1972

Article by Alan Trout

Born in Radcliffe, Lancashire, on 18 October 1884 (to Charles Barker & Martha Griffiths) Ewart Gladstone Barker had some success on the Flat in 1911, riding three winners, but fared much better over jumps after World War One with 21 victories between 1921 and 1926. They included the Gloucestershire Hurdle at Cheltenham’s National Hunt meeting.

He was apprenticed to the successful Penrith trainer Bob Armstrong and had his first ride in public when partnering Daragane, owned by Lord Lonsdale, the stable’s leading patron, in the Irvine Town Plate at Bogside on April 7, 1910. They were unplaced, and when Daragane did win later that season the successful jockey was another stable apprentice, Thomas Horseman.

Ewart had to wait until Whit Monday, June 5, 1911 for his first success, when 9-4 favourite Ruddy Shield-Drake won the Cleveland Apprentice Plate at Redcar by two lengths. He doubled his score when 4-1 on hotpot Eager Agnes best two opponents in the Hackfall Apprentice Plate at Ripon on August 7. His third and final success of the season came at Ayr on September 20 when riding Jack Pot to win the Auchencruive Three-Year-Old Handicap. Although he continued to ride on the Flat until 1914, there were no more wins.

Although Ewart took out a jump jockey’s licence in 1919, he had to wait until 1921 for a first success. That came at Sedgefield on March 22, when Laird’s Birthday won the Wynyard Optional Selling Chase by 10 lengths. On the following day at the same course, he won a match for the Sands Challenge Chase, then the next week rode winners on both days of Carlisle’s fixture, making four in a week. That set him on his way, although there was to be just one more victory during that year.

By 1923 he had moved south and teamed up with Bill Larkin, who trained at Bruce Lodge, Epsom. He rode three winners that year and five in 1924. The following year he registered his most important success on Imprudence in the Gloucestershire Hurdle. There was only a length between Imprudence and the 9-4 favourite Wandering Monk, ridden by Dick Rees. Imprudence and Ewart went on to run in the Imperial Cup at Sandown Park 11 days later but, weighed down by a 10lb penalty for his Cheltenham success, the four-year-old finished unplaced. Indeed, Imprudence never won another race.

Ewart’s most successful season was 1925/26 with eight wins, including a double at Hurst Park in March on Predial in the Garrett Moore Chase and Burning Thoughts in the Kingston Handicap Hurdle, both of them trained by Bill Larkin. But they proved to be the last eight of Ewart’s career, with Predial providing the final two in a two-mile handicap chase at Plumpton and then being gifted a walkover in the Novices’ Chase at Folkestone.

He rode on the Flat in 1926 and 1927 without success and last held a National Hunt jockey’s licence in the 1929/30 season.

He trained briefly under both codes during the 1950s, based at Bell Stables, Wexham, near Slough.

Ewart Barker died in Bedford in 1972.

Ewart Barker’s National Hunt winners were, in chronological order:

1. Laird’s Birthday, Sedgefield, March 22, 1921

2. Golden Song, Sedgefield, March 23, 1921

3. Erotic, Carlisle, March 28, 1921

4. Awbeg, Carlisle, March 29, 1921

5. Garleton, Wetherby, October 27, 1921

6. Purple Rider, Bungay, April 11, 1923

7. Predial, Kempton Park, December 1, 1923

8. Croiseur, Gatwick, December 5, 1923

9. Ranter, Sandown Park, February 3, 1924

10. Financier, Folkestone, September 8, 1924

11. Antimagic, Fontwell Park, October 6, 1924

12. Ranter, Wincanton, October 15, 1924

13. Imprudence, Cheltenham, March 10, 1925

14. Speen, Chelmsford, November 26, 1925

15. Speen, Windsor, February 18, 1926

16. Suke of Judea, Hawthorn Hill, March 1, 1926

17. Burning Thoughts, Kempton Park, March 5, 1926

18. Predial, Hurst Park, March 13, 1926

19. Burning Thoughts, Hurst Park, March 13, 1926

20. Predial, Plumpton, April 3, 1926

21. Predial, Folkestone, April 8, 1926 (walkover)