punchestown

Dandy indeed

DannyM8 Thinking of switching to DandyM8? :)

There's no DOG!!! How can you have that many horses and not have a dog to bark at them? It's not natural I say. Great shot of the old pub - when it was an hotel no less!

I love the old picture, great find but that was a good point, not dog in sight. Did someone SHOOT the poor brutes?

Swordscookie Do you know where this was/is then, Sean? Would love a Google Maps link. Think we need to get Niall McAuley to do a Google Maps linking seminar with you... :)

It certainly looks like a roulette wheel.

The croupier looks creepier ...

An account of a court case at Down Assizes (Freeman's , Wednesday, March 11, 1840) centres around a "fraudulently constructed" roulette table at Downpatrick races, by means of which James Perkins cheated several people "of divers sums of money". Here's a snippet including a description of the dodgy roulette wheel. So roulette at a racecourse wasn't unheard of. BTW later in the account , after a witness was asked if he had played in the tent A pause ensued, which was sufficiently significant to cause the court to be convulsed with laughter, which was joined by the learned judge himself The defence counsel argued that a tent was not a house, so it wasn't covered by legislation concerning gaming houses. The judge sentenced Perkins to 3 months imprisonment and £100 fine, but the sentence was suspended pending a decision from the Court of Queen's Bench.

And in an account of "The Card-Cheating Case at Brighton" (Freeman's Monday, July 26, 1852) a witness says he had played roulette at races before this, and generally lost; he had never heard of anybody that won (a laugh). This suggests that roulette wheels at races (a) were commonplace and (b) fixed

... and in 1862 The plaintiff , on examination, stated that he kept a roulette table at races, and also used "bones" (dice) at races; was last convicted of gambling at Limerick; gave up going to races September last; he went to races with a roulette table for the purpose of opposing parties who had robbed him of £600 ... The jury found for the plaintiff one farthing damages

"In 1868 the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VII of England, attends the festival much to the disapproval of his mother, Queen Victoria" www.punchestown.com/history.asp

It does look busy and with a cross hatch of people and dress.

Need the collective noun for sergeants.

I think this artist's impression shows the same stands.

OS 25" link at GeoHive