Ponies

Ann on Dushka - Southdean Drive

My older sisters were a mere 16 months apart and they did everything together.  Once the family returned to Middleton after the war, the girls were frequent visitors to the nearby stables run by the patient and steady Miss Seagrim with her cheerful second-in-command called Bunty – a name that is never heard these days.  The riding school was on the Yapton Road and comprised an attractive set of whitewashed flint stables by a field with riding ring.  Although keeping horses is an expensive business, children from all sorts of backgrounds can gain access to riding stables. My sisters started by volunteering at these stables where, exchange for mucking out, grooming, leading beginners around a ring and doing general chores, they were given a ride with the group. It was hard but purposeful work and the reward much appreciated.    

The ponies had been trained to relieve themselves on a certain patch by the edge of the riding ring and their stalls  always smelt fresh without that ammoniated reek common to many stables.  There are now houses on that patch of land and I often wonder if the area where the riding ring was is extraordinarily fertile.  Do giant vegetables now flourish in the gardens on that site?

The first riding lessons at Seagrim’s took place in what was known as the Cowboy field. Here children gained confidence in being quietly led round.  There’d be exercises such as Round the World where one had to balance on the saddle and turn in a full circle before graduating to the athletic Scissor turn. Once we were confident and comfortable in the saddle it would be time to go on a proper  RIDE. 

1949 All scrubbed up neatly for my first riding lesson with Bunty

 1969..my daughter's first ride with Miss Seagrim

Old postcard of Miss Seagrim in Sea Lane, Middleton

Miss Seagrim would lead her splendid clattering cavalcade through the village twice a day according to the tide timetable.  She’d have a novice on the leading rein next to her with the group following behind. They'd go to the end of Sea Lane where a concrete ramp led across the shingle, over the bed of seaweed onto the beach.  At low tide, there were huge expanses of sand perfect for a canter with the more confident riders being allowed to gallop ahead splashing through shallow pools.  The ponies were always a little livelier when the group turned for home.

Who's training who? My sister Sally in the cowboy field

It's girls who are especially drawn to ponies.  The Pullein-Thompson sisters who wrote such captivating pony books, had a sensible attitude as to why so many girls develop this passion,

"they need something to love, to nurture. It keeps them off pop stars!" 

 To digress further on this trio of sisters  - they wrote over 150 books between them and the majority were about ponies.  Their mother Joanna Cannan was also a prolific novelist and wanted her daughter Josephine and twins Diana and Christine to be strong, independent and resourceful.  She gave them excellent advice, unusual for the 1930s,   “I don’t mind what you do as long as you are not nonentities,”

Apparently, when a worried neighbour once asked Joanna if the twins were quite normal, she replied:  "Good God! I hope not." 

In 1948 we acquired Dushka who was a young New Forest pony with a soft, shaggy coat, a sweet nature and a mind of her own.  She was grazed in the fields at the back of Ancton Lane and it took us a while to acquire the proper tack for her.   We went carol singing that year and when asked which charity we were collecting for, I’d be shoved forward as the youngest to say winsomely, “For dumb animals” and we’d proffer our homemade collection box.  In fact, it was a shamefully duplicitous activity but we were desperate to buy a bridle for Dushka as my sisters had had enough of bumping along bareback.  Purchase of a saddle meant a trip to our favourite shop in Arundel; Rapley the Saddler which had bridles and heavy horse collars hanging in the window and where the deep, rich smell of leather wafted out of the shop.  I think we got a second-hand bridle in the end. 

Dushka was quick and competitive; she hated having another pony in front of her.  She loved to throw her head forward and gallop.  My sister won lots of gymkhana races such as bending and apple bobbing on her but made the big mistake of going out with the local Pony Club to join the Cowdrey Hunt one winter day.  Dushka assumed this was a different sort of gymkhana race and broke the ancient and inviolable rule of etiquette by charging ahead of the Master.  They never took her hunting again.

It's a lucky child who experiences riding.  Looking after ponies is much more rewarding than playing with stuffed toys and there’s a thrill to setting off on an adventure on horseback – getting the rhythm of rising to the trot, feeling the wind rushing past when cantering and galloping, being free and independent before heading back, thanking the pony, burying your head in their mane and offering an apple for reward.  When I first went to boarding school I used to ache with longing for that smell of horse and leather (and also had the deepest wish to be stroking Shandy's silky ears - we'll reserve this for another blog post).

The arrival of Dushka.  Shandy the dachshund poses neatly too

At Yapton in 1953 on  Bonnie, a borrowed pony - though on closer inspection, I think she might be a mule?

Sally on Punch at Clymping in 1955

We got another pony soon after - Punch was a piebald with a cheeky look in his eye and he was for Sally. The above photo shows her jumping Punch in fine style at a gymkhana.  They'd had lots of practice galloping along the beach and jumping over the breakwaters although this activity did startle sunbathers who were keeping out of the wind on the other side. I was often entered for the junior jumping event but became adept at steering Punch around the side of the jump to avoid flying over his head if he refused the obstacle.

We took great care preparing the ponies for the local gymkhanas.  Punch, poor chap, is being lathered with Lux flakes

On rare, but blissful occasions, we rode ponies into the sea.  They positively enjoyed this and would surge purposely out into the deep water; Dushka would quite willingly have swum the Channel.  I loved the sensation of being on horseback when they're swimming.  There's a gentle lurch when the ponies begin to pedal their legs and one feels perfectly safe with no danger of falling off onto some hard surface.

Unlike my horse-whispering sisters, I never had the knack with ponies although I did have some glorious outings with bold and fearless friends who had their own ponies and who were confidence personified.  I lost my nerve early on when Punch bolted off the beach with me flailing about and terrified on his back, On another occasion, I broke my leg falling off and remained fearful about a repeat of this. I was kicked by a pony at a gymkhana and though I quickly recovered consciousness in the ambulance, I was mortified with shame that I’d wet my jodhpurs.   My sisters however, had an enduring and happy partnership with their ponies – each summer they stayed at Pony Club camp and in term-time were even allowed to take them to boarding school - imagine that!  Eventually they, the sisters, not the ponies, migrated to Planet Boyfriend; - Dushka and Punch were adopted by another family.  

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