The
first properly laid out racecourse in the area was on Knutton Heath near
Newcastle-under-Lyme.
In
November 1823 a committee was set up to establish annual races in the
Potteries. Initially they tried to come to an accommodation with the
committee organising the Newcastle races, but without success. In the end.
the committee organising the Pottery races decided to hold their races for
two days on Thursday and Friday of Stoke Wakes Week.
They
explained their actions in the Pottery Gazette in January 1824: “Notwithstanding
the above answer, declining even a conference on the subject, yet to shew
that there was not, nor is, any desire to conflict with the Newcastle Races,
the Committee for the Pottery Establishment have now fixed to have their
Races, for the present year, on Thursday and Friday in the STOKE WAKE Week,
thus steering clear of both days on which the Newcastle Races have been held
since the last and third change in that respect; although it will be
recollected, that is not the Newcastle, but the Stoke Wake Week, and
consequently being its own festival time, must be fairly considered at its
own disposal without consulting any other place."
Staffordshire
Advertiser of 21 February 1824
The
Pottery Race Committee persuaded the Wedgwood family to lease 47 acres of
land at Etruria for the new course (see 1832 map). They
spent £1,000 laying-out the course and building a large stand for
spectators.
The
first race meeting was a huge success. The extract from the Staffordshire
Advertiser of 21 February 1824 shows that the committee put on a varied
programme which included a foot race and a prison bar match as well as
horse races.
By
the early 1830s the races at Etruria were attracting over 30,000 spectators
and competitors attended from the whole of the Midlands. Part of the success
of the racecourse was due to the support of the Davenport
family
, pottery manufacturers
at Longport, and the Copeland family who took over the Spode works in
1834.
Alderman
Copeland had a stud farm in southern England and he brought his horses up
for the Pottery meeting as well as subscribing liberally towards the prize
money. However, when they withdrew their support after the general election
in June 1841 the Pottery races came to a sudden end. In the following year Earl
Granville
leased the mineral rights from the Duchy of Lancaster and sank a pit on the
site appropriately called “Racecourse
Pit” (see the 1899 ordnance
survey map).
(1760 onwards)
Etruria Racecourse 