As I looked out of the window of my hotel bedroom, studying the view of central Damascus, the mobile phone rang. Peter Walwyn was on the line. I have not seen Mr Walwyn, who was twice British champion racehorse trainer and trained Grundy to win the Derby in 1975, for several years. I reminded him of our lunch at Simpson’s-in-the-Strand. He had sat down, ordered a vodka and tonic, and told me that the evening before he had placed flowers on Jeffrey Bernard’s grave. After Bernard died several Lambourn trainers, along with Peter O’Toole, held a ceremony at the top of the gallops. A simple granite stone memorial now marks the spot. I think that the Low Life correspondent of this magazine would have felt great happiness and pride that the daffodils swaying in the breeze beside the huge beech tree at the top of Faringdon Road gallops in Lambourn this spring were planted in his memory by one of the finest and most popular racing trainers of the 20th century.
Peter Oborne
Notes from Damascus
Plus: The memory of Jeffrey Bernard, and the 100th anniversary of the Armenian genocide

issue 26 April 2014
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