Danebury House, with racehorses training beyond

Danebury House itself is still standing today but no longer associated with horse racing. During the 19th Century, it was very well-known, closely linked with the nearby, famous, Stockbridge Racecourse. With a picturesque setting, the renown of the Stockbridge Racecourse grew from the first recorded mention of it in 1735. In 1780, the Prince of Wales attended the races there and in 1830, the Bibury Club, the oldest racing club in the country, elected to move and base itself there. The move was accompanied by further expansion of the racecourse itself; the extension of the course to twenty-four furlongs, and the building of a new enclosure. This was financed in part by Lord George Cavendish Bentinck who, as an enthusiastic gambler and racehorse owner, invested much of his wealth in restoring and expanding the racecourse. At the age of twenty-six, Lord George was reputed to have run up debts of 26,000 at Doncaster, despite the best efforts of his father to dissuade him from what he viewed as a disreputable past time. Lord George lived at Danebury House, and brought his horses to Danebury to be trained by the renowned local horse trainer, John Barnham Day, one of a notable local family of racehorse trainers. Lord George was also responsible for expanding the house to largely how it stands today, and building an extensive series of stables, paddocks and gallops. Run by Day, and not diminished by the untimely death of Lord George in 1848, the Danebury stables were the most successful horse training outfit in England during the reign of Queen Victoria and Edward VII, who also attended the races at Stockbridge. At a time when corruption in the racing world was rife, the Danebury stables were marked out by the integrity of their jockeys, as well as the success of their horses. In 1867, John Day sent out 146 winners, a record not broken until 1987. Tom Cannon later took over the running of the stables and they continued to prosper, as did Stockbridge Racecourse. The town's prosperity was further assisted by the expansion of the railways bringing the new burgeoning middle classes for a day at the races, and boosting the local economy particularly during the three day meet in June, when local inns and hotels were full to bursting with excited racegoers.
However this happy state of affairs was sadly terminated after the death of Sir John Barker Mill, who owned part of the land on which the racecourse was situated. Disapproving of gambling, his daughter withdrew the lease on the racecourse, resulting it its closure and the removal of the Bibury Club to Salisbury.