Manky Monkey Motors

Anyone remember Taz?
For those new to the forum, Tazet is my missus, Tanya. She owns a part restored '69 Dodge Charger & a part built Reliant trike.
She used to be a regular on the forum, but now works such long hours, she rarely gets the chance to call in here.
We live in an old cottage on the edge of Clandon Park, a National Trust house near Guildford in Surrey, where Taz runs the stables. Although they no longer own the big house, her bosses, Lord & Lady Onslow, still own the 800 acre estate around it & live in a large farmhouse in the grounds.
On Saturday, their youngest daughter got married at the local village church so Taz was in charge of the drive there & back in the horse drawn carriage.
Lord Onslow's recently retired from carriage driving. He & Taz travelled round the country, competing in events at other stately homes -sort of off road rally driving with horses. His team of Welsh Palomino ponies are used to charging around obstacles & through woods & streams, racing against the clock, not trotting sedately to church. We had visions of them skidding sideways into the churchyard in a spray of gravel, with the bride hanging onto the back of the carriage for dear life.
Because of Lord Onslow's failing health, the wedding was brought forward by several months, meaning Taz had just 1 week to get the team trained up for wedding duty. Only 2 of the 4 ponies had done a wedding before.
Brought in from their field, hosed down & brushed up, they scrubbed up suprisingly well. I was pressed into service to help polish the leather harnesses. Once they were fitted up, the 4 ponies had to stand for an hour in the 300 year old barn, waiting for their big moment. Max, in the foreground in the second pic, was starting to doze off & wanted to lay down -he had to be taken out for a brisk walk round the yard to wake him up again.
 

The dressage carriage was chosen, but hadn't been used for a year or so. I spent the rest of the morning polishing it till it gleamed. 

As Lord Onslow's very unwell, it was decided to load him onto the carriage first, then hitch the ponies up afterwards.

The present Lord Onslow, Michael, & his son, Rupert, looking very rakeish with his orange plume, who will eventually take over the estate. He drives a Range Rover with a Chevy engine conversion & is quite impressed that Taz owns a 6 1/4 litre Dodge charger!

My missus, Taz. She scrubs up well when she has to too, though she's more normally in jeans & wellies & smelling faintly of horse poo.  :P

Taz & stable hand Katie.

The 4 ponies aren't used to standing around -they know that once they're hitched to the carriage it's time to race. So Taz had to keep them in check until the bride appeared, then get going as soon as she was aboard.

Setting off, across the estate, to the local church.
The big house is now owned by the National Trust & can be rented out for formal occasions, but used to be the family home. The present Lord Onslow lived there when he was a boy. As the Onslows drove past in the carriage, there was another wedding taking place there.

bloody ell  taz does scub up well ;D ;D.
that well i had to study the picture,s   lol ;) ;)

Whoa there buddy!  :D
Out of the estate gates, gently over the speed bumps, & up the road to the church.
To keep the team of 4 under control in Saturday afternoon traffic takes some doing, especially when you're trying to look poised & sedate too. Taz handled it all expertly. Guess who got the job of standing on the corner outside the church, in a dayglo vest, slowing the traffic down.  :(  

didnt they give you the bucket and shovel job ,,,,

 ;D Tony Oily Bike lives nearby & rode through the village on his Triumph later that afternoon. He said there was a trail of horse poo leading to the church!

They'd arranged to unload everyone in the driveway of the house next to the church, away from the traffic.
With the family safely off to the service, it was time for a fag & a breather for the girls. The ponies were unhitched for a break too.

Only the bride & groom to take back to the house after the wedding, so while they were in the church, Taz dashed back to the yard where the lead pair of ponies were unhitched, leaving the more experienced 2 for the drive back.

Katie.

Out of a different gate on the estate & down the dual carriageway, back round to the church, to hide in the driveway next door until the church bells rang. Then out to the front to pick up the new bride & groom for their trip back to the house.

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Beautifully done. It all looked fantastic -you'd never know how much work had gone in behind the scenes to make this happen. All in a day's work for Taz.
Oh, & once they'd got the carriage safely back to the yard & stowed in the barn & the ponies given a well deserved night in the stables, Taz & Katie were back, swapping riding boots & gloves for waitresses' black n whites to help out with the evening catering for this lot. Taz finally got home at 1.o.clock in the morning. Then had to be up again at 6 to start mucking out the stables.

.

The family had gone for an orange theme for the wedding, with orange flowers & feathers in the top hats. All very stylish.

Taz needed an orange shirt for the day so she borrowed one of mine. Good job she didn't have to take her jacket off  -it had Pennsylvania Pyscho Ward printed across the back  :P yeah, 'course I'm proud of her.  :-*

There's doing things in style, and there's doing things in style......

Wow and cool.

Nice one.  ;)

Love the style, and love the fact that the Lord looks like he's having a great time!

Hats off to Tanya for making it happen!

Because I don't actually work on the estate, I just live there, I only see Lord Onslow once in a while if I'm calling in at the stables to see Taz. He has no reason to remember me, but always knows my name & takes the time to ask about my job, our various vehicles etc. A genuinely nice chap & a proper, old school eccentric British Lord -just as you want him to be.
Taz spent an entire day on the phone last week, talking to everyone in the carriage driving community, tracking down a horse carriage that could take a wheelchair & even drove down to Lord March's Goodwood estate in Sussex to check one out. Then he announced he wanted to use his own carriage & his own horses -I'm not an invalid, I'm just unwell. Good on him I say. I'd like to think he's determined to cause everyone as much hassle as possible while he still can too!  :)

and i say good for him ,,,








my dad worked/caused mayhem up untill  4 or 4 days before he passed on..

and the old bugger is still watchin from above ,,

I'm poooooooped  :( The whole day was fantastic. Who said you can't plan a wedding in a week. Will need weeks of intensive chiro though as back and right shoulder now buggered but worth it to make the day happen.  ;D

Well done taz made several people very happy

well taz good on you  xxxxxxx for doing it all and seeing it through  i  understand how you feel right now (f,,,,d) oo,ps sorry   , shattered

missed you at basingstoke so i,ve got to come back next year   :D ;) ;) ;D

Just picked up this item Mr. M, and you are fully justified in your sense of pride with Taz. In this peculiar, changing world, this seems to impart a sense of continuity! and that's not meaning to seem pretentious! nice one y'all, and that's from an old radical!!....Morrag

I'm not big on privelege & wealth. I agree the Royal family get far more respect than they're worth, especially in light of revelations of their various private lives & that probably goes for most of the aristocracy. But I think traditions are important & sometimes things just need to be done the right way.
As I said, his Lordship isn't long for this World & I'm glad we managed to do our bit to make it a special day for him & his family.

Well, it's been a very sad day here on the Clandon Park estate.
Lord Onslow passed away this morning. Affectionately known to his staff as Lordy, he was 73 & had been battling prostrate & bone cancer. In just a few months he'd been reduced from a strapping, hale & hearty 6 foot plus, to a frail old man in a wheelchair. Heart breaking to see, but he kept his sense of humour to the end.
It's exactly a week since the wedding. He never stopped grinning all that day, but we knew how much of an effort it'd been for him & it soon became clear he'd held on for his family's sake. Once he'd seen his daughter safely married & with assurances that the estate is in good hands for the future, he simply let go. Tanya was one of the very last to talk with him.
Taz has grown very close to him over the past 12 or 13 years that she's worked on the estate. I think he secretly enjoyed her nagging him for being constantly forgetful -he called her his Wife Number Two. They competed in carriage driving events around the country, him at the reins & her bellowing directions to him as they charged around obstacles & through woods & streams with a team of 4 Palomino ponies. Tanya was always frustrated that they didn't do better in competition, but he just loved taking part. Horses were his passion & we're so glad he was able to take one last carriage ride with his beloved ponies last week.
I don't work for the Onslows, I just live with Tanya in the cottage that goes with her job, so I'd bump into Lordy maybe once a month or so around the estate. I went to watch them compete once, marched with him in the annual village Remembrance Day parade & stood beside him as he belted out hymms at the accompanying church service. Tanya & I attended 3 or 4 of the staff Christmas drinks dos he & his wife hosted in their home. He was charming, generous, had a lively sense of humour, was a welcoming host & a great teller of stories. He was educated at Eton & studied at the Sorbonne. He had a wealth of knowledge of British history & took his duties in the House of Lords as a Conservative peer very seriously. In fact he was the very last hereditary peer left there. He may have been the 7th earl of Onslow, who's family once owned literally half of Surrey -"You were born in Old Woking Andy? We used to own that. Sold it for 5 pounds an acre", yet you could meet him in the local British Legion bar & he'd buy you a drink & chat to you all evening. He was an old school gentleman. A lovable eccentric. Above all, he was a thoroughly nice chap. They just don't make 'em like that any more.
One more generation gone. All that knowledge lost forever. A little bit more of the Great British spirit has slipped away. It was a pleasure to know you Sir.
Farewell Lordy.

Lord Michael Copplestone Dillon Onslow, 7th Earl of Onslow. 1938 - 2011.

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R.I.P. ,,lordy,,

at least he saw/took part in his daughter's big day

The difference a week can make............

Sad news indeed.

Touching write-up Andy, gives us that didn't know him a bit of an insight. I grew up in Guildford, so the name Onslow was always about.

One thing Britain is good at is having "characters".

 :'(
R.I.P. Lordy. A sad day indeed.

This country is what it is because of the likes of this great man. Such a sad loss. One less eccentric to colour our land. :( :( :( :(

A sad day indeed!!! RIP!

touching tribute Andy, RIP old chap....

Taz now has to organise a horse drawn funeral, using the same ponies that took Lord Onslow to the church for the wedding last week.
Final plans are still being sorted, but as far as I know, there'll be a private family service, followed by a funeral procession through the length of the 800 acre estate, passing along what used to be the grand avenue that led from the official estate entrance to the big house. The "Golden Gates" -huge black painted & gilded entrance gates with a small gate house on either side, stand beside the A25 & are no longer in use. They'll be opened specially for the procession to pass through enroute to the nearby Merrow church, where the Onslows have a family vault. Lordy's is the last space left in it. I think it's very fitting that he'll leave the estate for the last time that way. The end of an era.
Clandon Park's been the Onslow family home since 1641. Although his son will inherit the title & Taz gets on very well with him & his family, she says she'll continue calling him by his christian name as she always has. There'll never be another Lordy.

Scanning through the online newspaper obituaries, I came across this piece, written a few days before he died:
http://hightory.com/2011/04/17/earl-of-onslow-desperately-ill/

I knew he'd appeared twice on "Have I got news for you", but I didn't know he'd presented a show on Radio 3:

"Lord Onslow achieved a degree of prominence presenting a rather eccentric Radio 3 show on rap, ambient house, acid jazz, jungle and thrash metal".

That's gonna make me smile every time I think of him now.  :)

R.I.P. Lordy. :(

Just picked up on this thread. I never knew the fella, but knew that Tazet works and lives on his estate. He sounds like he was a real character and very determined too. At least he got to see his daughter married, I'll bet it was one of the best days he ever had.
R.I.P Lordy

realy am sorry for a realy sad ending and like others have said andy your memory of him is very touching they realy dont make them like that any more a lord but who also liked mixing with the different classes soemone genuine and who did take interest in the people and their families who worked for him
rip lordy

I used to pass those gates on a regular basis when I lived down that way. Always wondered where there led to. ;D ;D ;D ;D

To have left this mortal coil having left your mark, is all one can hope for, and this man obviously did so, therefore "Bon Chance", and may you stare eternity in the face without prejudice.....................Morrag

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/8519644/The-Earl-of-Onslow.html

 :'(

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1388562/Earl-Onslow-dies-73-The-non-PC-lord-refused-toe-ANY-party-line.html

Another busy day on the estate.
Lordy was buried today. Again, Taz was at the reins for his final journey, from the Onslow home in the grounds of Clandon Park, Surrey, to the family crypt at the local Merrow church.
Instead of using a normal hearse, it was decided to re-use the horse carriage that had carried Lordy & his daughter to her wedding a week or two ago. The carriage is fairly new & was built in Poland, with a powder-coated steel frame, rather than the traditional wood & has disc brakes all round. Some of the guys who work around the estate removed the rear bench seats & fitted a wooden platform to carry the metal lined coffin, (rather than being buried, it was interred in the family's vault below the church). It was decorated with flowers & black ostrich plumes, (taken from Taz's feather duster!), & his coffin covered in a burgundy drape, (the Onslow family's colour), embroidered with his gold crest.
Taz & her grooms, Katie & Amiee, led a procession of mourners who walked behind the carriage as it journeyed across the estate, from Lordy's home to Clandon Park House, the "big house", now owned by the National Trust, which Lordy grew up in. After stopping briefly under the entrance porch of the front doors, they returned along the grand avenue & left the estate through the golden gates, which were opened as they approached, to cross the road to the church.
   

They had to cross the busy A25, the wrong way along the dual carriageway, so local Police were on hand to stop the traffic. One mourner told me it was the first time he'd seen the entrance gates open in 45 years.

I wasn't sure it was appropriate to take photos, but the family were quite happy about it -this is history. Lord onslow was the last remaining hereditary peer in the House of Lords. The end of an era.

Around 160 family & friends chose to follow the carriage through the estate. It was very warm & sunny today & the half hour walk must've been quite a route march for some of the more elderly there.
Taz & Lordy agreed several years ago that she would take him on this last journey when the time came. He returned from a trip to the West Indies many years ago with a set of multi coloured woollen Rastafarian hats, which he insisted his team all wore over their riding hats when they competed, in typically flamboyant Lordy style. Appropriate really as Taz was actually born in Jamaica, but they all hated the things & tried several times to "lose" them. Taz hid them on the carriage today, so they travelled with him.
I took a day off work & was in charge of car parking in a field next to the entrance gates, so didn't take part in the procession, but was at the gates as they arrived.

Rupert, Lordy's son, the new Lord Onslow & Taz's new boss. 

Again, like the wedding, Taz & her team were working feverishly behind the scenes to make sure everything ran smoothly on the day. Once the casket was safely delivered to the church they had to jump back onboard the carriage & charge back to the stables, where a group of the owners who keep their animals on the estate were waiting to take charge of the ponies while the girls jumped into a car to dash back to the church for the service.

The church was packed with family & friends, many from the carriage driving community. So many that the service was relayed over speakers to the hall next door. Two vicars & the Bishop of Dorking were in attendance. Several family members spoke of Lordy having enriched the lives of everyone he met -& he did. This was a celebration of his colourful life, rather than a dour mourning of his death.
His brother in law spoke of his opening line when he presented a series of radio 3 programmes on acid jazz & thrash metal music -"Hello, now it's time to get trippy with Lord Onslow".
Our local vicar spoke of how Lordy had told him he'd had more love from his family than any man could expect
-"Well, what more could you ask for".
"Another ten years would've been nice".
A moving service & as Taz said when she finally got home at midnight, just the way he would've wanted it. A fitting end to a well spent life.

Poor Katie had borrowed a pair of leather riding boots from Amiee, but the march alongside the carriage had almost crippled her. By the time they got back to the stables after the service she could hardly walk & we had to find a pair of shears to cut the boots off her! Lordy would've been in hysterics.  :D

Katie, Taz & Amiee.

well what can be said,,,  only a job well done  and very ,fitting,

Well said...........

Was trawling through the post's when I saw this, well done Taz and your team for seeing a well liked gentleman off in such style.

RIP Lordy.

I guess Tanya has lost a friend - almost in tears myself reading this.

I've known this little rhyme for years and apparently it was written about one of Lord Onslow's ancestors, Tommy Onslow who was the 2nd president of the Bensington Driving Club in the 1800s...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_club (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_club)


A fine tradition he carried on!  I hope someone will continue to drive those wonderful ponies.

Well done Tanya for seeing her boss off in such style, I don't suppose it could have happened without her.

Thanks for your kind words.
I genuinely feel he would have been well and truly chuffed with what we did for him and I honestly don't think there was anything missed out or messed up. I was petrified in the morning and all the way to the Church. Before we got him on the carriage the full scale of what I was about to do hit me and knowing this is not just anyone but a huge political figure as well as my boss and friend, it was just not at all possible for me to allow anything to go wrong or it would be all over the tabloids. It wasn't till later in the day that I was told there were actually 2 photographers from 2 papers, (Times and Telegraph I think), taking pictures. I was also given a copy of the Surrey Advertiser today and there we are. I'm sure they could have chosen better photos.
We now have a huge transition to go through, from old Lord to new Lord, and things are going to be very strange for a while for all of us. I visited the crypt today and had a chat with him. God I miss him and keep expecting a phone call saying well done which he always did after a big event as he did the day after his youngest daughter's wedding and I get quite upset knowing that won't happen. Even now writing this the keyboard it getting fuzzy.
I'm so grateful for him believing in me and giving me the chances he did and allowing me to work and live on such a wonderful estate and meet the famous people I have. I'm also glad that by chance I went up to his room on the Friday night to take something to Lady O and ended up sitting with him till 7pm so she could pop to the shops so I had a few hours just me and him chatting and watching TV and that's the best. I was later told that that was about the most he was awake that day as the rest he was sleeping. There is so much I could ramble on about but I wont, so with that I will end.

R.I.P M'Lord  :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'(


  Radio 4 programme (http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b011ckxn)
His bit starts at about 07.55 into it. It's only on line for 7 days I think.

This began as a thread about Taz's carriage driving activities -well, it's kinda vehicle related isn't it. Just trying to give a little insight into what goes into caring for the animals, driving the carriages & the whole "behind the scenes" bit of a world some readers might not get to see.
It wasn't intended to be a memorial to a guy most of you wouldn't have heard of, but he was a very special man -the embodiment of all that we think of as important about being British. Sadly, that traditional image of our national identity's dying out with his generation. We're being watered down, dumbed down, Europeanised & made to feel guilty for being proud to be British. Lordy was a perfect example of what made our little island Great & it'll be a greyer World without his kind. This was a chap who once chased an escaped bullock down the A3 on horseback & lost his pet monkey on the London underground. As he admitted, he was only in the position he was by an accident of birth, but he made the very most of that privelege to enrich the lives of everyone he met. Of all the people I've spoken to in the 4 years or so that I've lived on the Clandon estate, not one has ever said a bad word about him. That's a pretty good epitaph for any man I think. We need more Lordys.
The link Taz posted in her reply, above, is to a Radio 4 obituary programme. It's only online for 7 days so have a listen if you can. His section runs from 7.55 minutes into the programme to 14.06. At the end, they play a clip from one of his Radio 3 music shows:

"It's time for me to go now.
I shall play you out with my personal choice -Connected, by Elastica.
Goodbye & have a pleasant day".