Horsey stuff too. Taz on wedding & funeral duty

[Manky Monkey]

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.
   

[Manky Monkey]

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.

[Manky Monkey]

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.

[Manky Monkey]

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. 

[Manky Monkey]

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.

[Manky Monkey]

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.

[Manky Monkey]

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. 

Katie, Taz & Amiee.

[spanners]

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

[Tony oily bike]

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

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

[TwistedPatience]

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.

[BikerGran]

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

What can little T. O. do?
Drive a phaeton and two.
Can little T. O,. do no more?
Yes, — drive a phaeton and four.

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.

[tazet]

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
His bit starts at about 07.55 into it. It's only on line for 7 days I think.

[Manky Monkey]

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".