Doncaster Racecourse its present location and in 1776 Colonel Anthony St. Leger founded a race in which five horses ran. This race has remained in existence and become the world's oldest classic horse race. During the first world war the racecourse was used for military purposes and substitute races were run at Newmarket from 1915 to 1918. Doncaster has the distinction of both starting and ending the flat season on turf. Every September, Doncaster hosts the prestigious four-day William Hill St. Leger Festival, which is acclaimed as the premier sporting occasion of the Autumn calendar. Doncaster has also taken over events whose
Ralph St Leger now lost. It depicts Ralph prone with hands together in prayer and dressed in full armour, his bare head resting on his helm atop which is the crest of St Leger, "a griffin passant". His wife Anne lies to his left, and wears an elaborate head-dress. Both persons feet rest on dogs. The Latin inscription beneath is as follows (expanded from abbreviated text): "Orate pro animabus Radulphi Sentleger Armigeri et Anne uxoris suae qui quidam Radulphus obiit undecimo die Novembriis anno domini millencimo CCCCLXX. Quorum animabus propicietur Deus Amen" ("Pray ye for the souls of Ralph Saint Leger, Esquire, and