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
Warham St Leger third wife, Mary Stafford, youngest daughter of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham, by whom he had five sons and four daughters, including: St Leger married secondly Emmeline Goldwell (d. 1628), by whom he had a son Walter, who obtained his father's Irish property. The Warham St Leger who died in combat in 1600 against Hugh Maguire (Lord of Fermanagh) was his nephew. Warham St Leger Sir Warham St Leger (1525?–1597) was an English soldier. He was second son of Sir Anthony St Leger by his wife Agnes, daughter of Sir Hugh Warham, brother of Archbishop William Warham, and was