Saturday, May 02, 2026
When Swansea had its own racecourse
There are two notable restrictive covenants that apply to the estate. One of these is that any alterations to people's homes need to get the consent of the estate agent, the second is that there should be no pubs within the estate boundaries. Despite this latter prohibition there is one pub, just up the road from me, but the Manselton Hotel was not built for that purpose. It was opened as an actual hotel to service the nearby racecourse.
There is a large area of open ground above Manselton, which I have edged in red on the map below. This land is known locally as the racecourse, because in the nineteenth century it actually accommodated a raceourse. The land itself, now contains a disused quarry, shows evidence of mining activity and has a number of underground streams. To its west there is a straight footpath, the incline path, leading from Brynhyfryd Square at the bottom to Penderry Road at the top. This used to contain the track for a mineral railway.
Today Manselton is a suburban area of the city of Swansea, but back in the latter part of the 19th century it was a town in its own right. Swansea had its own popular, flourishing racecourse, but such was the desire for another successful, sustainable meeting in the Swansea area that businessmen planned a super meeting for Easter Monday 11th and Tuesday 12th April 1887. This was a meeting to be held under National Hunt rules, situated on a closed course at Manselton with races over 2 miles plus.
The course was financed by a rather gullible Richard Mansel Mansel, but was the brainchild of his financial agent Arthur Burr. Richard had inherited a fortune when his father died in 1878, but in the will he was granted ‘tenancy for life’ which meant he could benefit from the estate but not sell it. Burr saw that the best way of maximising this predicament was to build a hotel and enclosed racecourse, modelling it on the Park courses of England like Kempton and Sandown, so benefitting from the potential profit that each of the ventures would make.
The racecourse, a mile and a half around, was enclosed with 32 turnstiles to welcome paying punters through the gates. It was planned to be a huge inaugural meeting with well over 50000 people expected to attend. A brand new grandstand was erected to hold over 2000 people. The first meeting opened with the South Wales Selling Chase which was won by Ulster Chief owned by Mr Owen, while the Hunters’ Steeplechase went to Tom King owned by Mr Olive. The management were forward thinking, offering to return rail fares and Irish Boat fares to all owners of horses entered in the races; offering stabling for up to 50 horses, and ensuring that a working telegraph office operated in the grandstand on race days.
For all the hype proclaiming the 'super meeting', and the success of the first meeting, the momentum could not be sustained. Whilst a further meeting took place on August Bank holiday 1887, the writing started to appear on the wall by Christmas of that first year. Further meetings were held on Monday 1st August and Monday 26th December 1887, when the crowd was disappointing, the gate take low and the associated Swansea Race Ball had to be cancelled. The venture proved too costly despite the gate receipts and revenue from stallholders. The final meeting took place on Thursday 18th October 1888.
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