Banstead Village

Nork Park - Vanderbilt coach and horses

Vanderbilt coach and horses in Nork Park. This postcard was dated 1908. The railings and drive are still there 100 years later.

In 1907 Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, an American millionaire came to England with 27 horses and competed in the International Horse Show. He won at his first attempt. In 1908 he brought up to 80 more horses to this country from the USA and put his coaches back on the road to re-create the atmosphere of the old coaching days before the advent of the railways.

Mr Vanderbilt often drove the coaches himself. He gave up coaching in 1914 when war was declared and returned to the USA. Unfortunately he died on his way back to England when the Lusitania, a British liner, was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine.