By the very late nineteenth century in Britain, the popularity of the Labrador was on the rise and it wasn’t long before the Royals got in on the act, in a connection with the breed that has endured right up to the present day.
The first Labrador kennels were established at Sandringham by King Edward VII, then Prince of Wales, in 1879 to house a hundred dogs, and the Sandringham kennels and the Labradors that are bred there have become firm favourites of the Royal Family as a whole. In fact, it may come as a surprise to many that the Queen is as fond of her Labradors as she is of her infamous Corgis.
In many ways the Corgis are the public face of the Queen’s canine companions, but the Labrador is the private love of her life. I was once told a story that the Queen has several Land Rovers custom-made with windscreen wipers on the inside. Apparently these were specifically adapted for her Labradors, who have a tendency to steam cars up from the inside out.
The Queen takes a very great interest in the Sandringham kennels. Since her accession to the throne in 1952, the breeding programme there has gone from strength to strength, culminating in the training of five Field Trial Champions. All the puppies born at Sandringham are named personally by the Queen and are registered at the Kennel Club with the prefix Sandringham.
At any one time, the kennels are home to about 20 dogs of all ages, including Labradors and Cocker Spaniels – ranging from the older and more experienced gundogs used by members of the Royal Family during the shooting season to the younger dogs under training as gundogs.
In addition to providing dogs for the Royal Family, the kennels also supply the Estate gamekeepers with working Labradors and Spaniels.
In a bout of hopeful optimism I sent a note to Her Majesty’s equerry asking if it would be possible to visit the Queen’s Labrador kennels at Sandringham. I was politely informed that the kennels are extremely private and that a visit would be impossible. While the Corgis are frequently photographed at the Queen’s side, her Labradors are rarely seen and it appeared that was the way she wanted it to remain.
Records of the breed were kept by the Buccleuch estate in Scotland at around the same time that Edward VII was beginning his Labrador breeding programme, and it is these that note the arrival of two chocolate puppies or ‘liver pups’ in 1890. Could these have been the progenitors for the future of chocolate Labradors? The royal household would undoubtedly have given the liver pups the ultimate royal seal of approval.
But while the Labrador was finally establishing itself on our shores, across the Atlantic a problem was looming that threatened the strength and integrity of the breed in Britain. In 1885 the Newfoundland government, worried about the number of dogs in the region, passed the Sheep Protection Act which gave local government the right to impose a dog licensing tax as well as the right to prohibit dogs completely.
Inevitably, dog importations were affected. Colonel Peter Hawker wrote in the Instructions to Young Sportsmen that, ‘Poole was, till of late years, known to be the best place to buy Newfoundland dogs; either just imported or broken in; until they became more scarce, owing (the sailors observe) to the strictness of those tax gatherers.’
The 1885 Act was meant to encourage sheep raising by reducing the number of potential predators, but the result was to kill the Labrador export trade. The Quarantine Act of 1895 created another barrier to the importing of dogs. The Act prohibited dogs from entering Great Britain without a licence and without first undergoing a strict six-month quarantine to prevent the introduction of rabies.
The future of the Labrador hung in the balance.
Between 1890 and 1930 the multiple taxes, restrictions and paperwork meant no new dogs were imported to Britain and the results were quickly felt. This was the moment when ‘breed mixing’ began. Some breeders began mixing Labradors with Setters and Pointers. ‘Bearing in mind the high qualities attributed to pure Labradors, it is somewhat strange that the breed should have been allowed to degenerate by the various crosses of Setter and Spaniel blood,’ wrote Hugh Dalziel in his 1897 publication, British Dogs, Volume III, referring to new problems such as a hard mouth and sulky temper.
Within the tight circle of enthusiasts there was a move to preserve the purity of the breed. In 1903 the Labrador Retriever was recognised by the Kennel Club. In 1904, it was granted breed status and listed separately as a member of the Gundog Group. The breed standard was written, and it was almost identical to the one that holds sway today.
During the first decade of the twentieth century, Labrador Retrievers rose to prominence in the show ring and in field trials, and were also much favoured gundogs. By 1913, they were so well entrenched in the world of dog ownership that their qualities as working dogs were causing an emotive debate. The criticism that was voiced that they could be a ‘bit hard in the mouth’ was queried by Frank Townend Barton in his authoritative volume, Gun Dogs. The ideal retriever is a ‘soft-mouthed’ dog, a fetcher which picks up game softly but firmly to bring back birds that are fit for the table. Dogs that unnecessarily drop, crunch on, chew or even eat the bird before delivery to the handler are considered ‘hard-mouthed’.
‘If the Labrador possesses the qualities assigned to it by James Craw (at one time gamekeeper at Hirsel and Netherby), viz sagacity, stamina, perseverance, quickness and nose, then no other variety can come up to the Labradors,’ he wrote. ‘The only fault that he had to find with some of them – a fault common to all other varieties of retriever – was that they were a bit hard in the mouth. Gamekeepers and shooting men required a dog that could retrieve birds and game without piercing the skin with their teeth. I have always thought Labradors have one of the softest of bites; indeed, I have even seen Labradors carry fresh, unboiled eggs in their mouths while running.
Controversy, however, has frequently arisen concerning this matter, but supporters often point out that this trait spans the retriever group as a whole. Sometimes hunger just takes over.
Townend Barton reasoned ‘the Labrador was one of the best dogs in existence for a gamekeeper, most of which like their dogs to look ‘well and fit’ at the opening of the shooting season, without needing to devote much attention to them during the busy time, which necessarily precedes it on estates where hand-rearing of pheasants is carried on to any extent.’
Barton gives his ‘strong recommendation of the breed to shooting men’ on the eve of the First World War. The sixth Earl of Malmesbury recalls the estate keeper, Mr Beech, being called up into the Royal Artillery and ‘… the [Labrador] bitch he left behind pined so much that she sadly died. As a child I just remember her. She was the last of the direct descendants of the dogs imported in 1823.’
In the middle of the war, in 1916, the Labrador Retriever Club was founded by Lord Knutsford (then the Honourable Arthur Holland-Hibbert) and Lady Howe (then Mrs Quintin Dick), with a Mr T. W. Twyford of Staffordshire, to champion the breed, and Labs suddenly became the fashion. In 1916 the club authored the first Labrador Retriever standard. In the 1920s and 30s, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth promoted Labradors at shows through their kennel, and the King entered dogs in Crufts. In 1938, King George became Patron of the Labrador Retriever Club. In 1952, on the death of George VI, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother continued as patron. Today, the Her Majesty the Queen is Patron of the Club and the Duke of Wellington is President.
The Hon Henry Holland-Hibbert, great grandson of the 3rd Viscount Knutsford, still has the stud book that traces the foundation of the famous Munden line of Labradors and, according to records, the original kennel is still intact on the Munden Estate.
It’s strange how trails can lead you in circles. I had already traversed the Atlantic Ocean in an effort to understand more about the breed I love so much, and now I found myself navigating the North Circular around west London towards
