Explore the sporting story of Hawthorn Hill, from its racecourse past to the golf and hospitality visitors enjoy at Bird Hills today.
The dates and photographs here come from the club's own archive and research.
Hawthorn Hill Racecourse
It began as a point-to-point on land owned by Sir Robert Wilmot. The course took quickly, and by the turn of the century it had been upgraded to full National Hunt racing. The ground you play today carried horses first.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveLittle Ascot
Hawthorn Hill became one of Berkshire's premier racing venues. Its meetings drew aristocracy, military officers and fashionable society, and The Tatler sent photographers to the steeplechases. The course earned the nickname that stuck: Little Ascot.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveA royal victory
The Prince of Wales, later King Edward VIII, rode Pet Dog to victory in the Brigade of Guards Steeplechase. He took the trophy from King George V and Queen Mary, and Hawthorn Hill took its place in royal sporting history.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveThe golden years
The course ran its most successful period, hosting major National Hunt meetings and drawing thousands from across the country. For two decades Hawthorn Hill was one of the best-known sporting venues in the South East.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveThe final race
War brought the racing to an end. The last meeting under National Hunt rules was held on Tuesday 4 April 1939, closing almost sixty years of it.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveThe Hawthorn Hill Derby
Racing came back after the war in a different form. The first Hawthorn Hill Derby was run on Tuesday 1 June 1948 under Pony Turf Club rules, a plate of 500 sovereigns over about a mile and a half, with thirty-two three-year-olds declared. Mr J. Leatham won it.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveThe pony racing years
For three seasons Hawthorn Hill was one of Britain's leading pony racing venues, with a trotting course inside the circuit and a full card under Pony Racing Society rules. By 1963 it was over, and racing left the site for good.
Bird Hills Golf Centre archiveGolf arrives
The old racecourse was reshaped into an eighteen-hole public golf course and a floodlit driving range. The open, walkable character of the parkland here still owes something to the circuit it used to be.
The Bird Hills name
The course was sold to Japanese owners and took the name it carries today, beginning a long run of investment: the clubhouse, the restaurant, the function suites and the wedding venue all grew from here.
Bird Hills today
Eighteen holes, a TrackMan range, coaching, the Elizabethan Restaurant, function suites and a wedding venue. The galloping has long since faded, but the ground still does what it always did: it brings people together.
