Gilbert Brothers of Mitcham by Keith Mott

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Gilbert Brothers of Mitcham.

The SMT Combine’s last and longest old bird race, Bergerac (450 miles) was flown in July 1979 and it was much the same as three channel races proceeding it, being tough with poor returns. The Combine winner, doing 1072.9ypm, was a yearling blue cock owned by Gilbert Brothers of the Mitcham Common FC and this club had set somewhat of a record. Out of the five Combine races flown in 1979 the Mitcham Common had recorded a staggering three firsts and two seconds in the SMT Combine and the 60 member club had an eight bird limit in place on channel races. Brilliant pigeon racing! Gilbert Brothers named their Bergerac winner, ‘Billy’, and he was bred from stock birds of the Bernard Miles / Stichelbaut and Bill Stevens of Wandsworth strains. ‘Billy’ was sent to Bergerac sitting chipping eggs and from the 1979 Le Mans smash he returned with a note in his ring after dropping in to a loft in France, which turned out to be a good single up training toss.

The brothers had two lofts, a 12ft racing loft and 8ft stock loft with an aviary, and they liked plenty of good ventilation in their set up. When they started up 18 years previous, their loft was a converted Canary aviary which belonged to their father and this was stocked with birds obtained from several local fanciers. The Gilbert partners paired their 17 pairs of old birds up on 14th February and the mail family raced were Stichelbaut crossed with the Bill Stevens of Wandsworth pigeons. They had always raced natural, but gave the widowhood system a try in the 1979 season, and said at that time that the old bird races had to be planned, with the youngsters being raced to educate them. They trained as much as possible and fed on high carbohydrate mixture, with ‘Red Band’ for trapping. Fred Gilbert rated Terry Goodsell of Mitcham and R. Pool & son of Hackbridge the best local pigeon racers, because they were the most consistent. Apart from their Bergerac win the brothers also won 1st club, 10th Surrey Federation, 12th SMT Combine from the very hard Le Mans race in 1979.

Terry Goodsell also of the Mitcham club was 2nd Combine, doing 1072.7 and this was the second time that season that Terry had been beaten on decimals in the SMT, he was previously 2nd and 4th SMT Combine from Plymouth. The 2nd Combine Bergerac pigeon was a Rosenbrek / Janssen blue chequer cock named ‘Terry’ and was sent to Bergerac driving his hen to nest. This game cock also won 4th SMT Combine Plymouth in 1978 and his sire was the champion racing cock, ‘Mr. Nice Guy’, winner of six times 1st club, three times 1st Federation and 3rd Combine Plymouth.

Text & Photos by Keith Mott (December 2025)