{"id":376441,"date":"2026-10-18T21:45:28","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T21:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/376441\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T21:45:28","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T21:45:28","slug":"actor-recalls-being-one-of-the-few-to-see-queen-elizabeths-homicidal-horse-routine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/376441\/","title":{"rendered":"Actor Recalls Being “One of the Few” to See Queen Elizabeth’s “Homicidal Horse Routine”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Queen Elizabeth<\/a> was always most at home with her horses and dogs<\/a>, but according to actor Ian Ogilvy, she was almost killed by a runaway horse in Windsor\u2014and her reenactment was something he\u2019d never forget.<\/p>\n

In Gyles Brandreth\u2019s biography Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait<\/a>, he details a polo match when English actor Ogilvy ran into the late Queen in a refreshment tent. Queen Elizabeth was dressed down in \u201ctweeds, headscarf, muddy wellington boots\u201d at the time, and when trying to think of something to say, Ogilvy asked about one of her favorite horses.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was wondering, ma\u2019am\u2014what ever happened to Burmese<\/a>?\u201d he said, referring to the black mare she rode for Trooping the Colour between 1969 and 1986. Unsurprisingly, the topic of horses made the late Queen brighten up, and she shared what happened when she encountered an out-of-control fieldmate of her beloved horse.<\/p>\n

Latest Videos FromMarie Claire<\/p>\n

\n

\"Queen\n<\/p>\n

Queen Elizabeth rides Burmese next to Ronald Reagan in 1982. <\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n


\n<\/p>\n

\n

\"Elizabeth:\n<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Elizabeth: the No.1 Sunday Times Bestselling Biography of Britain\u2019s Longest-Reigning Queen<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWell it\u2019s funny you should ask, because I\u2019ve just been to see her,\u201d Queen Elizabeth<\/a> said, per Brandreth. \u201cSo I went into her field, you see, and she came trotting over, as always, because we know each other terribly well, of course\u2014great old friends, in fact\u2014and I always take her a carrot or an apple or something.\u201d<\/p>\n

The late Queen said that while she was giving a snack to her \u201cvery old\u201d friend, a renegade horse came racing towards her. The monarch recalled hearing \u201cthis awful snorting and thumping noise,\u201d only to see a \u201chuge stallion charging at me! At full gallop!\u201d<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

Continuing her story, the late Queen<\/a> went into full horse impersonation mode.\u201dI had no idea what he was doing in Burmese\u2019s field, but here he was, pounding towards me, and his eyes were all red and his ears were bared\u2014just like this!\u201d she shared. Brandreth wrote that “here Ian Ogilvy claims to be one of the few of the late Queen’s subjects to have seen Her Majesty “performing her homicidal horse routine.”<\/p>\n

\n

\"Queen\n<\/p>\n

Queen Elizabeth rides Burmese at Trooping the Colour for the last time in 1986. <\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

The animated Queen told Ogilvy, “And I knew without a shadow of doubt that he was going to kill me so I ran, quite literally ran, as fast as I could to the gate and got out just seconds before he attacked me and\u2014well, the fact is\u2014you very nearly lost your sovereign.”<\/p>\n

Celebrity news, beauty, fashion advice, and fascinating features, delivered straight to your inbox!<\/p>\n

Brandreth added that the late Queen “loved a story of a runaway horse,” sharing a tale one military man told him after Elizabeth’s 2022 death<\/a>. Major-General Sir Sebastian Roberts recalled one horse story that was “his happiest memory of Her Majesty” while waiting for Queen Elizabeth’s body to return to Buckingham Palace<\/a> from Balmoral<\/a>.<\/p>\n

During a rehearsal for Trooping the Colour<\/a> one year, the horse Roberts was riding took off “down the Mall at 40 miles per hour.” He told Brandreth that there was a cry from a sergeant-major “ringing in his ears” of “Pull the effing reins ’til the bridle comes out of his arse,” and Roberts later told the story to the late Queen.<\/p>\n

“She laughed and laughed and laughed,” Roberts told Brandreth. “I’ve never seen her laugh so much.”<\/p>\n

Explore More<\/p>\n


\nQueen Elizabeth II
\n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Queen Elizabeth was always most at home with her horses and dogs, but according to actor Ian Ogilvy,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":376442,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-376441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/376442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}