New Zealand’s impact on the Melbourne Cup has been considerable but some of those triumphs have been touched by tragedy.

Five Melbourne Cup-winning jockeys later died following race falls and three of those – Hughie Cairns, Roy Reed and Keith Voitre - were Kiwis.

The New Zealand trio were all top-class riders. Cairns, who starred on the flat and over fences, was 41 when he died after a hurdle fall at Moonee Valley in 1929 and Roy Reed was in his mid-30s when he was fatally injured at Trentham in 1936.

Reed and his older brother, Ashley, both rode Melbourne Cup winners and won a host of other feature races in New Zealand and Australia but the family could not be described as lucky. A third brother, Con, made a mark as a jockey but died, aged 23, after a fall at Taumarunui in 1924.

Voitre was just 25 when he had a fatal fall at Moonee Valley in 1938.  He had already established an enormous following in both New Zealand and Australia and his Melbourne funeral almost brought the city to a standstill.

People were lined up on the streets, often five or six deep, throughout the eight-mile route the funeral cortege travelled from the chapel to the cemetery, with “thousands” more at the graveside.

The procession, which included four cars dedicated to carrying the floral tributes, was followed by around 150 private cars. Traffic lights were temporarily turned off along the route and extra trains were put on to allow the public to reach the cemetery.

Press reports stated that the crowd contained “men and women of every class” and that “not for many years has such an assembly been seen at a Melbourne funeral.”

Wellington’s Evening Post noted that “Like Phar Lap, Voitre had a name that was known not only in racing circles but in every corner and sphere in the Dominion.”

Following Voitre’s death, the “racing owners of Melbourne” agreed to fund the building of an additional ward at Prince Henry Hospital in Melbourne, as a tribute to the rider.

Though his career was short, Voitre had still managed to win two New Zealand premierships, including a record tally that stood for 35 years, and to dominate the 1935 Melbourne spring carnival, when his wins included the Melbourne Cup, Cox Plate, VRC Derby, VRC Oaks, Linlithgow Stakes, Williamstown Cup (Sandown Classic) and Wakeful Stakes.

He did not make a permanent shift to Melbourne till February 1935 and in addition to his spring carnival haul, his first year in Australia also produced wins in the Doncaster Handicap, Epsom Handicap, Newmarket Handicap, Moonee Valley Stakes, Lloyd Stakes, VATC Anniversary Handicap, St George Stakes, Heatherlie Handicap, Williamstown Stakes, Liverpool Handicap and South Australian St Leger.

Newspaper reports of the time said that 1935 would always be known as Voitre’s year. 

Voitre’s Melbourne Cup win came on Marabou, who was trained by Lou Robertson, another New Zealander. Robertson also provided Voitre with his winning Cox Plate, VRC Derby and VRC Oaks winners at the 1935 carnival.

Robertson, who also prepared three Caulfield Cup winners and won the Melbourne training premiership three times, had an extraordinary career. Before switching to thoroughbreds, he had been a leading harness driver and trainer in New Zealand and Victoria and was inducted into the both the Australian Racing Hall of Fame and the Victorian Trotting Hall of Fame.

His harness credits included wins in the NZ Trotting Cup and Auckland Cup and three Victorian drivers’ championships.

Voitre served his apprenticeship at Awapuni, with Roley Hatch, who had been a top-class jockey and premiership winner himself.

Voitre won his first New Zealand premiership when still an apprentice, with 86 wins in the 1932-33 season but really made a name for himself the following year, with 123 wins, from just 504 rides. This was a remarkable feat given the strength of the opposition, the limited number of meetings and the difficulties associated with travelling around the country.

It eclipsed Hector Gray’s record tally of 116, two years earlier, and would stand the test of time. No other rider managed 100 wins in a season till Bill Skelton sneaked past Voitre’s record in the 1967-68 season, with 124 wins. That record stood for another 15 years, before David Peake reached 127 wins in the 1982-83 season.

Voitre’s NZ wins included the Auckland Cup (2), Wellington Cup, Manawatu Sires’, Great Northern Guineas, Wellington Stakes, Great Northern Foal Stakes (2), Royal Stakes (2), ARC Welcome Stakes (2), Wellesley Stakes and numerous other Cup races.

He had limited chances to enhance his Melbourne spring carnival record after 1935 as he suffered a broken leg in a fall at Moonee Valley in September 1936 and was sidelined for more than a year. He did have a Melbourne Cup mount in 1937 but had not been back riding long and was not at peak fitness.

His fatal fall came two years after he had suffered his broken leg at the corresponding Moonee Valley meeting.

Roy Reed never made a permanent shift to Australia but also made his mark on both sides of the Tasman.

He won two New Zealand premierships and might have won more had he not ridden regularly at the major Australian carnivals. He had still been on track to be the first jockey to win 1000 races in New Zealand, with his tally at 921, when he had his fatal fall.

Reed, who was based at Awapuni, won 16 races on the outstanding Riccarton galloper Nightmarch, including the 1929 Melbourne Cup. Nightmarch won the Melbourne Cup with ease, under 58kg, with Paquito completing a Riccarton quinella and three-year-old Phar Lap third. Reed also partnered Nightmarch to win the Cox Plate, Epsom Handicap, Randwick Plate, Rawson Stakes and Autumn Stakes in Australia that season.

Reed died before his brother Ashley had a spectacular run at the 1937 Melbourne spring carnival, taking the Caulfield-Melbourne Cup double on The Trump, who also won the Mackinnon Stakes and Toorak Handicap.

Roy Reed had a particularly good record in staying races, winning the Wellington Cup six times, with two wins apiece in the Auckland and New Zealand Cups. He won the Trentham Gold Cup (3200m) four times, the NZ St Leger four times and Awapuni Gold Cup three times and added a win in the Metropolitan Handicap in Sydney.

Hughie Cairns might be an unfamiliar name to most New Zealand racing fans, but he was the first jockey to win the Melbourne Cup and Cox Plate in the same year and is in the Australian Racing Hall of Fame.

Cairns served his apprenticeship at Otaki, with Frank Higgott, but was never a lightweight and his first win came in a hurdle race. He also won the 1909 Wanganui Steeplechase while his main flat wins in his home country appear to have come in the Marlborough Cup (twice) and Wairarapa Cup.

There was no lack of competition in New Zealand and in the 1909-1910 season Cairns and Ron Cameron, another young Kiwi jockey, decided to try their luck in Melbourne.

They didn’t take long to make an impression. Cameron, later a successful trainer, ran second in the 1910 Melbourne Cup and 12 months later became the first New Zealand jockey to win the race, on The Parisian.

Earlier on the 1911 cup day programme, Cairns had been successful in the Cup Day Hurdle.

Cairns continued to mix flat and jumps racing, with his first major wins in Australia coming in the Grand National Hurdle and Australian Hurdle.

In 1917 he won the Grand National Hurdle again, as well as the All-Aged Stakes and Caulfield Stakes on the flat, and the following season his wins included the Australian Hurdle and the Futurity Stakes.

He gave jumps riding away in 1921, to concentrate on the flat, and won a series of big races.

He had a rewarding partnership with champion galloper Heroic, on whom he won 14 races, including the AJC Derby, Caulfield Guineas, Cox Plate, Newmarket Handicap, AJC Champagne Stakes and Ascot Vale Stakes.

At the 1926 spring carnival, Cairns won the Cox Plate on Heroic and the Melbourne Cup on Spearfelt. The Cox Plate did not have the iconic rating then, that is does now, but it was still a notable double. Spearfelt was trained by Vin O’Neill, another expat New Zealander, and the Kiwi combination struck with Spearfelt again the following year, in the Australian Cup.

Unfortunately, Cairns was persuaded to return to jumps riding late in his career. His fatal fall came at the last fence in a hurdle at Moonee Valley, on what had been a late pickup mount.