The Tiverton curly-coated retrievers were a major force in the breed in the later part of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. I have not been able to examine curly-coated retriever pedigrees, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the vast majority of modern curlies have a lot of ancestry in this strain. It seems that Mr. Samuel Darbey, the owner of the strain, was something like a Sewallis Shirey, a Reginald Cooke, or a Harding Cox in the wavy/flat-coated retriever.
His breeding program was located at Tiverton, Devon, which is in the West Country, not far from the Port of Poole, where many St. John’s water dogs were imported. His dogs were clearly purebred– curly coats of this type are very hard to breed if one outcrosses. But the West Country was always known for being the epicenter of curly-coated retriever breeding, for it was probably in this area that the St. John’s water dogs from Newfoundland were likely first bred with English and Northern Irish water spaniels. The Northern Irish water spaniel and certain English water spaniels very strongly resembled retrievers, as did the Tweed water spaniel, and these dogs are probably the water spaniels used to create the curly-coated retriever.
Not only is it likely that many modern curlies trace to these dogs, it has been found that two early popular sires in the golden retriever breed trace to one of the Tiverton curlies. So they are of interest to golden retriever historians as well.
These images come from Country Life Illustrated (15 February 1902).
Tiverton Bonny Lass
Tiverton Revel
Tiverton Beauty III
Tiverton Puzzle
Ms. Darbey and Tiverton Beauty II
Samuel Darbey with Bonny Lass and Sirdar.
The dog Sirdar was a liver, which was occasionally considered a separate breed from the more common black curly. I have found one text that calls the “red retriever” a liver dog that is identical to the black curly-coated retriever. At this time, it was particularly fashionable to breed a liver into black curlies, for it was thought that livers tended to improve the quality of coat. For this reason, it was thought that Sirdar would be in great demand as a stud, for “an occasional dash of liver generally improves the brilliancy of a black coat, which without it is apt to become dingy.”
I agree completely…