The first great New Zealand-bred thoroughbred
Musket-Mersey by Knowsley 
Bred in 1885 by New Zealand Stud Company, Auckland
43 starts, 33 wins, 6 seconds, three thirds, unplaced once
Prizemoney: £29,626, a record that stood for thirty years.
Carbine was sold as a yearling for 620 guineas to Christchurch owner-trainer Dan O'Brien. He won all five of his starts as a two-year-old and then followed a path taken by countless other outstanding New Zealand horses in the years to come: he went to Australia where he ran second in the VRC Derby before winning twice at Flemington.
By the end of his three-year-old career Carbine had won the Champion Stakes, All Aged Stakes, AJC Plate, Cumberland Plate and the Sydney Cup.

He was then sold to Donald Wallace for 3,000 guineas and trained in Australia by Walter Hickenbotham. He ran second in the 1889 Melbourne Cup, during which he split a heel, an injury that affected him for the remainder of his racing career. Yet he went on to win a second Sydney Cup and achieved permanent fame in Australasian turf history with his victory in the 1890 Melbourne Cup. He carried 10 stone 5 pounds (almost 66 kg), still a weight-carrying record for the Cup, and won it in race record time by two-and-a-half lengths from Highborn carrying 6 stone 8 pounds (42 kg). The following year Highborn franked the class of Carbine's performance by winning the Sydney Cup with a weight of 9 stone 3 pounds (58 kg).

Carbine retired to stud in Australia in 1891, siring the Victoria Derby winner Wallace and two AJC Derby winners, but he was sold in 1895 to the Duke of Portland for 13,000 guineas and sent to England. There he stood at Welbeck Stud alongside the great St Simon and sired the 1906 English Derby winner Spearmint, sire of the 1920 Derby winner Spion Kop who in his turn became the sire of 1928 Derby winner Felstead. This three-generational Derby-winning feat has been equalled only twice, by Gainsborough (1918), Hyperion (1933) and Owen Tudor (1941); and Mill Reef (1971), Shirley Heights (1978) and Slip Anchor (1985). Carbine died at the age of twenty-seven.
Carbine’s sire-line is now largely extinct but the name of his son Spearmint is still found in many pedigrees, largely because he sired Catnip, the grand-dam of the great sire Nearco. He also appears in the pedigree of Phar Lap, as the damsire of Phar Lap's sire, Night Raid.

Did you know….

• Carbine’s first trainer Dan O’Brien was at different times a stockman, jockey, goldminer and hotel owner as well as an owner and trainer.

• Carbine’s head can be seen in the Racing Museum at Ellerslie Racecourse, Auckland.

• Carbine’s sire Musket came to New Zealand on a 99-year lease from the estate of his eccentric owner Lord Glasgow, whose will stated that none of his horses should ever be sold.