Steeped in history, Belvoir sits on over 300 acres along the Thames River, just outside of London, Ontario. The main house on the estate was built in 1840 by Gideon Tiffany and was referred to by the locals as “Tiffany’s Castle”. The property stayed in the Tiffany family until the early 1900’s when Senator Little acquired it. It was the Senator who first named the property Belvoir after the famous estate in England.

The English estate was pronounced “Beaver” so as not to be thought of as French, and the Littles adopted the same custom for their Canadian namesake. The farm became the leading producer of Jersey milk for the London area and, in a brochure delivered to local households extolling the virtues of their prized bull, the cover had a large “Belvoir” heading with a small sub-title reading “pronounced Beaver”.

The Little family had an active social calendar, enjoying horses and becoming very involved with the local fox hunting community. The Littles also took great pride in entertaining, and counted Prime Minister McKenzie King as a frequent houseguest at their many parties. When the Littles eventually fell on hard times, the farm was sold to the Brotherhood of The Sacred Heart, who established the farm as a seminary and school for over a hundred boys. In 1978, a disturbed student burned the school down, but thankfully there was no major structural damage to the main house. The Order then shut down the seminary and converted the house into a retirement home for priests.

By 1986 when Terry and Maureen Pocock purchased the farm, there were only two priests remaining in residence. Since then, the barns have been rebuilt for a family’s worth of horses, and Tim Pocock, one of the seven Pocock siblings, has painstakingly restored the main floor of the house.

From 1987 through to 1994, Belvoir was host to numerous Horse Trials, from pre-training level up to intermediate. Belvoir has also been actively involved in hosting meetings of the London Hunt, more than one generation of Pony Club activities, as well as local area Dressage shows. Today Belvoir (once again pronounced Belvoir) stands as a prime training facility for eventers.

In 2003, siblings Susan Roth and Andrew Pocock resurrected the full-format Three-Day Event, running "1/2 Star" or Training Level Three-Day Event Clinics in 2003 and 2004 to great acclaim. In 2005 Belvoir hosted a wildly successful Ontario Horse Trials Association Championships at eight levels. In the fall of 2007, Belvoir repeated the successes of the 2005 Championships, as they hosted the 2007 Championships over the Labour Day weekend, September 1st and 2nd. Ten Championship divisions ran, as well as two local, non-championship divisions. Everyone worked hard to improve on all aspects of the event, from the stables to the grounds and everything in between, and once again Belvoir was blessed with the most wonderful weather. Thank you once again to all competitors, sponsors, volunteers and everyone who was involved with the event.

Welcome, and enjoy.