Yes. Don’t adjust your glasses. That caption says “Boosey: A Sussex Spaniel.”
This image comes from Country Life Illustrated (1 May 1897). The article in which it appears is on Borzoi coat color.
The actual text on this dog also appears in Country Life Illustrated (17 April 1897):
In the Sandringham Kennels last month died another aged favourite, a Sussex spaniel, by the name of Boosey, whose colouring (lavender-grey) resembled that of the Korthal Griffon [Wire-haired pointing griffon], and its jet black ears gave a very pleasing contrast to the faithful, intelligent face. Boosey had led quite a sporting life, for she invariably accompanied her royal master in the field, and proved a rattling good worker. Boosey was a great favourite of both the Prince and the Princess of Wales, and had reached the respectable age of fiftean years.
Okay. Um.
I hate to rain on anyone’s parade, but the royal family had a crossbreed among their shooting dogs (!)
I don’t doubt that Boosey was probably born to a Sussex spaniel bitch, and the majority of her litter mates probably were probably very typical golden-liver Sussex.
This is what happens when a litter has two fathers. The supposed father of Boosey’s litter was likely a fine Sussex spaniel, but some sort of terrier or lurcher got in with the mother while she was still in heat.
I don’t doubt that Boosey was an excellent gun dog. She was likely trained to be a Sussex spaniel, and because she was raised among “her mother’s people,” she took the task quite well.
Because this dog was a royal possession, I don’t think anyone would have admitted that she likely wasn’t a purebred.
But I don’t know how anyone could think that his dog was purebred. It may be a case of the Emperor’s New Clothes, where no one wants to say the obvious about something that might be embarrassing to an important person– even if it’s so obvious that a child could see it.
But it appears that one of the Sussex spaniel ladies at Sandringham was a tramp.
***
Sandringham is the large shooting estate in Norfolk that Queen Victoria purchased 1862.
It was the home of Edward VII and Alexandra, and the Prince of Wales mentioned as Boosey’s owner is George V. He was born on the estate and grew up shooting there.
George V loved gun dogs and shooting and spent most of his leisure time at Sandringham, which was better known for its Clumber spaniels than its Sussex.
It’s also possible that the writer had no knowledge of dogs, and that the Sandringham kennelman had a bit of a joke letting the writer infer that Boosey was “a Sussex”.
Certainly the present Queen has no problem with cross-breds, as witness her own beloved “Dorgis”.
Thomas Fall took her photo, and surely he knew dogs, seeing as he took photos of zillions of them.
So Fall may have taken the photo — but I doubt he was the one who led the writer to believe that this dog was a well-bred Sussex. If, as you postulate, Boosey was the result of a misalliance with a Sussex bitch, quite likely the tail was docked just as were the rest of thelitter. It’s very hard to tell on three-day-old puppies what they will look like as adultls!
(Just as further information, even after Thomas Fall’s death, the firm continued on under the same name for quite a few year, with a number of photographers working. Which makes dating a photo by the signature of “Fall” on it a bit more difficult.)
The dog’s tail is docked by a third as nearly all working spaniels are.