606 THE AMERICAN TROTTING HORSE. 



Kalamazoo in 1858. There is one otlier horse deserving especial 

 notice as a progenitor of trotters, in whose veins no blood of Mes- 

 senger can be found, though his pedigree is too obscure to warrant 

 the assertion that none existed there. Black Hawk, often called 

 Vermont Black Hawk to distinguish him from the equally cele- 

 brated Long Island Black Hawk, and also called Hill's Black 

 Hawk, was of Morgan stock on his sire's side ; being a sou of 

 Sherman, one of the best sons of Justin Morgan, the founder of 

 the Morgan family. The dam of Black Hawk was raised in New 

 Brunswick, and nothing is known of her pedigree. Black Hawk 

 was foaled in 1833, at Greenland, N. H. At four years old he 

 was taken to Lowell, Mass., where he was used as a carriage horse 

 for seven years. He then became the property of David Hill, of 

 Bridport, Vt., where he acquired great fame, begetting more high- 

 priced colts than any other horse .of his day. He had remarkable 

 power in propagating his own characteristics, and his stock were 

 uniformly stylish, spirited harness horses, many of them fast, and 

 some of them among the fastest. Another history of his pedigree 

 makes him the son of a Canadian named Paddy ; and still another 

 declares him a veritable native of Canada, though not a pure 

 Cannuck. The story, as it was given the writer by Mr. Lucien 

 Bechard, a Canadian horse-dealer, is as follows : An old Canadian 

 Frenchman, engaged in smuggling tobacco from the States, bought 

 there and took home with him a brown mare with foal. In due 

 time she had a bay colt, that at two years old begot Black Hawk 

 out of a little gray mare not over 14 hands high. The fortunate 

 possessor of the black colt was a widow who lived by the Chambly 

 River, in the Montreal district. At four years old he was sold to 

 John Harris for $200, and at six years old was sold again to Van 

 Loiseu, a dealer, for $400. Van Loiseu taught him many tricks, 

 at learning which he showed great aptitude, and sold him in New 

 York to a Bostonian for $600. From Boston he got to Lowell, &c. 

 This story is probably all true of some horse, but the identity is not 

 established. Black Hawk's colts were never gray, as many of 

 them would have been if his dam was that color, but many of them 

 were chestnuts, with white feet and faces, which was the cofar of 

 Sherman and of Sherman's dam. This fact pretty clearly shows 

 that neither the " Paddy" story nor the Canadian pedigree is 

 correct, but that Black Hawk was truly a Morgan. He was a 

 little under 15 hands, and weighed about 1000 lbs. In 1842 he 

 won $1000 by trotting five miles over the Cambridge Park Course 

 in 16 m. In 1843 he won a race of two-mile heats with ease in 

 5 m. 43 s. and 5 m. 48 s., and several times trotted single miles 

 in 2 m. 42 s. He was the sire of Ethan Allen, Black Ralph, 

 Lancet, Belle of Saratoga, Black Hawk Maid, Flying Cloud, and 



