443 DESCENDANTS OF MAMBllINO CniEF. 



second heat, would have won it and the race. She trotted under the draw- 

 backs named, in about 2:52. At the Louisville Fall Meeting I entered licr in 

 the three-year-old race, against Kentucky Chief and others, all of which I 

 had good reason to believe she could beat. In the race, after trotting in the 

 lead, her bit broke, and having a nose band on her bridle, she was gradually 

 taken up without anj^ demonstrations of kicking or ill temper, and of course 

 walked home and was distanced. In 1863, at the Spring Meeting, Louisville, 

 Ky., I entered Thorn in a three-in-five race, free for all. Belle of Indiana 

 and Thorn trotted for the purse, Thorn winning at her ease in three straight 

 heats. The next day I entered her in the two-mile heat race, with Indiana 

 Belle, Mountain Jack, and others; and Thorn won without ever being ex- 

 tended in any part of the race. My object was to drive her behind, in front 

 and in the crowd occasionally; and then letting her work through the horses 

 to the front, so as to test her in a crowd, etc. After which I sold her to C. 

 P. Relf, of Philadelphia, Pa. 



Lady Thorn was seven years old when she was sold by Dr. Herr. 

 The residue of her history I take from the sketch given by Mr. 

 Sanders: 



Mr. Relf owned her until the fall of 1865, and during this time she was 

 handled by Sam McLaughlin, who drove her in her first race with Dexter, at 

 the Old Union Course. It was Dexter's second year on the turf, and he had 

 already secured a record of 3:243^. The mare was two years older; but 

 Dexter was regarded as a certain winner, for up to that time he had never been 

 beaten. But it was Thorn's day. She won the first heat in 3 :24, the second in 

 3 :863^ ; Dexter took the third in 3 :37, and the mare finished the race by taking 

 the next heat in 3:263^. This race was trotted June 12, 1865. McLaughlin 

 won two races with her in 1863, the year that Mr. Relf bought her. The next 

 year she did not do much good, and only won one race ; but this was in very 

 fast time, for she made a record of 2:24 in the second heat. She won two 

 races in 1865, before Relf sold her—one in which she beat Dexter, and one with 

 Frank Vernon and Stonewall Jackson. 



In the fall of this year, Mr. A. Welch and J. D. McMann bought her, and 

 they let Dan Pfifer have her to drive. He won a race with her that fall, beat- 

 ing George Wilkes and Lady Emma, the best heat being 2 ■.2II4. The next 

 year she won six races, but none of them were very fast. In 1867, she won 

 five races, one of them being a two-mile race, to wagon ; but the best one of 

 the year was at Fashion Course, September 30th, when she beat Mountain 

 Boy, Lucy and Bruno. Thorn got the first heat in 2 :25^^, the Boy won the 

 second in 2 :34>^, and then Thorn took the next two in 3 :34 each, which shows 

 how game a mare she was. In 1868, she beat nearly all the best horses on the 

 turf— Lucy, George Wilkes, General Butler, Rolla Golddust, Rhode Island, 

 Mountain Boy, George Palmer — and got her record down to 3 :303^. Dan Pfifer 

 drove her the first part of 1869, and beat American Girl twice, and Goldsmith 

 Maid once; but in August, J. D. McMann took her himself, as Pfifer was 

 sick. 



The last race that Pfifer drove her was her first tilt with Goldsmith Maid> 



