CLOSE OF HER CAKEER. 443 



and it was a hot one; but Thorn disposed of it in tliree heats in 2:21?^, 2:201^^, 

 2 :21 14^. But the two mares met again a month later, at Prospect Park ; and as 

 it was the first time that McMann had driven her, a good deal of interest was 

 awakened in the race. American Girl was also in this fight ; but Thorn was 

 agam able to win in straight heats, and she put them all in close together — 

 2:203^, 2:201^, 2:203^, which was the best race she had ever trotted up to that 

 time. McMann won five more races with her that season ; the last and best 

 being at Narragansett Park, October 8th, when she beat Geo. Palmer, Gold- 

 smith Maid, Lucy, and American Girl. This was the fastest race ever trotted 

 up to that date. Thorn got the first, second and fourth in 2:19j^, 2:18i4, 

 2:21, and Geo. Palmer got the third in 2:19Q2£. This was the fastest race 

 the old mare ever trotted, and the time made in the second heat is her best 

 record. 



In May, 1870, she was bought by Dan Mace, for $20,000. Her first race in 

 his hands was on the 4th of July, against George Wilkes and others, at 

 Prospect Park. It was an easy race for Thorn, and she won in three straight 

 heats. July 22d, on the same track, she had a race with Goldsmith Maid. 

 This was looked upon by outsiders as pretty nearly an even thing ; for although 

 Thorn had beaten her in every race the previous year, yet people thought it 

 was doubtful if she could do it now. But she won the race in three straight 

 heats, without much eflbrt. Her next and last race was at Rochester, N. Y., 

 August 3d, when she beat Geo. Palmer in slow time; but displayed wonderful 

 speed, trotting the last half of the third heat in 1 :06. 



Her next race after the Rochester race was to have been at Buffalo, 

 and in loading her upon a railroad car, the movable platform was 

 allowed to slip, and she fell, with her hip striking the iron rail of the 

 railroad track, and the bone was broken — as it is generally styled, 

 was knocked down — and that ended her trotting days. She was at 

 this time very fast, and the public have been advised that in her then 

 condition she gave such evidences of speed as to indicate that she 

 would in her Buffalo race, make a time record that would stand as a 

 defiant challenge for a long time ahead. Her driver and owner 

 makes the statement that she was good for 2:10, and that he could 

 drive her the last half mile of a race in 1:04. She closed her dis- 

 tinguished career on the turf with a record of 2:18:^, and one hundred 

 and six heats in 2:30 or better. 



Soon after this unfortunate mishap the great trotting mare was sold 

 to H. N. Smith, Esq., proprietor of the Fashion Stud Farm at Trenton, 

 New Jersey, and sent to that place. She died on the 23d of June, 

 1877. While at the Fashion farm she was kept as a breeding mare 

 and has left one son and a daughter, both by the stallion Gen. Knox, 

 the former named General Washington, having been foaled on the 

 22d day of February, 1874. 



