THE LEVIATHANS vs. THE LUZBOROUGHS 

 AND OTHERS 



"The Luzboroughs have arrived." 



So wrote Thomas Barry, of Gallatin, to The Spirit of 

 the Times in February, 1838. 



And everybody in Tennessee, and in the whole South, 

 for that matter, knew what Barry was writing about. 



But now there may be some that do not know, and ex- 

 planations are in order. 



It started a few weeks after Gen. Desha bantered 

 the world to test the qualities of his Leviathan filly, 

 Angora. Before negotiations to that end could be com- 

 pleted, Leviathan's owner, himself, was called upon to 

 make good his claims for the get of his famous stallion. 



In January, 1836, the report reached James Jackson, 

 owner of the imported stallion, Lapdog, that the lessees of 

 Luzborough, at Franklin, Tennessee, had been saying bad 

 things about Lapdog, with the intention of injuring his 

 reputation as a sire. Jackson at once issued a challenge 

 for a test of speed and endurance between the get of the 

 two horses. This challenge was carried as a "standing 

 ad" in the Nashville Whig for several weeks and was the 

 beginning of a bitter controversy of two months' duration 

 between Jackson, on one side, and Thomas A. Pankey, of 

 Franklin, and Rev. Hardy M. Cryer, on the other. Com- 

 munications were printed as advertisements. In one 

 communication, answering Cryer, Jackson said: 



"We have for a long time tried to avoid Parson Cryer 

 (officious and intermeddling as he has been), in conse- 



