HISTORY OF THE SHORT-HORNS. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE SHORT-HORNS IN AMERICA. 



THE date of the first arrival of purely-bred Short-horns in the 

 United States is uncertain. Tradition has informed us that a few 

 Short-horn cattle were introduced here from England soon after the 

 Revolutionary \%r, which separated the American colonies from the 

 mother country, the treaty of peace between the two countries being 

 made in the year 1783. We have no recorded evidence of the fact 

 from any printed chronicles of the time, although men not long ago 

 living, and some still alive, have stated on what they believed good 

 authority, that such was the fact. The best evidence at our command 

 will be given, and if it be not such as will commend the purity of the 

 blood of these animals to breeders of good Short-horns at the present 

 day, they will at least have the benefit of what knowledge exists, and 

 draw their conclusions as best they may from the material which we 

 have gathered. 



We have also heard that about the year 1775 a Mr. Heaton 

 emigrated from EnglantU-to^New York, then a provincial city, and 

 followed for some years the occupation of a butcher. It is also said 

 that in 1791 he returned to England and brought back with him sev- 

 eral Short-horn cattle from the herd of George Culley, a cattle breeder 

 living near Grindon, in Northumberland. He was probably induced 

 to this enterprise by knowing the deficiencies of the common cattle 

 then bred in the United States, which, in his mind, and truly so, much 

 needed the improvement which the Short-horn blood could impart to 

 them. What became of the cattle, neither tradition nor written his- 

 tory of the day give us an account ; but it may be supposed that the 



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