Military Proposition 



In the breeding of the thoroughbred horse there is something more involved than 

 merely gambling upon the turf. It is a matter of military import, not to be wholly 

 overlooked nor hastily dismissed as being impracticable or unimportant. Men who are 

 familiar with the history of the Civil War in America know that for the first three 

 years of that war the Federal troops never won a single cavalry engagement. And 

 why? Because they were mounted upon horses wholly unfit for cavalry service, bred 

 in the Northern states, where people rode behind their horses instead of bestriding 

 them. 



In the last year of the war the government managed to get hold of a few hundred 

 thoroughbred geldings and the scale of battle turned. But the victories of the South- 

 ern cavalry were wholly due to the fact that, up to the outbreak of the war, they had 

 used nothing but thoroughbred sires for all purposes ; and that the light-harness horse 

 was unknown in the South, save in the state of Kentucky, and there only in about 

 four counties. The blood of all sorts of turf celebrities flowed in the veins of nine 

 out of every ten horses that carried men in uniforms of gray. It was no wonder, 

 therefore, that the message of McClellan to the effect that "Pleasanton, with his cav- 

 alry, is in full pursuit of the enemy," became a "source of infinite merriment" to those 

 who knew anything about horses. They knew that, after the first hour's pursuit was 

 over, the Southern horses could gallop ten miles in less time than the Federal cavalry 

 could cover seven ; and that as long as the Federal cavalry were mounted on Northern 

 bred horses, they might chase the Southerners for years and never catch them. 



No army can get along without good horses both for cavalry and artillery use ; 

 and that is why I urge the establishment of breeding farms by the government, similar 

 to those of Russia and Austro-Hungary. In the Boer war in South Africa, England 

 purchased about 12,000 cavalry horses in the Argentine Republic and shipped them 

 across to the Cape of Good Hope ; and also purchased about 7500 head in Austro-Hun- 

 gary, which, while they were not so good as might have been desired, were infinitely bet- 

 ter than those bought in South America. Now, supposing that England had been en- 

 gaged in a war with some power on the continent, how would she have gotten out her 

 Hungarian-bred horses? 



I favor government breeding for the reason that our government still has plenty of 

 land for such purposes and can breed her own cavalry remounts as cheaply as she can 

 buy them, and of a good deal better quality. In this I am sustained by the opinion of 

 Major William B. Kennedy, U. S. A., retired, and a resident of this city; and by con- 



