INTRODUCTION 



dairy, supposed to have been purchased at the 

 fair of Kington^ on the confines of Wales. Mr.' 

 Tonakms remarked the extraordinary tendency 

 of these animals to become fat. On his mar- 

 riage he acquired these two cows and com- 

 menced breeding them on his own account. 

 The one with more white he called 'Pigeon' 

 and the other of a rich red color with a spotted 

 face he called 'Mottle.' " 



Further he says: "He then began a system 

 of breeding that ultimately completely altered 

 the character of the Herefords." Low applied 

 this information to B. Tomkins, Jr., who mar- 

 ried his first cousin Sarali, daughter of Richard 

 Tomkins, of Wormsley Grange, in 1772. 

 Family tradition and the King's-Pyon register 

 attest that his father died in 1748, when Mr. 

 B. Tomkins, Jr., was but three years old, con- 

 sequently he could not have been in the "em- 

 ployment of an individual, afterwards his 

 father-in-law;" nor is it likely that Low's in- 

 formant would call his first cousin "daughter 

 of an individual." This expression may well 

 have been applied to the elder man's wife, as 

 in the lapse of years her father's name would 

 most likely have been forgotten. It may be 

 retorted that it was the widow who employed 

 him, but Eichard Tomkins left three sons, 

 Eichard, George and Thomas, aged twelve, eight 

 and two years respectively. All were brought up 

 as farmers, so that the widow could not have 

 at any time required the services of her nephew 

 when old enough even to manage for her. As 

 to his ever being employed as a dairyman, the 

 idea is absurd, for his father, as will be shown, 

 had only two sons, and was a well-to-do man 

 at the time. 



Many other circumstances prove this por- 

 tion of Low's information to refer to B. Tom- 

 kins, Sr., on his marriage in 1742. Low -not 

 knowing that there had been two of the same 

 name applied it to the son, on his marriage in 

 1772. 



Again, Professor Low in his "Practical Agri- 

 culture" (1843) writing of Hereford cattle, says: 

 "The breed owes all its celebrity to changes 

 began about the year 1760. The great im- 

 prover, or rather it may be said, the founder of 

 the modern breed, was the late Mr. Tomkins 

 of King's-Pyon, near Hereford, who, from a 

 very humble stock of cows, but by means of a 

 long course of skilled selection, communicated 

 to the breed its most valuable distinctive char- 

 acters." 



There is unmistakable evidence that the 

 Misses Tomkins let Low believe that it was all 

 the work of their father, consequently it is not 

 surprising that he did not harmonize facts and 



dates when applying them all to the younger 

 man. Low here says the changes began about 

 1760. This was nine years before the younger 

 man commenced business (as" will be shown 

 later on) and twelve years before his marriage 

 in 1772, yet, as previously quoted, Low says 

 he commenced the improvement on his mar- 

 riage, evidently referring to the elder man. 



It is greatly to be regretted that Low never 

 seriously attempted to harmonize his facts and 

 dates. If he had done so he must have dis- 

 covered at once the existence of B. Tomkins, 

 Sr., and given a chronologically correct history 

 of the origin and development of the Tomkins 

 cattle. The correction of his remarkable mis- 

 take quite allies the hitherto accepted ideas as 

 to when the systematic improvement of the 

 Herefords began, which was in 1742, not 1772. 



COURT HOUSE, CANON-PYON, HEREFORDSHIRE. 



Tomkins was at_jwork iinproymg-tlie- Herefords 

 nearly-a-qna'fter of a century Ijefore Bakewell 

 began to improve the Longhorns, and a much 

 longer time before the Brothers Colling, the 

 Shorthorns; consequently Bakewell followed 

 Tomkins, not Tomkins Bakewell, as has been 

 generally asserted and believed. 



Thus- the Herefords are the oldest improved 

 breed of cattle in the kingdom. 



B. Tomkins, Sr., had evidently formed the 

 idea of developing a superior breed of cattle 

 to any then extant some years before his mar- 

 riage in 1742. 



On his marriage he was able to set about it 

 in a systematic way, having already selected the 

 materials. He began with the three distin- 

 guishing color types of the Tomkins cattle, 

 namely, the Silvers, reds with white faces, the 

 mottles and the greys. These three type names 

 were applied to the Herefords for more than 

 a century, unfortunately giving rise to endless 

 controversies amongst breeders about breed. 



Low says Tomkins acquired the cows 



