Small Horses in Warfare

Walter Gilbey

Small Horses in Warfare

The present seems an appropriate time to put forward a few facts which go to prove the peculiar suitability of small horses for certain campaigning work which demands staying power, hardiness and independence of high feeding. The circumstance that the military authorities have been obliged to look to foreign countries for supplies of such horses for the war in South Africa has suggested the propriety of pointing out that we possess in England foundation stock from which we may be able to raise a breed of small horses equal to, or better than, any we are now obliged to procure abroad.

Elsenham Hall, Essex,

May, 1900.

SMALL HORSES IN WARFARE

The campaign in South Africa has proved beyond doubt the necessity for a strong force similar to that of the Boers. Their rapidity of movement has given us an important lesson in the military value of horses of that useful type which is suitable for light cavalry and mounted infantry.

Since the war broke out we have seen that we possess numbers of men able to ride and shoot, who only need a little training to develop them into valuable soldiers, but our difficulty throughout has been to provide horses of the stamp required for the work they have to perform. The experience we have gained in South Africa goes to confirm that acquired in the Crimea, where it was found that the horses sent out from England were unable to withstand the climate, poor food, and the hardships to which they were subjected, while the small native horses and those bred in countries further East suffered little from these causes. It was then proved beyond dispute that these small horses are both hardy and enduring, while, owing to their possession like our English thoroughbreds of a strong strain of Arab blood, they were speedy enough for light cavalry purposes.

Breeders of every class of horse, saving only those who breed the Shetland pony and the few who aim at getting ponies for polo, have for generations made it their object to obtain increased height. There is nothing to be urged against this policy in so far as certain breeds are concerned; the sixteen-hand thoroughbred with his greater stride is more likely to win races than the horse of fifteen two; the sixteen-hand carriage horse, other qualities being equal, brings a better price than one of less stature; and the Shire horse of 16.2 or 17 hands has commonly in proportion greater strength and weight, the qualities most desirable in him, than a smaller horse. Thus we can show excellent reason for our endeavours to increase the height of our most valuable breeds; and the long period that has elapsed since we were last called upon to put forward our military strength has allowed us to lose sight of the great importance of other qualities.

Breeders and horsemen are well aware, though the general public may not know or may not realise the fact, that increased height in the horse does not necessarily involve increased strength in all directions, such as greater weight-carrying power and more endurance. Granting that the saying, "a good big horse is better than a good little one," is in the main correct, we have to consider that the merits which go to make a useful horse for campaigning are infinitely more common in small horses than in big ones.

All the experience of campaigners, explorers and travellers goes to prove that small compact animals between 13.2 and 14.2 hands high are those on which reliance can be placed for hard and continuous work on scanty and innutritious food.

Horses in the Crimean War

During the Crimean War I was located for a short time at Abydos in Asia Minor, on the shores of the Dardanelles, and had daily opportunities of seeing the horses and studying the manœuvres of some 3,000 mounted Bashi Bazouks and Armenian troops who were encamped there under General Beatson in readiness for summons to the Crimea, whither they were eventually dispatched.

The horses on which these troops were mounted ranged from 14 hands to 14.3; all had a strong strain of Arab blood, and had come with the troops from the Islands of the Archipelago. They were perfect horses for light cavalry work. The economy with which they were fed was surprising: their feed consisted principally of chopped straw with a small daily ration of barley when the grain was procurable, which was not always the case; and on this diet they continued in condition to endure long journeys which would have speedily broken down the best English charger in the British army.

Cape Horses

The universal opinion of residents in South Africa is against the introduction of imported horses for general work, inasmuch as they cannot withstand the climate, hard living, bad roads and rough usage which make up the conditions of a horse's life in the Colony.

In past years, before the present war, large numbers of English horses have been sent to Natal for military service, but the results were not satisfactory; all became useless, and the large majority died; the change from English stables and English methods of management to those in vogue in the Colony almost invariably proved fatal.

Some five years ago, when discussing with Mr. Cecil Rhodes the advisability of introducing into Cape Colony English sires to improve the stamp of horse bred in South Africa, he gave his opinion against such measures. He pointed out that highly bred and large horses were unsuitable for the work required in the Colony; they needed greater care in housing, feeding, and grooming than the conditions of life in South Africa would allow owners to bestow upon them. The hardships attendant upon long journeys over rough country, the extremes of heat and cold which horses must endure with insufficient shelter or none at all, must inevitably overtax the stamina which has been weakened by generations of luxurious existence in England.

Mr. Rhodes considered that no infusion of English blood would enhance the powers of the small colonial bred horse to perform the work required of him under local conditions; that though thoroughbred blood would improve him in height and speed, these advantages would be obtained at the cost of such indispensable qualities as endurance and ability to thrive on poor and scanty fare.

It is however permissible to suppose that a gradual infusion of good blood carefully chosen might in course of time benefit the Cape breed. The use only of horses which have become acclimatised would perhaps produce better results than have hitherto been obtained. The progeny reared under the ordinary conditions prevailing in the Colony would perpetuate good qualities, retaining the hardiness of the native breed.

Ponies in the Soudan

The late Colonel P. H. S. Barrow furnished a most interesting and suggestive Report to the War Office on the Arabs which were used by his regiment, the 19th Hussars, during the Nile campaign of 1885. This report is published among the Appendices to Colonel John Biddulph's work, The XIXth and their Times (1899).

Experience, in the words of Colonel Biddulph, had shown that English horses could not stand hard work under a tropical sun with scarcity of water and desert fare. It was therefore decided before leaving Cairo to mount the regiment entirely on the small Syrian Arab horses used by the Egyptian cavalry. Three hundred and fifty of these little horses had been sent up in advance and were taken over by the regiment on arrival at Wady Halfa. Colonel Barrow thus describes these horses:

"Arab stallion. Average height, 14 hands; average age, 8 years to 9 years; some 15 per cent. over 12 years; bought by Egyptian Government in Syria and Lower Egypt; average price, £18."

About half of the ponies had been through the campaign in the Eastern Soudan with the regiment in February and March, 1884, and had returned in a very exhausted state. In September of that year they were marched up from Assouan to Wady Halfa, 210 miles; and when handed over to the 19th again in November, all except some 10 per cent. of the number were "in very fair marching condition." From Wady Halfa the regiment proceeded to Korti, a distance of 360 miles, at a rate of about 16 miles per day, halts, one of one day and one of two days not included; their feed consisted of about 6 lbs. of barley or dhoora1 and 10 lbs. of dhoora stalk; and on this rather scanty ration the horses reached Korti in very good condition. Here they remained for eighteen days, receiving 8 lbs. of green dhoora stalk daily instead of 8 lbs. dry; the rest and change to green food produced improvement in their condition.

While the main body rested at Korti, a detachment of fifty went to Gakdul, 100 miles distant, on reconnaissance; they performed the march in sixty-three hours, had fifteen hours rest at Gakdul, and returned in the same time. Six of the party returned more rapidly, covering the 100 miles in forty-six hours, the last 50 being covered in seven and a-half hours. During these marches the horses were ridden for eighty-three hours, the remaining fifty-eight hours of the time occupied being absorbed by halts.

The reconnaissance party having returned on the 5th, the regiment, numbering 8 officers and 127 men, with 155 horses, started, on January 8, to march with General Sir Herbert Stewart's column across the desert to Gubat. This march, 336 miles, occupied from January 8 to February 20, 4 miles only being covered in the hour they were moving on the last date. They halted on the 13th at Gakdul; whereby the average day's journey works out at nearly 26 miles per day, or, if we ignore the march (4 miles in one hour) of January 20, at nearly 28 miles per day. The hardest day was the 16th, when the regiment travelled 40 miles in 11-1/2 hours, from 4.30 a.m. to 4 p.m., the horses receiving each half-a-gallon of water and 4 lbs. of food grain. Their ability to work on scanty diet was put to the test on this fortnight's march. The average daily ration for the first ten days was from 5 to 6 lbs. of grain and 2 gallons of water; the horses covering an average of 31 miles per day exclusive of the halt at Gakdul on the 13th.

When the final advance to the Nile was made, the horses went fifty-five hours with no water at all, and only 1 lb. of grain; some 15 or 20 horses were upwards of seventy hours without water. During their halt at Gubat from January 20 to February 14, they had received but one ration of grain, 6 lbs. given them two days before they had to start for the Nile. During this period they performed out-post and patrol duty averaging about 8 miles daily.

On the return march, the journey between Dongola and Wady Halfa, 250 miles, was performed on an average rate of 16 miles per day, with one two-days' halt. On this march the regiment usually travelled at night for the sake of coolness, but the scanty shade available generally compelled exposure to the hot sun all day.

Colonel Barrow remarks, "I think it may be considered a most remarkable circumstance that out of 350 horses, during nine months on a hard campaign, only twelve died from disease." Colonel Biddulph sums up the work of the horses in a few words: "The performance of the small Arab horses, both with the river and desert columns, carrying a heavy weight, on scanty fare and less water, is a marvel of endurance." The former officer attributes the small percentage of loss from disease to the facts (1) that the climate of the Soudan is most suitable for horses, (2) that the Syrian horse has a wonderful constitution, and is admirably suited for warfare in an Eastern climate. Colonel Barrow's opinion on the suitability of the Eastern climate for horses must not be read as meaning for horses of all breeds. On the contrary, Colonel Biddulph, in words quoted on a previous page, states that experience had shown that English horses could not withstand the conditions of campaigning in the Soudan.

Sir Richard Green Price, writing over the familiar pen-name of "Borderer," in Baily's Magazine, has urged the formation of a regiment of Lilliputian horse, to consist of men under five feet, or five feet six inches, weighing not over eleven stone, of good chest measurement: these he would mount on ponies not over 14.2 and equip with light arms and accoutrements. As he points out, increase in our cavalry is an admitted necessity, and this branch of it in particular appeals to the common sense of the people as a quick and handy service:

"After many years of practical experience of what ponies can and do accomplish, especially well-bred ones hardily reared, I do not hesitate to say that they will beat moderate horses of double their size, and that very few of our present cavalry horses could live with them in a campaign – they are more easily taught, handled and mounted than bigger horses, and with twice their constitution and thrice their sense – with riders to suit them, where are the drawbacks to their employment?"

Sir Richard, in brief, urges the creation of a regiment of scouts or mounted infantry whose horses shall be of much the same type of those described by Colonel Barrow.

The special correspondent of the Times with the Modder River force, in course of an article on this arm, which appears likely to play a large part in the wars of the future, writes thus of the animals used by the Colonists and Boers: —

"Here in South Africa the country-bred pony, tractable, used to fire, and taught to remain where he is left if the reins be dropped from the bit, is already a half-trained animal for these purposes, and the work of training has been slight in consequence; but in Afghanistan, and other places where the mounted infantry man has been tried in a lesser degree, the chief cause of trouble has been found in his mount."

The South African ponies ridden by the Colonial scouts and mounted infantry have acquired their education as shooting ponies on the veldt under conditions very similar to those prevailing in warfare. There is radical difference between animals so trained and ill-broken Indian country-breds whose tempers have been far too frequently spoiled by rough usage in native hands. The mounted infantry in Afghanistan might well find trouble with such ponies.

Burnaby's Ride to Khiva

Captain Burnaby, in his well-known book, A Ride to Khiva, describes the animals brought up for his inspection at Kasala, in Turkestan, when his wish to buy a horse was made known: —

"The horses were for the most part of the worst description, that is to say, as far as appearance was concerned… Except for their excessive leanness, they looked more like huge Newfoundland dogs than as connected with the equine race, and had been turned out in the depth of winter with no other covering save the thick coats which nature had given them… At last, after rejecting a number of jades which looked more fit to carry my boots than their wearer, I selected a little black horse. He was about 14 hands in height, and I eventually became his owner, saddle and bridle into the bargain, for the sum of £5, this being considered a very high price at Kasala."

The reader may be reminded that the winter of 1876-7, during which Captain Burnaby accomplished his adventurous journey, was an exceptionally severe one even for that part of the world, where long and severe winters are the rule. On the day of his departure from Kasala the thermometer stood at eight degrees below zero. The traveller was by no means favourably impressed with the powers of the horse he had selected as the least bad of a very poor lot, and the native guides started apparently satisfied that it would break down under its heavy rider clad to resist the penetrating cold.

After his second march, Captain Burnaby began to acquire a certain measure of respect for this pony: —

"What had surprised me most during our morning's march was the extreme endurance of our horses. The guide frequently had been obliged to dismount and to clean out their nostrils, which were entirely stuffed with icicles; but the little animals had ploughed their way steadily through the snow… The one I rode, which in England would not have been considered able to carry my boots, was as fresh as possible after his march of seventeen miles. In spite of the weight on his back – quite twenty stone – he had never shown the least sign of fatigue."

Again, a few days later, the conditions of the journey having been no less trying: —

"From Jana Darya we rode forty miles without a halt. I must say that I was astonished to see how well the Kirghiz horses stood the long journeys. We had now gone 300 miles; and my little animal, in spite of his skeleton-like appearance, carried me quite as well as the day he left Kasala, this probably being owing to the change in his food from grass to barley. We are apt to think very highly of English horses, and deservedly as far as pace is concerned; but if it came to a question of endurance, I much doubt whether our large and well fed horses could compete with the little half-starved Kirghiz animals. This is a subject which must be borne in mind in the event of future complications in the East."

It is clear that Captain Burnaby was somewhat puzzled by the qualities displayed by a steed which looked so unpromising; he seeks to explain its performance by the better food it had enjoyed while on the march, and begins to compare the staying power of English horses with those of the Kirghiz pony with doubts as to the superiority of the former. At a later date he records without surprise that his party travelled forty miles in six hours, the horses having gone all the time at a slow steady trot. On his return journey, while staying at Petro-Alexandrovsk, he was given a mount on a little bay, hardly 14 hands high, for a day's hunting; and records that it "danced about beneath me as if he had been carrying a feather-weight jockey for the Cambridgeshire." The Kirghiz and Bokharans who accompanied him evidently thought his weight would prove too much for the pony, and when there was a ditch to be jumped looked round to see how the bay would manage it. "Never a stumble … the hardy little beast could have carried Daniel Lambert if that worthy but obese gentleman had been resuscitated for the occasion."

Finally, Captain Burnaby sums up the performance of this fourteen-hand pony: —

"We had ridden 371 miles in exactly nine days and two hours, thus averaging more than 40 miles a day! At the same time it must be remembered that, with an interval of in all not more than nine days' rest, my horse had previously carried me 500 miles. In London, judging by his size, he would have been put down as a polo pony. In spite of the twenty stone he carried, he had never been either sick or lame during the journey, and had galloped the last 17 miles through the snow to Kasala in one hour and twenty-five minutes."

The same author describes a remarkable forced march made in the summer of 1870 by Count Borkh in Russian Tartary. The Count's mission was to test the possibility of taking artillery over the steep and difficult passes in a certain district, and his force consisted of 150 cossacks, and 60 mounted riflemen and a gun. The troops accomplished their journey out and back, 266 miles, in six days; the heat was excessive, the thermometer marking sometimes as much as 117° Fahr. during the day; yet the ponies were none the worse of their exertions, the "sick list" at the end comprising only twelve, all of which suffered from sore backs caused by careless saddling. Other expeditions under similar conditions are mentioned; these go to prove that the endurance of the Tartar pony is affected as little by heat as by cold.

Post Horses in Siberia

Mr. H. de Windt, in his book From Pekin to Calais, bears witness to the wonderful endurance of the small post-horses supplied to travellers in Siberia. He describes them as very little beasts ranging from 14.2 to 15 hands. "Though rough and ungroomed, they are well fed, as they need to be, for a rest of only six hours is allowed between stages." The speed maintained depends upon the condition of the roads; and the number of horses furnished for each tarantass is regulated by the same factor; three horses sufficing in good weather and as many as seven being required when the roads are heavy from rain or snow.

Ponies in India

Captain L. E. Nolan, in Cavalry History and Tactics (1860), gives an account of an experimental march made by 200 of the 15th Hussars from Bangalore to Hyderabad and back, 800 miles. The objects of the march were to test the capabilities of the troop horses and to ascertain if there were anything to choose between stallions and geldings in respect of endurance. To arrive at a solution of the latter question, one hundred of the men were mounted on entires and the other hundred on horses which had been castrated only six months previously, regardless of age, for the purpose of making the experiment.

The squadrons marched to their destination, took part in field-days and pageants, and started to reach Bangalore by forced marches; they accomplished the last 180 miles at a rate of thirty miles per day, bringing in only one led horse, the remainder being perfectly sound and fit for further work. One horse, a 14.3 Persian, carried a corporal who, with his accoutrements, rode 22 stone 7 lbs. It may be added that there was nothing to choose between the performances of the stallions and geldings; though the fact that the latter had so recently been castrated was held to make their achievement the more creditable.

A forced march such as this has far more value as testimony to staying power than a more trying feat performed by a single animal; but mention must be made of Captain Horne's ride. This officer, who belonged to the Madras Horse Artillery, undertook in 1841 to ride his grey Arab, "Jumping Jimmy," 400 miles in five days on the Bangalore race-course; and accomplished his task with three hours and five minutes to spare, the horse doing the last 79 miles 5 furlongs in 19 hours 55 minutes, and being quite ready for his corn when pulled up. General Tweedie, in his work on The Arabian Horse (1894), quotes the above particulars from the Bengal Sporting Magazine, in whose pages full details are given.

Captain Nolan, in the work from which quotation has been made above, sums up the shortcomings of the cavalry trooper of his day in the following pithy sentences: —

"Our cavalry horses are feeble; they measure high, but they do so from length of limb, which is weakness, not power. The blood they require is not that of our weedy race-horse (an animal more akin to the greyhound and bred for speed alone), but it is the blood of the Arab and Persian, to give them that compact form and wiry limb in which they are wanting."

The great value of the pony in India was insisted on by Mr. J. H. B. Hallen, formerly the General Superintendent of the Horse Breeding Department, in a memorandum published at Meerut in 1899. Pointing out the many spheres of utility open to the pony, he urged the local authorities and agricultural societies to foster and develop pony breeding by providing suitable stallions for public use. As proving the value of the pony, Mr. Hallen points out that in the two-wheeled cart called an ekka, used by the natives of Northern India, a pony will draw a load of from 4-1/2 to 6 cwt. over long distances at a rate of 5 or 6 miles an hour.

Ponies all over India are equally in request for riding and driving, and in the northern parts for pack purposes. Indeed, adds Mr. Hallen, "the pony may be said to be all round the most useful animal." The supply is not equal to the demand.

Captain H. L. Powell, R.H.A., writing in Baily's Magazine of March, 1900, says: —

"I am a great believer in the Arab for officers' chargers, light cavalry and mounted infantry in this campaign. The Arab is a hardy little beast, and will thrive and do well on what would be starvation rations for an ordinary troop-horse. As a rule the Arab is rather light of bone, but his bone is twice as strong as that of an underbred horse. I have an Arab pony about 14.2 which I am looking after for his owner who went out to the war, and who is now, I am sorry to say, enjoying Mr. Kruger's hospitality in Pretoria. The pony carries my 15 stone as if it was a feather, and never seems to tire."

The superiority of the Arab over the Indian country-bred is reflected in their respective cost. Mr. Hallen, in the memorandum before referred to, says stallions of the country-bred class can be obtained at from about £6 10s. to £13, while suitable Arab pony stallions cost from £16 10s. to £33.