There are a good many misstatements in that paragraph; but when I wrote it I was deceived by the false pedigrees which have been manufactured and recorded in the trotting-horse registers and stud-books. The truth is, that Hambletonian was a bull-like horse that was trained by Hiram Woodruff, but could never develop a speed equal to a mile in three minutes—3.18, to be exact, being the best mile he ever did. As to his pedigree: Mambrino, the grandsire, was by Messenger; but he was worthless and also vicious. He could neither run nor trot. He was bred by Louis Morris, of Westchester County, New York, and sold to Major William Jones of Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island. As he was worthless and a serious disappointment, Major Jones virtually gave him away, and he was used as a traveling stallion at a small fee. John Treadwell, a Quaker farmer near Jamaica, Long Island, had two Conestoga[[6]] or Pennsylvania Dutch draft-mares. Out of one of these mares, by Mambrino, was born Abdallah. This horse was so bad-tempered that he could never be broken to harness, but was ridden under the saddle. He had no speed either as a runner or trotter, not being able to do a mile in four minutes at any gait. He had a mule-like head and ears, a badly ewed neck, and a rattail. But he was a Messenger, despite the Conestoga crossing, and he was sold to Kentuckians for $4500. In less than six months the Kentuckians repented of their bargain, and sold him back to New Yorkers for $500—Messrs. Simmons & Smith, Bull’s Head dealers, buying him as a speculation. No purchaser could the speculators find at any price, and the stallion was virtually given away to stop expenses of keeping. About this time Charles Kent wanted a new horse for his butcher wagon, and traded, through Alexander Campbell, of Bull’s Head, his worn out mare to Edmund Seeley, a farmer in Orange County, New York, for a steer for butchering. The butcher’s mare had, originally, been sold to him by Campbell, who had obtained her in a drove of western horses, paying $40 for her. Her pedigree was quite unknown. This mare is known in American horse history as the Charles Kent mare, and is said to be by imported Bellfounder. She was in foal to Abdallah when Seeley got her, and the colt and mare became the property of Bill Rysdyk, a hired man on Seeley’s farm. Rysdyk looked around for a name for his colt—a name which should indicate the Messenger blood in him. There had been in the early years of the century a famous son of Messenger named after Alexander Hamilton. This horse finally became known as Bishop’s Hamiltonian. In his effort to borrow the name, Rysdyk, being weak in his orthography, called his horse Rysdyk’s Hambletonian. And so he lives in history—false in his pedigree as in his name. The public of that day believed this horse to be a son of Bishop’s Hamiltonian, and for the sake of the Messenger blood he was served to the best mares in Orange County, and Orange County was rich in the Arab and Barb blood of the daughters and granddaughters of that great and unbeatable trotting horse, Andrew Jackson. No stallion ever had a better chance, and it was almost impossible that there should not have been good horses among his get. And there were. But the bad blood of his ancestry, sire and grandsire being worthless degenerates, together with the utterly unmixable Conestoga blood in his grandam, have been continually cropping out in his progeny—for faults more readily reappear than perfections—until now, when it must be acknowledged that the boasted horse type of which he is said to be the founder is no type at all.
[6]. I had a friend who was with the Confederate Cavalry when Lee invaded Pennsylvania to meet defeat at Gettysburg. He told me that the sleek, large Conestoga horses that were abundant in the section traversed were too tempting to be neglected, so many of the cavalry men abandoned their lean and battle scarred mounts and replaced them with the Conestogas. Before they reached the Potomac on their retreat southward, these cold blooded draft horses were completely used up and the soldiers swore at themselves for their folly in making the exchanges. The Conestogas are good draft horses and serviceable on farms where no quick work is required, but they are totally lacking in speed and the courage and stamina which speed requires. A more impossible cross than that between a Conestoga and a Thoroughbred could hardly be imagined.
When the pedigree manipulators were manufacturing this line of descent for Rysdyk’s Hambletonian, Alexander Campbell, of Bull’s Head, was offered a thousand dollars to certify to the stated pedigree of the Charles Kent mare. Campbell declined, and ordered the Hambletonian emissaries out of his office. Here is another rather amusing evidence of the careful way in which the pedigree of Hambletonian was bolstered up. There was no such horse as Bishop’s Hambletonian. The horse alluded to was Alexander Hamilton, or Bishop’s Hamiltonian. Nobody ever thought of calling a Hamiltonian a Hambletonian until old Bill Rysdyk did it, simply because he was not gifted in the art of spelling. But this did not bother the record makers. They simply misspelled the name of the elder horse. Surely old Bill Rysdyk laid a spell on the gentlemen of the press, and he kept it to the end as his horse, shaped like a cart horse, rather than one filled with high blood, was a great money-maker in the stud. His earnings by the record were $184,725.
When there was a great many men interested, and most sincerely, too, in the breeding of trotters, it was thought to be a good thing to inaugurate a systematic method of breeding and establish a standard which should regulate the records that were to be kept of trotters. By general consent the suggestion of the Turf, Field and Farm, Mr. Busbey’s paper, a horse that could go a mile in 2.30 was considered worthy to get a place in the register. This would have excluded all the trotters previous to the time of Lady Suffolk. But the matter was discussed, and Wallace’s “American Trotting Register” was accepted as the official record of pedigrees, thus putting the business in the hands of the most ingenious partizan that has ever been interested in the horse business in this country. These were the rules that were adopted:
“In order to define what constitutes a trotting-bred horse, and to establish a Breed of trotters on a more intelligent basis, the following rules are adopted to control admission to the records of pedigrees. When an animal meets with the requirements of admission and is duly registered, it shall be accepted as a standard trotting-bred animal.
“First—Any stallion that has, himself, a record of two minutes and thirty seconds (2.30) or better; provided any of his get has a record of 2.40 or better; or provided his sire or his dam, his grandsire or his grandam, is already a standard animal.
“Second—Any mare or gelding that has a record of 2.30 or better.
“Third—Any horse that is the sire of two animals with a record of 2.30 or better.
“Fourth—Any horse that is the sire of one animal with a record of 2.30 or better; provided, he has either of the following additional qualifications:—
“1. A record himself of 2.40 or better.