Black Rose proved to be one of the best brood mares ever owned at Woodburn. I am told she was a pacer, and certainly all that is known of her blood was pacing blood. She was sought after and procured by Mr. Alexander because she had produced several trotters, and it can be read all through his purchases for the trotting stud, that he had undoubting confidence in the theory that trotters must come from trotters. When this mare first appeared in the Woodburn catalogue no dam was given to her, but meantime the “pedigree maker” had come around, and the next year she was fitted out with the following, in fine style.
“Black Rose, bl. m., foaled about 1847; got by Tom Teemer; dam by Cannon’s Whip; g. d. by Robin Gray, son of imp. Royalist.”
The pedigree stood in this form a number of years, and probably would still be so standing had it not been that in trying to learn something more about the sire, Tom Teemer, I received some intimations that made me doubtful about the maternal side. On a certain occasion I asked Mr. R. S. Veech, of Kentucky, what he knew about it, and he replied that he had made a trip to Clark County for no other purpose than to trace and investigate the pedigree of Black Rose, and he was not able to get a single syllable of information about her dam, any more than if she never had a dam. Some time afterward I wrote to Mr. Brodhead, manager at Woodburn, inquiring where the pedigree of Black Rose as given and perpetuated in the Woodburn catalogues came from and on what basis it rested. He replied promptly and briefly that Mr. Veech had made a trip to Clark County in search of this pedigree and the result of that search was what appeared in the catalogue. These are the facts, substantially, as given me by these two gentlemen, and this is the first time I have ever given them to the public. I have known Mr. Veech intimately and trustingly for twenty-eight years and I know him to be eminently truthful. I have not known Mr. Brodhead so long, and if he had not published the fraudulent extension of this pedigree in his catalogues every year for more than ten years, before Mr. Veech made his trip to Clark County, I might at least express my sympathy with him in having so bad a memory. Mr. Brodhead had nothing to do with either the original construction or utterance of this fraud, for he was not then connected with the management of Woodburn. My readers can employ their own terms in characterizing, as it deserves, the fraudulent act of manufacturing a pedigree out of whole cloth; and they can also exercise their own ethical discrimination in determining whether the man who executes the fraud is any worse than the man who maintains and supports it after he knows it is fraudulent.
We pass on to Sally Russell, the grandam of Maud S. It is not a pleasant task to review an old controversy, whatever it might bring to light; but a controversy which involves the true lines of descent of so great a family as that of Maud S., Nutwood, Lord Russell, etc., is worth preserving for the enlightenment of future generations. It all turns upon the breeding of Sally Russell and the identity of her breeder. She was a little chestnut mare, represented to have been foaled 1850, got by Boston and out of Maria Russell, by Rattler, and so on, claimed to be thoroughbred. She was bought by Mr. Alexander from the foreman on Captain John W. Russell’s farm, with the pedigree given as above. The name of her breeder was not given to Mr. Alexander, I think, but Bruce has it that her dam, Maria Russell, and this mare Sally Russell were both bred by Benjamin Luckett. In 1863 this mare was offered, with others, to the highest bidder, at Mr. Alexander’s annual sale, being then thirteen years, old according to the records of the establishment, and the auctioneer was not able to coax a bid of ten dollars on her and she was led out unsold. Five years later—1868—I attended the Woodburn sale, and a little scrubby-looking old mare was brought into the ring, represented to have been stinted to imported Australian, and when this was announced a subdued whisper went round the ring, “She’ll never raise another foal.” The auctioneer was eloquent upon the value of the Australian blood on the Boston blood, and the possibilities of the coming foal, but all to no purpose, as the mare was led out of the ring the second time, with no person willing to bid a dollar. I was astonished that such an animal should have been put up at auction, for she had all the appearance of being twenty-eight instead of eighteen. She died that summer, apparently of old age, and I have no shadow of doubt that she sank under the weight of years. On two separate occasions great crowds of practical horsemen had, in this manner, proclaimed that Mr. Alexander had been victimized in the age of the mare, and fifteen years later I determined to settle the question as to whether this judgment was right.
As the supposed age and breeding of Sally Russell has been made to turn and rest upon the ownership of her dam, Maria Russell, it is important that we should have the antecedent circumstances set out in the plainest possible manner. Captain John A. Holton and Captain John W. Russell were farmers in Kentucky, living a few miles apart, and I think they were both river men at one time or another; certainly Russell was in command of a snag boat on the Ohio and Mississippi along about 1836-40. Like many other Kentucky farmers, they both bred a few running horses, but not enough, singly, to justify the expense of separate training establishments, so they united their strings in one stable, sharing the expense and dividing the profits, if any, equally. The partnership did not extend to the joint ownership of any of the horses, but simply to the losses or profits of training and racing, and Major Benjamin Luckett was in their employ as trainer.
Before going to work in earnest on this investigation, I learned that Mr. Llewellyn Holton, a son of Captain John A. Holton, still resided on the old farm and that he was old enough to know all about the origin and history of Maria Russell, as well as the other stock belonging to his father at that time. This was very encouraging, but I wanted to know whether he was a man who could be relied upon to tell the truth. On this point I addressed an inquiry to the late Colonel R. P. Pepper, and his reply is as follows: “Your letter of the 29th received. I regard L. Holton, of this county, as a man of honor, integrity and intelligence, and the peer of any gentleman of my acquaintance. In my opinion any statement he will make upon any subject, as to his own knowledge, will be accepted in this community as readily as that of any gentleman in it. He is a man who sometimes gets on sprees from intoxicating liquors, but I have never heard of it affecting his intelligence, honor or integrity, and, as above stated, his word will be accepted in this community at this time as soon as the word of any gentleman in this county or community.”
With this very high indorsement I did not hesitate to send a commissioner to interview Mr. Holton and get from him the exact facts in the case, without any leading questions and without any shading of the truth or bias on either side. What this commissioner learned will be given further on.
Let us now turn to the other side and see how Mr. Brodhead manages to get Maria Russell into the ownership of Captain John W. Russell. Under date of April 30, 1883, he wrote to the Turf, Field and Farm as follows:
“A Colonel Shepherd, of the South—New Orleans, I think—gave or sold to Captain J. W. Russell and Captain J. A. Holton a Stockholder mare, out of Miranda, by Topgallant, etc. This mare was called Miss Shepherd. They owned and bred this mare in partnership. Among the produce thus owned were Maria Russell by Rattler, Mary Bell by Sea Gull, and Swiss Boy by imported Swiss. Captain Russell sold his half of Swiss Boy to Mr. Taylor, son-in-law of Ben Luckett, for $750. Maria Russell was owned and run as a partnership mare by Holton and Russell, but was trained by Major Ben Luckett.”
Then follows a lot of stuff, without any relevancy whatever, going to show that Ben Luckett trained her at three years old, but had no connection whatever with the family, all of which is known to everybody, and then he again asserts that “in the division of the partnership property, Maria Russell fell to Captain Russell.” The next dash that Mr. Brodhead makes is for a negro seventy-five years old, who had been in the Russell family from his birth, named Jesse Dillon. Jesse was no exception to his race, or indeed to many of the white race, for whenever any information is wanted from them they are always ready to give it, as they expect at least one half-dollar, and if they tell the story “right up to what is wanted” they expect two. Jesse was sharp enough to discover just what his interviewers were after, and he was ready to supply “the long-felt want.” Jesse was able to tell just how the mare got her eye knocked out and just how he took her to Blackburn’s and had her bred to Boston. In all this, including the loss of the eye and the trip to Blackburn’s, Jesse may have had in his mind Captain Russell’s one-eyed mare, Mary Churchill, while his interviewers were thinking about Maria Russell. It is no uncommon thing for white people as well as black, at seventy-five, to get names of forty or fifty years past confused.