When the colt grew up, Mr. Oliver, his breeder, sold him to Mr. George M. Patchen, of Brooklyn, and he became a very popular stallion. After the death of Kemble Jackson and Long Island Black Hawk he was considered the best trotting stallion on Long Island. He was in a good many races, some of which were reported, but more that were not, and as against stallions, he was with the fastest. In temper he was disposed to be vicious and had to be watched. In form he could not be considered beautiful, but powerful. When the artist was modeling the equestrian statue of Washington that stands in Union Square, he had a great search for a horse to serve as a model, and he selected Cassius M. Clay as the best representative of majesty and power that he could find. Although the bronze is of heroic size, it is, no doubt, a fair representation of the outline and structure of the horse. He died at Montgomery, Orange County, New York, July, 1854, in the same stable where Long Island Black Hawk had died four years before. The three great horses, Long Island Black Hawk, Kemble Jackson and Cassius M. Clay, died just as they entered on what should have been the period of their greatest usefulness, the first at the age of thirteen; the second at the age of nine; and the third at the age of eleven. If these horses had lived through the usual period of horse life, doubtless the records of performers would bear very different relations from what they do to-day, but the really great sire had not yet made his appearance.
Considering the short period Cassius M. Clay was in the stud he left a numerous progeny, but only one of them, George M. Patchen, achieved greatness on the turf. He placed thirty-four heats in 2:30 or better to his credit and made a record of 2:23½ in 1860, which was the fastest for any stallion of his day. This was the only one in the 2:30 list from the loins of Cassius M. Clay. Nine of his sons became the sires of eighteen trotters, and more than a dozen of his sons were named “Cassius M. Clay Jr.” thus leading to great confusion and oftentimes uncertainty as to identity.
Cassius M. Clay Jr. (Neave’s).—This was a brown horse foaled 1848, got by Cassius M. Clay; dam by Chancellor, son of Mambrino; grandam by Engineer, sire of Lady Suffolk. He was bred by Charles Mitchell, of Manhasset, Long Island, owned by Joseph Godwin, New York; stood in Orange County, 1852, in Dutchess, 1853, and was taken to Cincinnati that fall. He was owned by Mr. Neave, made a few seasons, broke his leg in the hands of Mr. McKelvy, and had to be destroyed. Mr. Godwin represented this horse to me as very fast until four years old, when by an accident he was thrown into the Harlem River when hot and was stiff ever afterward. He put four of his get into the 2:30 list, and four of his sons got ten trotters and one pacer. His early death was esteemed a great loss, for he was better bred than most of the other sons of his sire.
Clay Pilot, by Cassius M. Clay (Neave’s), was out of a catch filly, whose dam was the famous Kate, the grandam of Almont. From the noted old trotting mare Belle of Wabash, whose history will be found in Chapter XXX. on the investigation of pedigrees, Clay Pilot got The Moor, himself a fast trotter and a successful sire. He died at ten years old, leaving among others the famous Beautiful Bells, 2:29½, that, mated with Electioneer, produced a remarkable family; and Sultan, 2:24, sire of the great Stamboul, 2:07½, and of thirty-eight other performers, and of thirteen producing sons and twenty producing daughters. The Moor founded an excellent family.
From a sister to Crabtree Bellfounder, by imported Bellfounder, Neave’s Cassius M. Clay got the black stallion Harry Clay, 2:29, that was quite a reputable trotter in his day, and left five standard performers, sixteen producing sons and twenty-three producing daughters, among the latter the famous Green Mountain Maid, the dam of Electioneer.
Cassius M. Clay Jr. (Strader’s).—This was a handsome brown horse, foaled 1852, by the original Cassius, and his dam was a black mare by Abdallah, that passed through the hands of A. Van Cortlandt and afterward became the property of Joseph Godwin; grandam by Lawrence’s Eclipse; great-grandam the Charles Hadley mare by imported Messenger. This pedigree has been questioned without assigning any reasons or facts, but as it came to me circumstantially and from unquestionable sources I have no reason to doubt it. He was bred by Joseph H. Godwin, of New York, and foaled the property of Dr. Spaulding, of Greenupsburg, Kentucky. He made some seasons in the hands of Dr. Herr, of Lexington, Kentucky, was bought 1868 by R. S. Strader, and passed to General W. T. Withers, of Lexington, where he died 1882. He was engaged in several races and made a record of 2:35¼. He put four in the 2:30 list, and he left sixteen sons that were the sires of forty-six trotters and seven pacers. His daughters have produced well, thirty-four of them having produced forty-two trotters and seven pacers. This shows him to have been a better horse than his sire and better than any of the other sons of his sire.
George M. Patchen was a large bay horse, fully sixteen hands high and heavily proportioned. He was bred by H. F. Sickles, Monmouth County, New Jersey, for Richard F. Carman, of New York, the owner of his dam. He was got by the original Cassius M. Clay, and his dam was a light chestnut mare, owned and driven on the road by Mr. Carman. As the blood and origin of this mare was for many years unknown, it is necessary to go into some particulars concerning it. From 1835 two brothers, Thomas and Richard Tone, were contractors on the streets in the northern part of New York City. Two or three years afterward Richard bought or traded for a large, strong sorrel mare to work in one of their dirt carts. It was represented that she had lost a foal shortly before and she was thin in flesh and looked coarse. When she moved out of a walk she always went into a pace, and that seemed to be her natural gait. They kept this mare at work in the cart for several years and sometimes turned her out to pasture in a small field at the foot of “Break-neck” hill, adjoining a pasture owned by the Bradhurst family. One morning a two-year-old stallion colt, owned by Samuel Bradhurst, was found in the pasture with the big pacing mare. He had broken down the fence between the two pastures and gotten the big mare with foal. In due time she dropped a light chestnut filly, and when weaned, Thomas Tone bought this filly from his brother Richard, and at two years old commenced working her to his wagon. She had very severe treatment for so young an animal and went amiss, when Thomas sold her to James Scanlon, a blacksmith, and after a time he sold her to Richard F. Carman for a driving mare. Like her dam, when she started off she would pace, but after going some distance she would strike a trot and go very fast. Mr. Carman paid one hundred dollars for her and he drove her beside another that he paid fifteen hundred for, and his fast daily drives from Carmanville down to the city soon tested the respective merits of the two mares. The hundred-dollar mare could outlast the other and had to help her along toward the end of the drive. In time she was foundered and permanently stiffened and that was the reason she was sent to Mr. Sickles to be bred.
We must now look after the two-year-old colt that was the sire of this mare. Robert L. Stevens, of Hoboken, owned the famous race mare, Betsey Ransom, and with others he bred from her the two fillies, Itasca and Frolic. In 1837 these two mares were owned by Samuel Bradhurst, who manifested a sporting disposition, very much against the wishes of his father. In 1837 he bred these two mares to imported Trustee, then standing at Union Course, Long Island, and the produce were Head’em and Fanny Ransom. It is not known what became of Fanny Ransom, but he continued to own Head’em for some years and ran him in 1841 at the Union Course and beat the imported colt Baronet, by Spencer. There seems to be no other trace of his running or his stud services. It was in 1840, therefore, that he jumped the fence and in 1841 that the dam of George M. Patchen was foaled. George Canavan, Mr. Bradhurst’s coachman, says there were no other foals of any description bred by Mr. Bradhurst. These facts were gleaned personally and separately from Tone and Canavan, and as they complement and sustain each other, they must be accepted as the best information extant on the breeding of this great horse. His dam was by Head’em, a son of Trustee, out of a mare by American Eclipse, a grandson of Messenger, and she was a pacer and a trotter. His grandam was a pacer of unknown breeding.
In 1851 he was purchased for four hundred dollars from Mr. Sickles by John Buckley, of Bordentown, New Jersey, and a few months afterward he sold a half interest in him to Dr. Longstreet, of the same place, and he remained their joint property till 1858, when Mr. Buckley sold his half interest to Mr. Joseph Hall, of Rochester, New York. He commenced his remarkable career on the turf in 1855 and it continued till 1863. In 1858 he was engaged in the first race that gave him a national reputation. This was against no less a celebrity than Ethan Allen, and he was distanced, leaving Ethan with a clear title to the stallion championship. In 1860 he turned the tables on his old rival and beat him in straight heats in 2:25, 2:24, 2:29. The next week the contest was renewed and Patchen again won in straight heats, and this gave him the unchallenged right to the rank of the fastest trotting stallion in the world. His triumphs, however, were as wide as the trotting turf and not limited to sex. He was able to beat and did beat all the best but the indomitable little Flora Temple, and although he beat her twice, she was too fast for him and beat him many times. It is not my purpose to give a history of his achievements. It is sufficient to say he made a record of 2:23½, with thirty-four heats to his credit in 2:30 and less, and two miles in 4:51½.
It cannot be said that he was a very great success in the stud as we now measure success. Four of his get were able to enter the 2:30 list, and among them was the great Lucy, with her record of 2:18¼. Fifteen of his sons became the sires of sixty-two trotters and three pacers, and four of his daughters produced five trotters. It is hardly fair to compare the stud services of a horse of Patchen’s generation with many of the great sons of Hambletonian, but at the same time we must not forget that Patchen was foaled the same year as Hambletonian. On the first of May, 1864, when Dan Pfifer was preparing him for the racing season then about to open, he died of a rupture, just as his sire had died.