The Fire Horse ( Thirty Days Trial )

But, with the test of the eyes, even if an animal is satisfactory in all other respects, the examination has only begun. Thirty days’ trial we require before deciding whether we are going to accept or reject a beast. A horse’s disposition, his aptness to lean, his grit and his nerve, his common sense and his habits must all be taken into consideration.

The engine we use for breaking the horses is one of the three-abreast kind, now commonly used to throughout the department. Bi hitching a new horse between two veterans we not only steady him and get the aid of the older animals, but we have the candidate where the dead weight of the four and a half tons pulls heaviest and where he will have to show his mettle. As the engine starts the frightened animal springs forward to get away from the dreadful thing behind. But the other horses throw the full weight of the engine right on him and steady him. Up and down the block the three horses are driven, two, even three hours at a time. Until gradually the stranger gets exhausted and finds himself, and doesn’t try to pull the entire load by himself.

When a horse is broken to pulling the engine he is tested for a number of qualifications. For instance, an engine may depend upon the willingness of the horses to try to pull it out. A horse that balks, for instance, is out of question. Therefore, as the team drives along the engine driver jams his brake down hard, almost locking the wheels. A balky horse will object at once to the added load. The kind of a beast we want will dig his toes into the asphalt and make fire fly before he gives up.

Joan, a War Horse ( Part II )

This was not surprising, for good horses will never lag behind, but next morning early when the wagon started for rations there were Darby and Joan-fresh as paint, traces taut, bite rattling like a pebble mill, ears forward, snorting and stepping out just as if there had been a week in the stable.

That Summer we lost horses. July, August, September, found them always on the move; sometimes Fritz got their range, sometimes they were bombed at night or shot while bringing up rations. We moved slowly forward, and sometimes backward, day and night in action, with the horses never far away in open fields’.

With the Autumn came rain, mud and cracked heels, and in the village of Souastre Darby had to go with open gashes on both hind feet. Standing in the lines, I watched him being led away. I saw him stop, raise and turn his fine head in time to see Joan being hooked in with another horse. This was too much for Darby-there was Joan with a strange animal; perhaps she wanted him; anyhow he was going. With a sharp tug at his halter he was free; in a minute he had caught the wagon, whinnying all the way; in another he was limping by Joan’s side.

The Fire Horse

Among the most interesting institutions in this city are the Fire Department’s big hospital and training stables in West Ninety-Ninth Street. Here the world-famous New York fire horse passes his examination and is accepted and get his first lessons in the art of fire fighting. Here he is brought when scorched or bruised. Or cut or sprained. To be doctored and nursed back to strength and usefulness. And from here he is borne away dead. Or is condemned and sold to the highest bidder to end his days in front of a truck or a coal cart-the reward of a big city for gallantry displayed in action.

Anywhere from seventy to eighty horses a year are trained to take the places of those killed or crippled in service or to join newly organized companies scattered throughout the outlying districts of our continually growing town. Yearly more than a hundred horses are brought to the hospital to be sewed up and bandaged and operated on by the official veterinary and his assistants. And yearly some sixty horses are stricken from the training stables’ rolls either as “died in the discharge of duty “or “condemned because of unfitness”.

Of all the firemen in the department, probably none knows as much and can talk so interestingly about the fire horses of New York as Chief Joseph Shea, The official veterinary in charge of the hospital and training stables, and the man who examines and passes upon and trains every beast bought by the city for fire purposes.

“You may be surprised but all we pay for fire horses is $250 each “the Chief said in answer to a question. “We contract with the lowest bidder. And throughout the year he is obliged to supply us with horses whenever called upon. I often wondered at the absurd rate asked for a horse that is physically and mentally perfect and without blemish, but we never had trouble getting all the horses we wanted at this low figure. And our specifications are pretty stiff at that.

“Most of our horse comes from the upper part of New York State, from the big farms around Rochester. Some come to us from the West. But the New York State horse is about as fine a beast as we can find for our purposes, and that’s where most of the animals in the department hail from.

“The contractor notifies us that he has one or two or a dozen horses which he thinks will fill our purpose, and he is ordered to send them on trial. Height. Weight, &c., being satisfactory, the first step is to examine the candidate for soundness. I always look first at the eyes. An animal with what we call ‘pig’s eyes’ is apt to be near-sighted. His eyes are sunk deep in his head. He’s the sort of horse that will stumble and fall all over himself and that ought to wear spectacles. A horse set with eyes too far out of his head is likewise apt to suffer in sight. Look at the eyes of any fire horse and see what is meant by properly set eyes, and if you see a brute wide between the eyes, put him down as knowing next most to yourself. A horse with eyes set close together doesn’t seem to have enough room for much brain, and ,sure as fate, you couldn’t teach him anything if you pumped at him for a month of Sundays.