view raw text
LEIGH ON FRENCH RACING RETURNED HORSEMAN SAYS THERE IS LITTLE PROSPECT IN NEAR FUTURE. All His Former Friends on the Track Now in the Army — Says War Has Drained New York of All Good-looking Horses. New York, January 17. — Eugene Leigh has been the center of many an interested group of old friends since his return Sunday from France, being plied with questions on all sides not only as to his own fortunes but also as to racing conditions on the ether side. "All the Frenchmen I knew about the race tracks, who could qualify to do so. joined the army." said the returned horsemen. "There were only a dozen days of racing last season in all France, and tliey were for test purposes only. These were conducted on different tracks, and there was no betting. The principal winner was Jefferson Davis Colin, a London broker. He has the best stable of horses on the continent at the present time. "I have been commissioned by a syndicate in France to pick up as many horses and mules fit for army service as I may be able to get. but Im afraid Im too late in the field to do anything in this line. Already they have taken 2.300.000 horses out of America for the Allies, and it looks like they had left a nihility scrawny lot to choose from. I was looking at the horses here on the streets of New York today, and the change is something sad to see. They are the poorest, weakest lot of horses pulling the wagons, cabs and trucks that I ever remember seeing in any city. This is unquestionably the result of taking away the best that were to be had at good prices for military use in Europe." During his long life abroad Leigh won more than i.000 races. In one year he won 165 races with steeplechasers alone, and in another year he took no less than 110 jumping races with his charges. It was only a few weeks ago that he decided to return to America. He says that the future for racing in France looks so bad with the long-drawn out conflict that he became discouraged over the prospects. When war was declared Leigh had eighty horses in training, and on the first day the French government commandeered seventeen of them. Since that time all the geldings and mares in the stable have been taken over by the government for military uses, and all the others from his t table have been otherwise disposed of. When war was declared the American had a training track on an island in the Seine near Mai-son Lafitte. where he had a three-quarter mile straightaway and a five -furlong oval. Having been a farmer in Kentucky, he had taken up the breeding of pigs. With the war on and no chance of racing, he saw an opportunity in pork and started i. to raise hogs on a big scale. Early in the conflict and directly after the retreat of the French from the Marne. there were 300 tons of bread tiiat had been shipped from Paris to the soldiers damped out at Malaga Lafitte. and there he had food for Battening hundreds of his porcine pets. He started iff with too much luck, however, and came to grief later on, after he had opened two or three meat shops for the distribution of pork. Last summer, just as he had established business on a big scale, an epidemic of cholera struck the island hog tarns, and Leigh found himself out of the pork business, as well as racing.
