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THE THOROUGHBRED AND WAR Capt James M Brown attached to the Royal Field Artillery in France writes as follows to the London Sportsman about the thoroughbred and his conduct in the great war warAfter After being veterinary officer for over three years in France and attached to the field artillery the whole period I can affirm that there is not one per cent of trott Ingbred halfbreds in any unit of tlie Royal Field Artillery anil I think I may safely affirm the same as regards the French and Kalian artilleries Certainly a large proportion of the Tlritish Fjeld Artillery horses are American or Argentinebred but I should say the large majority are Percheron crosses The French artillery are largely Percheron Bonlanais or Breton or crosses of these breeds 1 understand the Belgian artil ¬ lery are now similarly horsed to the British The cavalry t French or British are horsed with thor ¬ oughbred crosses or halfbreds and often tbree quirterbreds I can vouch for the fact that the better bred the Animal tlie better he is under shell fire A well bred animal can be trained to stand any amount of shell fire and surpasses in courage and stamina any other breed I think one would be hard put to it to find a single American trotter that is used as a recognized officers charger by any general brigade of artillery or battery com ¬ mander On the other hand I will without diffi ¬ culty find plenty of thoroughbreds or so near thor ¬ oughbred that one would have great difficulty to tell the difference used by officers of the above ranks as chargers
