The Real War Horse
The children’s author Michael Morpurgo published War Horse in 1982 long before the growth of interest in the Great War began. He has said many times that little did he realise it would morph from a child’s book to a play seen mainly by adults to now a Hollywood film. While some websites are arguing about whether the right uniforms and equipment will be shown, or whether it will be an exaggerated North American view of a war that it barely known of in the US, it seems likely it will bring many with only a passing interest in the subject to ask more, and perhaps remember a few stories of war horses passed down in their own family.
Horses in the Great War are as much a symbol of that conflict as the mud of Passchedaele or the gas mask. Veterans I interviewed in the 1980s had harrowing, often terribly sad memories of animals they had cared for at the front, and in my Great War photo archive I have literally hundreds of images showing a beloved horse, special to a particular soldier who brought them home.
An Army Service Corps Horse Transport limber in France 1918.
The sheer scale of animals used is incredible. The British Official History shows that in August 1914 the army had 165,000 horses on the establishment; doing everything from pulling wagons and ambulances, to serving in mounted regiments or serving as Sir John French’s charger. The same establishment four years later numbered more than 828,000 horses and in those four years millions of animals had been brought into use by the British alone. For the British effort horses were brought from a wide area; 428,00 from North America, 6,000 from South America and some were even sourced in Spain and Portugal. At war’s ending many were sold locally but nearly 95,000 were brought back to Britain for sale, sometimes to their original owners. The cost to the horses was great; more than 225,000 of them died in British service on the Western Front and more than 376,000 died in service with the French Army; figures for the German war effort seem unavailable.
Germans shelter in a dugout with their horse, 1916.
One of the sad facts when I lived on the Great War battlefields was that when a field was ploughed the most common bones found were not human but horse or mule. How these animals were loved can be expressed that many officers wanted to be buried with their horses if they fell; and I know of at least one war grave where that indeed happened.
A French Poilu with his horse, 1915.
War Horse the film will make thousands of people think about the Great War and remember the often forgotten sacrifice of those beautiful animals who marched under the thunder of the guns just like their human masters.
Great War Photos 
Like your opening couple of paragraphs Paul. Well done.
11/01/2012 at 10:58
As a horse owner, I thank you for an excellent presentation. Wife’s G-father was a shoeing smith – an ‘Old Contemptible’, sadly he left no stories and I think no one asked.
11/01/2012 at 12:19
Sad that the community at large failed to appreciate what so many WW! vets experienced.
11/01/2012 at 18:48
Great photos Paul.
My grandfather moved to Brighton around 1908 to work with horses at a local dairy. He left after a short time as he did not like the way the horses were treated.
In 1917 he went to War himself – I wonder what he must have thought of the conditions the horses suffered there in Passchendaele?
11/01/2012 at 16:45
In the United States of America, 1922, the first memorial tree planted in memory of birds and animals killed in the war was placed at Happy Hollow playgrounds, Washington D.C. Children gave the program for the tree planting ceremony. James F. Briggs of the Humane Education Society made the address and the tree was marked with a bronze marker. The children made signs that read, “Be Kind To Animals”.
11/01/2012 at 16:51
Mules in the Great War are a pivotal moment in my novel, “By the Hands of Men, Book One: The Old War.”
You might like it.
http://bythehandsofmen.com/?page_id=26
11/01/2012 at 16:55
I love the pic of the horse sharing the dug-out. My grandad was an old contemptible with the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards and came early to the war as a dragoon, albeit one used to horses from hunt service back in blighty. Although he was invalided out in March ’18, he served again in India and won tent pegging awards for the regiment. After de-mob, however, he never again sat a horse. But neither would he see one abused and was famous for ‘laying into’ a drover whipping a mule up a track some time in the 20’s.
We have a shadow of the faithfulness and empathy horses can give to people in the most extreme conditions in their work in RDA – riding for the disabled. They have the most incredible ability to understand instantly what takes us ages, and they will tolerate and endure beyond belief. The war machine may have treated them abysmally- the men did not and revered them.
We also seem to forget that many of the WW1 horses were closest to the ‘hunter’ type which is dying out here now – big brave Irish Draughts in the main – not the fragile thoroughbreds popular in racing today.
12/01/2012 at 11:35
The horse in the dugout is one of the sweetest I’ve seen. These stories break my heart… But what a great site this is!
06/03/2012 at 19:13
Thanks Sarah – I have so many images of some fine looking horses it’s nice to have an excuse to share them!
06/03/2012 at 20:59
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