Clydesdale

The Clydesdale Horse, so utterly synonymous with the phrase 'Horse Power' began to develop as a breed in the early part of the 1700's. As the name implies, it originated from the valley of the River Clyde (world famous for the shipbuilding activities in its lower reaches within the City of Glasgow) in the area comprising the upper wards of the County of Lanarkshire.

Informed legend has it that one of the Dukes of Hamilton wanted to cut a dash with some splendid coaching stallions and so he imported big black Flemish Stallions from the low countries of Europe. He generously allowed his tenant farmers to mate their 'scotch' mares with his imported blood and the resultant offspring were considered superior to both their sires and dams. These farmers, realising that they had something rather special in the way of horse flesh, carefully developed the breed amongst themselves and before long they had an animal that was widely sought after.

The Clydesdale spread rapidly from its base in Southern Central Scotland to Northern England, Ireland and northwards through Scotland itself. The sales at the market town of Lanark became renowned and in the heyday of the breed, hundreds if not thousands were sold in a matter of days.

The horses provided the power not just for farming, but were widely used in the cities for carting and also for haulage over greater distances - there would at one point have been as many Clydesdales working in the towns and cities as there were in the countryside tilling the soil. Large numbers of Clydesdales were also exported to America, Canada, New Zealand and Australia - and indeed the Clydesdale is credited with aiding the opening-up of Australia.

The original Clydesdale horse was a stocky, close coupled animal around 16 hands high with good feathering on the legs, an active movement and a good sloping shoulder. They were largely of a solid dark bay, brown or black colour. Today when people think of Clydesdales they immediately think of white blazes on their faces and white legs, but that was a fashion that was introduced at a later stage

The development of the railways, motorised transport and farm tractors spelled the death knell of the Clydesdale as a 'working' animal, although not perhaps as quickly as one might imagine. When the railways were being constructed, Clydesdale horses were used to transport the building materials and remove the waste soil and rocks that were dug out to fashion a level track bed. However, over time the horse became 'redundant' and the breeding of these magnificent animals was left in the hands of a dwindling number of farming families who because of sentiment could not bear to see them, nor indeed the blood lines which had been perfected over the decades, lost.

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