The key to a number of American breeds was an elite Rhode Island horse bred as a trade commodity in the 1600’s.

Article by Donna dePetrilio

Some 340 years ago, a breed of horses was bred and raised in the Narragansett Bay region of Rhode Island.  They were the finest little saddle horse ever known, not only for their unusual and remarkable ambling gait that gave pure comfort to the rider, but because of their tremendous stamina, sure-footedness and speed.

They were said to be able to cover rough ground at their steady and fast amble for more than 50 miles in a single day, often while burdened with both saddle, pillion and two riders, without fatigue to either themselves or rider.

This was the Narragansett Pacer, a true legend among horsemen for centuries.  For a bit more than three quarters of a century they were the most sought saddle horses in the Western world, and had they not disappeared due to the greed of our ancestors they could have been the predecessors of all gaited horses in the United States.

So great was the value of the Narragansett Pacer that eventually all the quality horses were sold out of the country, thus killing "the goose that laid the golden egg" and leaving all but a memory and a legend.

Remarkable as it sounds, the Narragansett Pacer is responsible for both the foundation of today's Morgan and American Saddlebred.  The dams of three of Morgan foundation sire Justin Morgan's four best sons (Sherman Morgan, Woodbury Morgan and Revenge) were Narragansetts, as was the dam of Gaines' Denmark, the greatest American Saddlebred progenitor.  John H. Wallace, founder of the Standardbred Register, was convinced the speed of the trotter derived from the Narragansett Pacer ancestry.  Today, breeders of some 30 modern horses are trying to re-capture the characteristics of this amazing animal.  Some have had more success than others, but none have ever able to duplicate the Narragansett Pacer.

It all started in the mid-1600s when New England colonists began exporting Pacers to the other colonies, and increased into trade with the West Indies.  In the West Indies, the horses were used to run the rollers of the sugar cane-crushing mills, haul the cane from the fields and transport sugar and supplies.  The trade continued to grow and flourish until the Revolutionary War, some 100 years later.

As the West Indies planters became wealthy, the demand for saddle horses spread to personal use.  Planters became willing to pay any price for these Pacers.  The "best-riding beast" was valued at 300 pounds, but a "Sorrel Pacer," as the Narragansett Pacer was known because of its brilliant color, was worth as much as 400 pounds.  New Englanders began breeding the horses by the thousands to accommodate buyers.  The Colonies exportation spread to the French West Indies, then later to the Dutch Islands, Martinique, Guadeloupe, Dominica, Curacao, Bonaire, Aruba and Surinam. 

Horses became the most desired commodity shipped, and vessels used for the equine cargo were soon referred to as "horse jockeys." By 1731, the number of these "horse jockeys" had grown to 120.  They were heavily built vessels, able to carry two to three tons of cargo, rigged as sloops, schooners and brigs.  But with their excessive weight, they were very slow and able to make only two or three voyages a year.  Ship captains tried timing the trips to avoid hurricane season, but did so with limited success.

For each horse on board, an allowance of rations was made up of one puncheon of water (110 gallons), one bundle of hay (500 pounds) and 10 bushels of oats.  Despite their high value, many of the animals died in route and were used as meat.  But since only the strongest and fittest completed these long journeys, this brought a certain hardiness to the breed by weeding out' animals unable to stand the rigors of the sea. 

These horses were so prized, many countries created special laws to accommodate them.  In Surinam, no vessel was allowed to dock and trade unless it brought Narragansett Pacers as its main cargo.  Many other islands did not charge trade permits if the cargo consisted of at least 60 horses.  Massachusetts Governor Robert Jenks placed these horses as first in importance among the Colonies exports.

Trading horses for molasses became highly profitable for New Englanders.  In Rhode Island, molasses was turned into rum, and the area became the major distiller of molasses-based rum.  With French home markets closed to rum, molasses sent to the Colonies was a truly valuable commodity for both the trading of furs and slaves with the French.

The horse trade was so substantial that in one Secretary of Customs ledger record, in a single year the New England Colonies shipped 7,133 horses to the British Islands alone.  In 1745, Moses Brown, one of the most prominent of the Providence merchants, sent out many vessels with horses as their main cargo even though his interest was in the textile industry.  His name is still prevalent in the area as the founder of one of Providence's most popular prep schools.

From the horse trade arose an aristocracy in New England society equal to the Southern plantation owners.  Members of this aristocracy lived in luxuriously large, isolated farms of several thousand acres.  Their wealth differed from their Southern counterparts only by instead of developing one staple crop such as cotton or tobacco, theirs came from breeding droves of fine horseflesh.

They built great houses, filled them with masterpieces by Smibert and Copley, and works of art from the finest silversmiths and cabinetmakers.  Both herds and houses were cared for by multitudes of slaves traded from the West Indies.  It is no wonder the aristocracy felt apart from their less affluent neighbors to the North and East.

Self-sufficient unto themselves, the life of the New Englanders was one envied even today.  The wealth and affluence of Narragansett County increased steadily throughout the 18th century until the Revolution.  The demand for this world famous breed and brisk trading with the West Indies was a major cornerstone to the building of Rhode Island.

The Narragansett Bay region was natural for the breeding of these fine horses, with plenty of level, well-watered pasture land, swamp grass that grew the best hay in abundance, and grazing lands separated from corn fields by saltwater ponds and lagoons.  This made for a great advantage over most other regions, and allowed the Colonist to maintain purity in the breed as well as keeping stock safe from theft or running off.

The major goal of the breeders was always to maintain purity of the breed.  As early as 1677, John Hull, Treasurer of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Master of the Mint and leader of the Pettaquamscut Purchasers, was one of the major players in the exportation of Narragansett Pacers.  He had an elaborate scheme for building a wall across Point Judith Neck, creating an enclosed area five miles in length and a mile or more in width for the sole purpose of breeding the Narragansett Pacer.  In a letter to Benedict Arnold on April 16, 1677, Hull wrote:

"We, the partners of Pointe Juda Necke, did fence with a good stone wall at the north end thereof to procure a very good breed of large stallions and fair mares, and that no mungrell breed might come among them, we have a very choice breed and in a few years might draw of considerable numbers and ships from Barbados." The project continued steadily for half a century.

The horses were most definitely regal and classy.  The best description of the fabled horse exists in the first edition of the Edinburgh Encyclopedia:

"They have handsome foreheads, the head clean, the neck long, the arms and legs thin and taper.  The hindquarters are narrow and the hocks a little crocked, which is here called sickle hocked, which turns the hind feet out a little.  Their color is generally, though not always, bright sorrel, they are always spirited and carry both head and tail high.  What is remarkable is that they amble with -more speed than most horses trot, and it is difficult to put them into a gallop.  Notwithstanding their facility of ambling, where the ground requires it, as when the roads are rough and stony, they have a fine, easy, single-footed trot.  These circumstances, together with their being very sure-footed, render them the finest saddle horse in the world, they neither fatigue themselves nor their rider.  It is generally to be lamented that this invaluable breed of horses is now almost lost by being mixed with those breeds imported from England and other parts of the United States."

Although referred to as having a "singlefooted trot," it is said the pureblood Narragansetts could not trot at all, but maintained their own pacing gait.  The gait was unique in their backbone moved through the air in a straight line, quite different from the motion of today's "pacers" and horses trained to acquire a pacing gait. it is this movement of the backbone that distinguishes the Narragansett Pacer from other breeds.  The big questions remains, however:  Where did they come from?  And, more importantly, where did they go?

There are many theories to what happened to the Narragansett Pacer.  The most general and believed comes from J.H. Waflace, writer and authority on the development of the American horse, who believed careful and selective breeding resulted in this New England horse.

Another theory is native Indians had a few mustangs that owned a gait known as an "Indian Walk," and crossed them with the Colonial livestock.  This is hard to believe, however, since at the time Plymouth, Massachusetts and Connecticut passed laws preventing the selling of horses to natives.  Even as late as 1665, it was after considerable debate that a Plymouth court allowed one such sale to be made to a friendly Indian for purposes of husbandry.

It is apparent our ancestors fully realized the advantage Indians would have if they possessed horses.  The Colonists were completely aware how horses transformed the Indians on the western plains, and they were not going to make that mistake with Indians on the East Coast.  Just as missiles of today made the United States into a world power, and ships were weapons with which Great Britain won her world empire, so too had horses delivered the New World to Spain, England and France.

Even another theory was that Deputy Governor Robinson, the founder of Rhode Island, imported a stallion from Andalusia named Old Snip, and thus is the father of the Narragansett.  Many newspaper advertisements at the time read "Narragansett Snip" or "a clean bred Narragansett horse of true Snip breed."

The theory is plausible, but according to records of 1684 there was no absence of "pacers" in New England, and that was some nine years before Robinson was born.  Many students of this subject believe the breed may have began with Andalusian stock, but imported w ell before Robinson's time.

Hence another theory rises that Irish Hobbies, possessing a similar natural gait, were involved in the breed.  There is no doubt some of them came to the Colonies during the middle 17th Century, but there iss nothing to prove this theory since no stud books were kept at the time.  But the Irish Hobbies were remarkably the same in size and color, and possess a natural pacing gait very much like the Narragansett.

If there were careful selection and breeding of these Hobbies (which became extinct in Ireland before the end of the 17th Century) with stock brought over with the Colonists just after the landing of the Mayflower, the end result might have very well been the Narragansett Pacer.

Finally, many believe Spanish horses bred on farms in the West Indian Colonies were heavily infiltrated by the Narragansett Pacer.  There are many more similarities than differences among the breeds, but without proper records this is only another educated theory, albeit a believable one.

The Narragansett Pacer was a king of his day, and one of the most popular sports of its time was racing along beaches.  Betting was brisk, competition keen and enthusiasm high.  "A purse of $ 100 was offered to run such a race on a course 'at Easton's Beach," read one account.  Littleneck Beach, now a bathing beach, had a racecourse one mile in length, with silver tankards and money the purse of the day.  Some of these prized tankards may still be found in local Rhode Island antique shops.  Records show that as late as the mid-1700s, Narragansett Pacers races were held in the Carolinas, Virginia and Philadelphia.

Owning a Narragansett Pacer was a great status symbol, and consequently the demand grew greater than the supply.  Agents from the West Indies and Cuba came to New England and bought any and all available stock, and a few of these prized animals were introduced into England as fine ladies saddle horses under the name of the Spanish Jennet.  But the majority of the horses were still sent to the West Indies.

This demand became one of the chief causes of extinction.  Agents bought so many horses and shipped them during any kind of weather, so only horses with superior stamina could survive the oppressive sea crossing.  Also, land in Cuba and the West Indies earned such large sums of money producing sugar that hay and grain became secondary crops.  Horses were driven off pastureland, which was replanted with sugar cane.  Between exposure to foul weather and the lack of food, the pacers all but vanished.

© Ride! Magazine, October 1996.  Reprinted with permission from Ride! Magazine.