CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS UPON HORSE SHOES
Year: 1806

page_text: CLARK'S SPECIFICATION.
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, BRACY
CLARK, of Giltspur, in the City of London, Veterinary Surgeon, send
greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by
His Letters Patent under the Great Seal of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Ireland, bearing date at Westminster, the Twenty-fifth day of
March, in the forty-sixth year of His reign, give and grant unto me, the said
Bracy Clark, my executors, administrators, and assigns, His especial licence
that I, the said Bracy Clark, my executors, administrators, and assigns,
during the term of years therein mentioned, should and lawfully might use,
exercise, and vend, within that part of the United Kingdom called England,
the Dominion of Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention
of "CERTAIN IMPROVEMENTS UPON HORSE SHOES;" in which said Letters Patent
there is contained a proviso obliging me, the said Bracy Clark, by an instru-
ment in writing under my hand and seal, to cause a particular description
of the nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to
be performed, to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery
within one calendar month after the date of the said recited Letters Patent,
as in and by the same (relation being thereunto had) may more fully and at
large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Bracy Clark, do hereby declare that the nature of my said Invention, and in

page_text: what manner the same is to be performed, is described in manner following,
that is to say:-
Having discovered, by much attention to the subject, that the present mode
of shoeing horses, by nailing the foot perpetually to an inflexible iron shoe,
besides the many calamities that the use of nails is subject to, the foot itself
is injured in its properties, becoming stiff, hard, and inelastic, from being thus
held for a long period without any motion whatever or exertion of that clasticity
which is natural to it, from whence arises that tenderness of the feet which is
so much complained of in the use of horses, and the danger of their falling,
and which leads to the use, or rather renders necessary, the sharp and painful
bits to the mouth to divert the attention of the horse from the suffering of
his feet; and having also satisfactorily proved, by actual experiments, that it
is this constant nailing of the foot to the shoc, which by contracting and
withering the foot, occasions the frog to be squeezed and pressed upon on
every side, and produces that foul and often painful disorder called the
running thrush, and the consequent tenderness and danger this occasions ;
the operation of these causes render it necessary annually to destroy thou-
sands of these costly and nseful animals prematurely, and before their age or
bodily powers are at all impaired, being rendered unable longer to use their
fect in any way that can be serviceable. Urged by these considerations, I
have been led to attempt a new kind of shoeing altogether, by which those
inconveniences will be entirely removed, and which, with much difficulty,
The useful
labour, and expence, I have at length happily effecter.
property of the kind of shoe invented by me is, the great facility of its
Application to the horse's foot and of its removal again, requiring only a few
seconds for this purpose, not exceeding in complication of its make or
difficulty of its application the bits often used for horses' mouths, so that
any intelligent person may casily apply them, and that they can be kept away
from the foot whenever the horse is not at his work, or as often as may be
desirable, leaving the foot at all other times to its perfect freedom, by which
means the foot will be kept fresh, firm, and free from disease, to the latest
period of life.
The Specification of my Invention, which admits of various modifications
in the actual structure of it, are as follows:-The shoe itself is made
of two distinct parts, which can at any time be separated, viz., a shoc
of elastic steel or other metal nicely fitted to the figure and turnings
of the foot, and sufficiently light in weight, with side and front clasps or
bands as shall hereafter be described, by which it is held firmly to the foot.
This shoe serves as a medium or means of attaching another shoe called the

page_text: wearing shoe to the foot, and which can be fixed to it or separated at pleasure.
The wearing shoo or the under shoe which comes in contact with the ground,
and receives the attrition and wear of the roads, is made of iron or steel, in the
ordinary form of the horse shoe, and can be renewed at pleasure, when worn
out, as it is merely screwed to the former by four or more sufficient screws. In
this way the fitted shoe is made to last many years, or even in some cases
the whole lifetime of the horse; the fitted shoe may be made of any metal
or mixture of metals, but steel seems the most suited to this purpose, or iron
or iron case-hardened, or silver made elastic, or steel or iron plated with other
metals. This shoe is held to the hoof by stays or clips extending round the
whole or part of the foot, which prevents the foot escaping latterally or in
and those clips or holds are part of the shoe itself, or distinct, and
fastened to it, and are made with a slit or groove. The above fastenings,
however, only prevent the escape of the foot in front or side ways, and
it may be still subject to slide out backwards, and as the heels are elastic,
tender, and sensible, no apparatus of the above kind can be used to prevent
this occurrence, or severe compression of any kind.
front;
I have, therefore, after much research and difficulty, devized another means
of effectually preventing this inconvenience by a bolt or bolts, or pin or screw,
passing through or near the front or side clips into the hoof, and which are
moveable with the growth of the hoof, descending along with it; also, on some
occasions, by bringing points through the under side of the shoe upright into
the hoof to serve the same purpose, so that one or the other of these may be
had recourse to, or both, as the ideas of security or fancy may suggest; or a
band or bands of steel or other metal may be constructed to carry these
points, or bolts, or screws, or plates, or hooks, or such like, and without
the principle of this construction of shoe being at all departed from. These
holes or excavations for lodging the bolts or points of steel are made in the
hoof previously to their application with a small center-bit, or gouge, or passer,
guarded, or any other fit instrument, in such way as to prevent the possibility
of its injuring the quick and living parts beneath the hoof.
A stout screw,
a toothed rack or steel shaft, or other contrivance of this description, serves
at the same time to carry these points and to regulate their elevation and
also descent along with the growth of the hoof; a sliding bolt and pin or screw
and nut may also serve the same purpose or other apparatus of this sort.
The clips also may be placed on a single shoe of stout iron or steel, though
a double one appears on the whole more advantageous; and numerous teeth
may be employed to enter the hoof and keep on the shoe, instead of one or
more points of bolts. All these are only variations or rather modifications of

page_text: the same general principle bere laid down. The clips, the double shoes, and
especially the bolts passing into the horn, are my discoveries, and without
which the thing cannot be usefully effected.
In witness whereof, I, the said Bracy Clark, have hereunto set my
hand and seal, the Twenty-third day of April, in the year of our
Lord One thousand eight hundred and six.