The Sun. — 1867-01-03 (London, England)

THE CROYDON STEEPLECHASE.  -Sir Francis B. Head writes in a contemporary as fol lows : Sir,—ln your account this day of the Croydon Steeplechase it is stated by your report that "among those present was the Duke of Hamilton and Sir Francis Head, author of "The Horse and his Rider," who was there to give evidence, if needed, for the defence. As I have always considered steeplechasing to be, as regards both horias and riders, an unsportsmanlike exhibition of "valour without diecretion," and as I am an ardent supporter of the Society for the Suppression of Cruelty to Animals, I shall feel exceedingly obliged if you will be so good as to allow me testate that shortly after the Croydon Steeplechase, which I had attended to see Meanwood, a favourite horse that had belonged to me, run, I declined to give evidence on the forthcoming trial, which was then announced to me. On Saturday morning last, not knowing it was to take place in a few minutes, I walked into Croydon, and on again being earnestly solicited to appear as evidence, I replied, "I will not come forward as a volunteer, but as I should like to hear the trial I will go into court, and then if either side think proper to notice my presence I will reply to any questions that may be put to mo." On the motion of the secretary for the prosecution, all persons who were to give evidence were ordered to leave the court. For nearly three blessed hours was I therefore shut up in a little dungeon, not loft. square, with witnesses of all castes, until a policeman, opening the door, said, "You may all come out now; the case is dismissed." So much for my having been during the trial present in court. With respect to the case itself permit me to state that, with the most benevolent intentions, the prosecutors made a great mistake. For really the society might as well stigmatise the six noble-hearted Americans, lately swept into eternity from the deck of the yacht Fleet vying, as " suicides," as to charge that quiet, game-looking little rider, Mr. Crawshaw, with "cruelty to his horse which broke its back at the steeplechase at Croydon." The magnates and magistrates and the thousands of people of all classes whom I saw crowding the stands and congregated on each side of the water-jump were all more or less guilty of the cruel expectation, bordering on hope, or seeing some of the horses and riders souse into the water or roll along the turf, but no saint on earth or angel in heaven, instead of wishing to break Voightlander's back, could more ardently desire that ho should land safely than, of course, the man who rode him. As the course was not only over stiff clay, but was unusually wet, it was what sportsmencall "severe"—in plain English, cruel to the weakest of the horses that went twice round it. But Voightlander, the horse selected by the society, shortly after starting, fell in going over the waterjump the first time. The jump, as regards breadth, any ordinary hunter would, without the smallest extra exertion, have traversed in his stride ; and as on the off-side it was not 6 inches deep, if the green grass for the 13 feet, instead of being flooded with a layer of water, had been whitewashed, the horses reaching it at full speed would all have jumped it quite as well, and with no less danger. The fault of the fence was that the furze in front of the water had been placed upright, instead of sloping outwards. Voightlander fell, therefore, not because he was exhausted by cruel riding, but because, being too fresh and joyful, ho jumped only for height, and thereby throwing himself out of gear for jumping breadth, his feet, pasterns, and body landed on the turf in a false position, and so, greatly to the grief and disappointment of his gallant little rider, down he came, and for a few minutes remained prostrate, with Mr. Crawshaw's leg underneath him. Poor, noble animal ! As I rode home I passed him with his head dangling downwards from a knacker's cart. Only a few days before I had happened to pass a horse in the agonies of death from having fallen at a trot on a turnpike road.—l am, sir, your obedient servant, Croydon, Jan. I. F. B.