A Horse is not a pet.. but a friend for life!
Yes... how to dish the dirt on a poor defenceless animal!
Right.. like he is that alright..... the only thing missing was 666 tattoed on him somewhere and if you look under his top lip at the tattooed army number there are three sixes in that number!
He's a livley, comitted (several times) active, boisterous large beast who would never refuse alcohol in any form, search people for mints and food and also go out of his way to cause mayhem, chaos and embarrasment whenever possible. He's not a pet, he's a friend and companion. No horse is a pet they work alongside and with humans and have so for at least 2 thousand years!
Maestro's Victims include, at least 16 British Army Personel of different ranks (some more than once), 4 vetinary surgeons, 3 horse boxes, 2 British customs officers (who have not been heard of since) 26 French customs officers, half of Calais Docks, numerous other equines who were not able to get out of the way in time and members of most European Tournament Jousting teams as well as unsuspecting media reporters as well as his own handlers and owner!
He joined the army as a yearling being brought over from Ireland and grew to an impressive 18.1hh. As most Horses in the British Army he was taught the basics.. eat children, don't be afraid of weapons and kick your assigned handler and the Regimental vet as much as possible. When Yours Truly was assigned to be his rider/handler things grew from bad to worse but a trusting long standing friendship to date began with the aggressive use of a shovel at point blank range and much swearing, gnashing of teeth, hopping round on one leg and being squashed and scraped down a wall whenever the beast thought it could get away with it!
A military gelding operation went right down the pan when it came to "Charger Maestro" as he was officially known in the army. Unofficially known as "The black b*****d in the end stable" he sucessfully put 16 members of the regiment in the hospital and the vet on crutches for 4 weeks and nearly caused a Royal Parade to be cancelled! He knew what was going to happen to him and in a vein attempt to keep his "horsehood" he managed to fend off any attempt to hold him still for 3 hours, bit everybody, mangled the regimental vet kicked the senior duty NCO between the legs (still talked about in the mess as the finest shot in the regiment!) but finally he was sucessfully gelded, with the use of an elephant sized dosage of knockout stuff and a hurried operation as 16 injured officers, NCO's and troopers managed to hold him still long enough for the vet to do his work.
His work and duty in the military was of top class performance and he was, and still is, the most highly regarded Charger within the cavalry and excelled at treading deliberatly on tourists while on state duties at Horseguards Parade and being a complete nuisance at he Royal Mews by learning how to open his stable door there and letting himself out on a frequent basis. It's difficult not to laugh when a large black horse weighing a ton and a half slowly moves a hoof and deliberatley puts slow pressure on to the foot of a tourist laden down with about 20 cameras round the neck and who is intent on getting the best picture they can of the cavalry's state dress uniform in close up. All of a sudden you start hearing a crunch as a bone goes and then a scream followed by a panic stricken stream of foreign language which increase as the poor tourist's family join in and try and rescue the trapped foot. We, of course can't move or do anything and it's up to the off duty section of the guard to sprint to the rescue.
When I came out of the army I recieved the opportunity of purchasing Maestro and I didn't have to think about it. We had grown close over the years together and both Maestro and I knew each other very well he knew where the food came from and I knew where the trouble started!
A move to Civillian life with his Rider/ Handler and now owner saw sighs of relief in military circles and I understand the Squadron Sick Parade was much shorter after that. Yours truly belatedly found out that bribery worked every time and the bond got stronger between us, to such an extent that an attempted mugging on yours truly while out for a morning ride found the mugger fleeing through London with a very large aggressive pissed off horse chasing the poor sod. Police caught the mugger after Maestro had knocked him off his feet and trampled him into the pavement not far from The Admiralty Arch and then held him down with one large hoof until the boys in blue took the poor sod away to hospital and then prison. Maestro recieved a very large bucket of beer and several packets of mints as well as lots of pats.
About this time I got an invitation to start up with historical re-enactments. Napolionic and English Civil War was no problem as his army traning included all that stuff. Yes.. The British Army still trains Cavalry Horses the old way as well as parade stuff and competition work (lots of army riders compete at showjumping, 3 day events and dressage with their army mounts)! What I needed though was a good Warhorse for Medieval Tournament work. A search through family archives revaled gold.... One of my ancestors had carefully and in complete detail written down the training of a Warhorse. These documents date back to the 1300's and I had to get them translated.... English is a much developed language and much Latin is used in the text!
After an intense training regime, Maestro became a Warhorse and rapidly became respected as the best horse on the Tournament Jousting and Re-enactment circuit. kids loved the big kind beast who would lick them, nuzzle them and then drool hot horse drool down the back of their neck... opponents hated him for his intelligence, his quickness and ability to outguess them. Media people walked with care round him after a certain French media person had her clothes torn off by him live on Frog TV - but that's another story!
well.... I'll post more about his misadventures another time.. but as you can see he is.. a horse and a half - a friend and a companion in arms
Snap