Warrior: The true story of the real war horse. Isabel George
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and would not have wanted any of that for Warrior. Everyone was talking about signing up for King and Country and being home for Christmas, but Seely had devoted his civilian life to politics and he sincerely doubted the Great War would be over in four months. Even before he had returned from the war in South Africa he had been voted in as MP for the Isle of Wight, and alongside his great friend Winston Churchill (a war correspondent in the Boer conflict) he had nurtured a parliamentary career. By 1913, while Churchill accepted the role of First Lord of the Admiralty, Jack Seely was in the pivotal role of Secretary of State for War.
Seely did not rush into donating Warrior for the war effort. First, he pondered his concerns and talked them over with his friends in politics who also knew of Warrior’s qualities and his suitability for the task at hand. He had already made one leap of faith in his decision to train the youngster as a charger, not a racehorse. He heard from his trainer ‘Young Jim’ Joliffe how his young horse showed calm intelligence and that he was wise and lovable, but he also knew that he was brave and fearless. In the spirit of Empire and all that was considered good and honourable in the service of the monarch, Jack Seely signed up for war and volunteered Warrior, too.
Warrior had no idea that he would soon be wrenched from the comfort of his mother’s love. He was just four years old but he was about to embark on an episode that would require him to focus every ounce of his courage and resilience on survival. All he ever was and all he ever could be would converge at that moment.
The pair took one last gallop over the Downs together. The smell of the sea clung to their hair and clods of sweet earth spat up from the fields as Warrior pounded the ground. ‘My Warrior, we are about to go on an adventure and neither of us can know what it will bring. One thing is for sure: we will be together and we will care for each other until we can ride these fields again.’
Warrior had hardly been away from his mother’s side since the day he was born, but early on 11 August 1914 he left behind the security and tranquillity of home to start his journey to the battlefields of the Western Front. He called to his mother as he was led from the field, and as the gate closed behind him he took one last look at home. Cinderella galloped along the edge of the field, watching her son being taken from her. She followed until she ran out of field, calling to Warrior in a language only the two of them could understand. It was a mournful, empty sound and when it stopped the silence was solid.
For weeks after her son’s departure, Cinderella paced Sidling Paul – the huge pasture she now had all to herself. Wandering around with her head bowed, she had no interest in anything or anyone, despite the best efforts of the Seely children to console her. She was missing Warrior and there was no doubt that he would be missing her.
When they reached Southampton docks Seely and Warrior met a scene of chaos. Men, horses, supplies and equipment were crowded together waiting to be loaded onto the troopships. One way or another, it all had to find a way to the men at the Front.
As an officer’s mount Warrior would be watched very closely by the men assigned to look after the horses during the Channel crossing. The majority of the horses around him were not so lucky. Taken from farms and fields all over Britain, the majority of the horses requisitioned by the Army that summer had never been further than their own stable, field and back yard. Now they were lined up, flanks quivering, eyes wide, waiting for their turn to be led up the gangway to the deck or settled in mass makeshift stalls in the hold.
Warrior didn’t need much coaxing up the gangway, but others found the experience traumatic. When panic set in with one or two horses, the others smelled fear. There were reports of some getting so agitated that they broke free of their ropes and bolted through the docks in a bid to escape. One who made it on deck with the bustling, stomping, snorting heave of horses decided to take a leap of faith, crashing the barrier and falling overboard. As the troopships pulled away from the quay, the men and the other horses could do nothing to help the horse destined to drown.
In just two weeks the British Army had requisitioned 140,000 horses from all over Britain and all had to be transported to France in overcrowded troopships as quickly as possible. The heave and swell of the water and the cramped, sweltering conditions below deck ensured a number of the horses never completed their journey. Some fell during the voyage and broke their legs, while others were claimed by the trauma. Warrior was one of the lucky ones. Later that day, on 11 August, he trotted ashore at Le Havre with Seely by his side.
As the Special Service officer of the British Expeditionary Force, Seely was attached to the Headquarters. By the time he arrived with Warrior the HQ had already moved 20 miles closer to Paris due to the German advance. Warrior had no time to acclimatise to the fear, stink and commotion of war – the white heat from a bursting shell, the violence, the noise and the smell of blood. He had to hit the ground running. Riding through the small French villages gathering and sharing information with the local people, Seely and his steed dodged the almost constant shellfire, but Warrior never shied away. On one occasion a shell hit a stable building directly ahead of them, sending a plume of fire into the sky. Later, Seely proudly told anyone who would listen how his horse had the uncanny ability to stall fear – he felt it, but did not show it. Many other horses would have run at that point, but not Warrior.
The experience of war had been a sudden one for Warrior. He had left the green and pleasant land of home and found himself in a place torn apart by fire and explosions. Everything a horse feared was there and it was inescapable. As Seely and Warrior joined the British Expeditionary Force’s advance on the Marne, their main enemy was exhaustion. In the space of just a few weeks Warrior had grown up. He was no longer a six-year-old green to the ways of life and war; he was a survivor in a place where death was strewn all around.
The swift advance of the French Army had cut off a section of the Germanadvance and their exhausted men were surrendering on all sides. Warrior, with Seely on his back, took a path through it all and on to La Ferté-sous-Jouarre. Suddenly, Warrior and a group of other horses from the Expeditionary Force came to a halt just as a shell landed alongside them, blowing all around it into the air. Screams erupted from the stricken and bloodied, but out of the fire and mayhem stepped Warrior. As Seely gathered a group and ran ahead to the nearest village, the German machine guns rallied. All were killed except Seely. Warrior stood just a few hundred yards away.
Seely kissed Warrior on the nose. ‘If you are missing home, my Warrior, you should know that I am missing it, too. This hell is so far removed from our heaven at home, and I’m sorry I can’t give you a better shelter than this.’ Warrior did as he always did when his master spoke so softly to him; he nuzzled his cheek. There was a moment of thankfulness between the man and his horse for the fact that, by some miracle, they had survived the onslaught. Exhausted and covered in dirt and debris, Warrior took his rest. It was not for the war horse to know what would happen next, but Seely was aware that if there was any silence on the fields of Flanders that night it would be the calm before a storm. There was already talk of the hostilities building at Ypres, and few would be spared.
The fighting was desperate. The Allied forces faced overwhelming numbers and often superior artillery along the front line, and Warrior’s refusal to acknowledge fear was infectious. Every fighting man from the officer at General Headquarters to the Tommy in the trenches knew that if they slackened their grip on the enemy they would fail to hold the Channel ports and ultimately England could be lost. Seely went to report on activity at the Front only to find that it was being held by the brave survivors of an Indian contingent who refused to give in to the barrage of rifle and machine-gun fire. Warrior’s legs sank into the mud that had been stirred up in the wet gloom. He kept looking around warily. He had mastered his fear of fire and shells, but he still maintained a wise respect for rifle fire. He didn’t shy away or bolt, but there was unease in air. When Warrior suffered a bout of internal cramp and had to be taken back to GHQ at St-Omer, Seely breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed the unease was not unfounded – the horse Seely rode to the same spot the next day came under attack and was seriously wounded.
The informal armistice of Christmas 1914 brought a kind of peace that was welcomed by both sides. Seely heard later that