Beautiful as this area is, it was then (and is now) a hard place to make enough money to keep a family and I clearly remember my Mum and Dad – a couple who up until then had regarded Battersea Park as the great outdoors – attempting lobster fishing and relief milking amongst other things in order to make ends meet.
We didn’t have much spare cash at that time but nearly all of my parent’s new friends had horses, and so despite Dad having turned 50 and Mum in her mid-thirties they began to learn to ride. The locals were very generous with their time and nags and riding became a big thing for all of us – with the highlight being the occasional chance to ride up on the moors.
Bodmin Moor is the perfect riding country. Miles of wide open spaces that are much flatter than many of our other uplands and littered with ‘wild’ ponies. The draw of this was so strong that in the end my parents sold everything they had and then borrowed a bundle to buy a very run down moorland farm called South Penquite.
I clearly remember on the first day we moved in, one of our new farming neighbours rode up to introduce himself. His bridle and stirrup leathers were both made of baler twine and his pony look like it hadn’t been fed for a week – but it nevertheless scared the pants off me as it bolted down the lane when I foolishly accept “a go”.
The moors were, at the time, a genuine horse culture where the farmers often had more ponies grazing than sheep, when the two annual pony sales were the biggest dates at the local market, where Land Rovers were scarce and quad bikes unheard of, and where riding was the preferred means of transport for everyone. My parents were in heaven, and even when I joined the army I would come home every leave and break in ponies and help on the farm.
My Dad had a new horse that was straight off the moors and broken by one of the local lads. Jumping Jack Flash (or just Jack to his friends) wasn’t big, but carried my father literally to his grave. He was riding Jack right up until the week he passed away and we buried them both in the same corner of the farm – but that is another story.
What brings me to reminisce about horses are two events that have happened last month. Firstly it was a day of mixed emotions when I helped some of the local rough riders round up about 40 wild ponies on one of the more remote areas of moorland. It is perhaps a sign of the times that whilst one farmer of over seventy turned up with his horse, tacked up and ready to ride in the back of his cattle trailer – a couple of the younger generation turned up on scramble bikes. Anyway after an hour or so of galloping round and after another hour of horse trading we were left with 22 unwanted and unmarked moorland ponies.
Having literally no value, these ponies were actually threatening the viability of our major conservation scheme on the moors, where we are paid to reduce the grazing to help restore the heather and wetlands. So, with no other options left we called in the knacker man and spent a harrowing afternoon humanely disposing of them.
On a more cheery note, I have known for a while that I would need a “Jack” of my own to see me into old age and so I have purchased another moorland horse (from the son of the farmer Dad got Jack from) and am now showing him the moors and getting him used to the livestock on a daily basis. His name is Henry.
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