Officer finds it hard to dismount
It is a sunny Tuesday afternoon and Constable Cyndy Henry is supposed to be at her desk at the RCMP’s headquarters in Ottawa looking after trademark infringement investigations. But she has sought clearance to visit her horse at the RCMP stables.
Const. Henry was part of the RCMP’s famous musical ride, one of the most coveted jobs in the police force. She was part of an elite band of officers chosen to spend three years learning to ride a horse, touring the world and putting on shows in which officers in full Mountie regalia lead their horses through a series of precision moves set to music.
It was a great gig. But since moving to an office job with the force, Const. Henry pines for the musical ride and misses Inky, who she still considers her horse. She visits him monthly, including weekends now that Inky has been retired to the training stables.
For two of her three years with the ride, she was assigned to Inky, a hotblooded, 98% thoroughbred. He is large — more than 16 hands and about 1,300 pounds — and a beauty, elegant and black with a white stripe down his face and two distinctive white marks on his back legs. He is temperamental and mischievous but a loveable horse, Const. Henry says.
“I miss him. I had him for two years. I know where his sweet spots are. He likes behind his ears and he likes it right on the base of his tail,” she says, as she scratches his bum while he grazes on grass at the musical ride’s training grounds east of downtown Ottawa.
When officers join the ride, they submit their wish list of horses. In her second year, she picked Inky. Normally, officers switch horses every year, but she had the rare opportunity of keeping Inky for her last two tours.
Const. Henry was once the typical hardened street cop. Before joining the ride, she was in a plainclothes unit in Vancouver, investigating sex assaults and other major crimes in North Vancouver.
Although it was a terrific assignment for a young officer, the lure of the musical ride was too great and she moved to Ottawa.
Every year, about 30 officers are chosen from 700 to 1,000 applicants to attend an introductory five- week class. Of those, only about half make it on to the ride.
Being selected was “like winning the lottery,” says Const. Henry, who was on the 1998, 1999 and 2000 tours. Her father was also on the musical ride — exactly 40 years before she joined.
It has been five years since she left and she is still finding it hard to move on.
She is not alone. Sergeant Len Klimpke, an instructor, says many return to see their horses — they get under the skin of even the toughest officers. He likes to quote Winston Churchill, who is attributed with saying: “ There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man.”
Leaving the musical ride can be hard for a number of reasons. “It might be bad to say, but people treat us a lot like rock stars when we’re on the tour,” Sgt. Klimpke says. “ As police, you’re dealing with the 10% of people you wouldn’t have for dinner.”
Officers on the ride do a number of jobs normally given to stable hands. They feed and groom their horses and clean out the barns. On tour, they also take turns spending the night in the barn — a horse could bolt and there are security precautions with such valuable animals. Every night, two officers sleep on hay bales beside the horses. Although hardly a glamorous part of the job, Const. Henry loved it.
Like a protective and doting parent, she would snuggle in with Inky. “Not for the whole night, but I loved to curl up on top of him. I’d have a cuddle with him. I liked working the night shift because you could go in and spend some time with them.”
She says Inky was like her first child. It was good training for the two boys she would have after she left the musical ride. “I called him my son. Now I have real sons, so he is my third son.”
She had to learn how to discipline Inky, who she says can be a bit of a brat, and gave him the right mix of strict mothering and love.
“I think a big part of it was I treated him really well. I pampered him. I spent lots of time with him. I talked to him. I gave him treats and brought him carrots and apples.
“Maybe it’s my maternal instinct,” she says, adding that some of the other female officers had the same attachment to their horses.
Const. Henry keeps photos of him on her desk at work, alongside pictures of her children and dog.
She thinks they still have a bond. “I feel to this day that I come into the stables and if I walk behind him and call his name that he still remembers my voice and remembers me. Now maybe that is just wishful thinking on my part but I am certain that they have to. I can’t have spent two years with this horse and him not know me.”
The only thing she cannot do is ride Inky again because it causes too much interference for the instructors and recruits. She respects the rules but, of course, she wishes she could ride her horse again.
Const. Henry, who has a house in the country, says half-jokingly, “I’d like to take him home.”