ANSON’S CROSSBREDS
With his spacious west Texas home in the background, William Anson shows off the stallion Jim Ned. The caption to this photo reproduced in Points of the Horse merely identifies this animal as “a Rondo” and one of Anson’s polo ponies; in actuality it is a rare image of an important, elegant yet powerful stallion who takes after his ancestor Travel in conformation.
Anson’s Suffolk stallion Ashmoor (1901, imp. 1907) stood less than 15 hands with an estimated weight of 1,200 pounds. Of all the Directors of the American Suffolk Horse Society, Anson imported the fewest horses—first because he did not intend to market large numbers of them to Midwestern farmers, and more importantly because he sought small individuals—smaller than would be of interest to those breeding for the farm market. I believe that Anson’s intention from the first was to use them for crossbreeding. (From The American Suffolk Horse Stud Book, Volume 1)
Denhardt reports that Brown Jug (by Jim Ned, out of an “Anson mare”) stood under 15 hands yet weighed 1,125 pounds. If Brown Jug was born in 1906 as Denhardt speculates, he precedes the arrival of Ashmoor and thus would not have draft ancestry. However, he could have been foaled several years later, and I think this likely because of the horse’s massiveness and the large yet well-shaped head, plus the typical draft-type pelvic shape. Brown Jug is ridden here by the redoubtable Mexican revolutionary general Francisco “Pancho” Villa. Anson sold Brown Jug as a 3-year-old to the Corralitos Ranch in northern Mexico, from which he was stolen during the Mexican Revolution in about 1915, before Villa’s attack on New Mexico. The stallion became Villa’s favorite personal mount.