26 December 2015

Finally, a Reckless Breyer!




At long last, a Breyer statue of a Korean-American hero!
A decorated veteran of the Korean conflict, this little mare hauled ammunition for her comrades during the 1950s, well after the US Cavalry had been disbanded. Reckless performed her duty not just bitless but often without human supervision once she knew her route. Ignoring heavy shelling, she hauled ammo up and brought wounded back down steep, rocky Korean terrain.
Robin Hutton started the Official Sgt Reckless Fan Club on FB, wrote a detailed book about the mare's life, and successfully campaigned for the superb memorial statue of Reckless. Hutton's books contains a good many details the original book by Andrew Geer lacks, but Geer's quite worthy account is free online: https://archive.org/stream/recklessprideoft011755mbp/recklessprideoft011755mbp_djvu.txt
While she may have had some Mongolian blood somewhere, I still contend this little mare was most likely carrying Japanese TB blood. In the early 1950s, WWII was way too close for most Americans to want a hero to remind them of Japan.