10/11/2025
🕊️ Remembrance Sunday 🕊️
Today, across the world, people pause to remember those who fought in the First World War. We wear poppies, stand in silence, and read out the names of the fallen. But there’s another part of that history that still stands quietly in the shadows, the horses, donkeys, and mules who also served, suffered, and died.
When the war began in 1914, the world still depended on horses. They worked the land, delivered food, pulled carriages, and carried people to school, church, and work. They were family, partners, and livelihoods. But when war came, armies across Europe and beyond called for horses, millions of them.
From Ireland and Britain, from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, and America, horses were gathered up, bought, and shipped to the front. Many were farm horses. Some were hunters or carriage horses. A few were even children’s ponies. For many families, watching them leave was like saying goodbye to a member of the family.
The numbers are staggering. Over eight million horses, mules, and donkeys served during the First World War. Around a million came from Britain and Ireland alone. Some never even reached the front, dying on ships that were overcrowded, overheated, or attacked. Those that did make it were met with a life of constant hardship.
They pulled heavy guns and wagons through deep mud that could swallow a horse whole. They carried supplies, ammunition, and the wounded. They lived among shellfire, gas, hunger, and exhaustion. At one point, the British army was losing a thousand horses every day. Imagine that, a thousand animals dying daily in mud and chaos.
Still, they kept working. Horses don’t understand war. They only understand trust, voice, and touch. And when their riders asked them to go forward, they went. Even when terrified, even when hurt, they obeyed. That trust that quiet willingness is what makes their story so heartbreaking.
There were people who tried to care for them. Veterinary hospitals were set up near the front lines. Soldiers wrote home about tending to their horses before themselves. Some shared their food with them. Many described their horses as friends, not tools. In letters home, one man wrote,
“My horse is the only friend I have left out here.”
But war is merciless. Wounds, disease, cold, and starvation took their toll. The horses that survived often carried scars that never healed.
When the fighting finally ended in 1918, the soldiers came home but the horses mostly did not. Ships were in short supply and returning them was expensive. Governments decided it was cheaper to sell them abroad. Some went to farmers. Many went to slaughter. The men who had fought beside them begged to bring them home, but few were allowed. In total, only a few thousand horses made it back to Britain and Ireland. The rest were left behind in the same foreign lands they had fought upon.
Those that did return were thin, quiet, and changed. They went back to the plough or the cart as if nothing had happened, but their eyes had seen too much. The bond between human and horse had been tested to its limit.
Today, a century later, their courage is finally being remembered. Memorials stand in London, Australia, France, and across the world statues of horses mid-stride, heads bowed, bearing empty saddles. They remind us that war was never theirs to fight, but they carried the burden anyway.
For every horse lost in those years, there’s a lesson that still matters. The way we treat the animals who serve us in sport, in work, or in daily life reflects who we are. These war horses gave everything and asked for nothing. Their strength built peace; their silence carried nations.
So, wherever you are in the world today Ireland, America, Australia, India, South Africa, or beyond take a moment to remember them. The horses who pulled, carried, and trusted. The ones who didn’t come home.
They had no choice, no voice, no medals.
But they had hearts that never gave up.
🌹 Lest we forget for them, too.
Photo Credit: Julia Clarke ( long time follower and dear friend)
