In the absence of that primary source evidence, a series of legends have grown up around the story of Figure, and what fascinates me particularly is trying to parse them out from history.
For example: There are several different and conflicting stories about Figure's breeding, with some later sources (mostly gathered by Linsley or Battell) that claim him to be a Dutch horse or a Canadian horse. Some have interpreted that to mean, variously, Friesian, Cheval Candien, or some other heavier breeds that might help to explain the physical traits that were clearly passed on down the line.
The story that interests me the most, however, is the one that has Figure sired by a Thoroughbred stallion named True Briton.
True Briton, the story goes, was the prized cavalry horse of Captain James Delancey, Loyalist officer during the American Revolution and member of the New York Delanceys, a family of immense power and wealth in colonial America. True Briton is supposed to have been stolen out from under Delancey's nose and spirited off to Connecticut, where he was re-named Beautiful Bay. (Delancey later got his comeuppance when he was forced to flee to Canada after the Revolution.)
Justin Morgan, who made part of his living as a stallioneer (ie, he leased and stood stallions to collect breeding fees) is supposed to have stood Beautiful Bay at stud for a few years, and during that time bred him to a mare he owned of indeterminate breeding. By the time the foal Figure was born, the mare was out of Morgan's possession. Morgan came to own Figure again some years later.
The more I think about this origin story, the more it fascinates me. So much of the story of Figure and the first Morgan horses is tied up in the twinned ideas of the American frontier and American exceptionalism. Figure was by this re-telling a true all-American, born out of the Revolution, fathered by a British stallion of impeccable breeding, who belonged to a wealthy landowner, and foaled by a scrappy mare of unknown breeding. He was an amalgam, a true American blend of pedigree and grit. He would go on to sire a line of horses who become closely identified with American history, from their service as cavalry mounts in the Civil War to their role in opening the American West.
This story of Figure as all-American gets particular play in fictional accounts of his life, in particular Marguerite Henry's Justin Morgan Had a Horse, which ends as follows:
"Well, the schoolmaster and Farmer Beane both be dead now," Joel said, restoring the piece of evergreen to the horse's headstall, "and likely nobody will ever know who was this fellow's sire and who was his dam. He was just a little work horse that cleared the fields and did what was asked of him."
Joel's face suddenly lit up as if he had thought of something for the first time. He spoke now to the horse, as though he were the one that mattered. "Why, come to think of it, you're just like us, Bub. You're American! That's what you are. American!"It's a neat narrative trope for Henry, who after all made her living transforming equine history into young adult books, many of which had similar themes about the horses who made made America. But it appears in other sources - Eleanor Waring Burnham's Justin Morgan, Founder of His Race: The Romantic History of a Horse, and explicitly or implicitly this storyline is repeated in nearly every other article or history of Figure.
Figure, American original, has become such a hard-wired narrative that any history of his life will have to navigate it and to deconstruct it. It becomes crucially important, then, to look at the various stories of his origins and see when they came on to the scene, and by whom they were repeated. As my research continues, I'll do just that.
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