Jimmy High working in his forge in Sheringham
with his paid assistant Obadiah Sadler
In his youth, Jimmy had been apprenticed to a blacksmith in a neighbouring village, and in his adulthood he set up a business in Sheringham - his wife's hometown - and became very prosperous and popular in his trade.
Wrought iron gates were his speciality and there are several examples of his work to be seen Sheringham today.
photo © Gillian Read 2002
During the first World War, the army employed mules as well as horses, and Jimmy High was often required to shoe them. In his unpublished autobiography, he devotes a special chapter to this subject - not so much in merit of the subject (he explains) - but as a mark of respect for his own efforts to overcome the waywardness of the mules.
Here is the whole chapter as he wrote it in 1940 :Many and varied were the experiences I had in shoeing these animals. I first established a practice of shoeing the quiet ones first and sending the bad ones back to their quarters, but this was not the way to solve the problem as they had to be done sometime, though it did work for a while. When the order came that every mule was to be shod I was cornered, and had to think of ways and means. Some of the mules were positively dangerous and seemed quite wild. I learned afterwards that they were, and had never been properly handled.
A neighbour of mine who was a son of a blacksmith often came to watch me at this work. Both he and his father were watching me one day when I was having a tussle with one of the mules and, to this day, the son declares that he firmly believes I put my arms round the mule's neck and threw him to the floor. What really happened was this, as he came at me I hit him between the eyes and down he went. On another occasion I was given a message to go to the military quarters to shoe a mule which I knew to be a very wicked tempered brute, so I asked my neighbour if he would assist me in the job, and he agreed to come with me. I told him of my intention of throwing the mule, tying it down, and shoeing it in that position and I asked him if he knew how to tie a knot that would not slip, as I didn't know how to. "Yes" he said, "I've thrown horses in my time".
I had already told him of my intention of throwing the mule, tying it down and shoeing it in that position.We borrowed a strong rope which looked long and thick enough to anchor the largest ship; we were not going to err on the side of frugality, and off we went to the task marching along as proud as conquerors.
Two or three soldiers were detailed to assist us, but when the mule saw this rope he gave one snort indicating his intention of not having that rope round him, and so commenced the party. After a long and weary effort we finally succeeded in getting the loop over his neck, but then we had another struggle to work the rope noose down to over his legs. He kicked and jumped so much at this, that I for one did not feel any more like a conqueror, and even my neighbour began to look worried.
At last we caught him. Down he went and he stayed down, for I knew enough to know that if someone sat on his head he could not get up. After a time we managed to make his legs fast and I proceeded with the first shoe and succeeded in getting it fixed, but when I looked for the other leg preparatory to shoeing that foot, I found it was not in the position for the job; we hadn't got him over far enough. I tried to get at the hoof but try as I would it could not be done, so we agreed the mule must be got up. I remembered all the trouble he had been to get in that position and dwelt on the trouble we should have in getting him down to a new position, but there was no other way of getting the job done, so he was untied.
When we had started on the mule its colour had been black, but by the time he was allowed to get up he was white, due to the lather of perspiration his struggles and kicking had produced. As he stood still when we got him to his feet, I decided he looked quiet and drew up to him. When I lifted the required hoof he did not move and I was able to shoe him in that position and finished the job without any further trouble. He never once moved. I learned later that he did not come out of the stable for eight weeks after the shoeing and I don't wonder at that, considering the handling he had had, to say nothing of the huge rope and the sight of two queer looking creatures as my neighbour and myself. When we were at the task our appearances would have frightened a dozen lions. We often had a laugh over this afterwards.
My troubles in shoeing mules led me in time to adopt a system which I finally established as the only practical way of shoeing them. My method was to fix four posts firmly in the ground, have slings made to take the weight of the animal, and then lift it off the ground by the slings before tying each of its legs to a post.
I have been told that an animal off the ground in this manner cannot kick, but I can vouch for the fact that a mule can and does. I have seen a mule kick and kick so hard as to throw off a shoe I had partly nailed on, and this mule was off the ground.
I even improved on my idea and eventually finished up with an affair that at first sight looked like a cage. The idea being to get the mule into the cage and just tie up the leg I was working on. This proved easier and quicker than my other method, indeed some of the mules, after they had been in the cage a time or two, caught on to the idea and gave me no trouble, and there was then no need to put them in the cage and tie them whilst I shod them.
My fame as a mule-shoe smith spread far amongst the troops, and mules were sent to me from miles away where other smiths had refused to do the work. I was very fortunate in that while I was at this dangerous task I was never seriously hurt. My most serious injury in this effort was a kick on the nose, and on another occasion one trod on my foot and I was lame for a week but, as I have said, nothing serious considering the nature of the work amongst such brutes.
I received four shillings for each set of shoes fixed, and I can tell you that my experience made me feel that double the price would have been more suitable.
© Gillian Read
Keeper of her grandfather's autobiography.
No reproduction without her permission.
Stephen Cooke, a contemporary of Jimmy High, and wife Gladys (nee High, Jimmy's cousin) with one of the mules that many people bought from the army at the end of the first World War.
photo © Val Fiddian 2002
The British Army purchased a large number of mules from the USA. The mule has amazing stamina and endured the terrible conditions in the front-line better than the horse. At the end of the 1914-18 war the army owned 213,300 mules.
(I got this from:http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWhorses.htm )
