Honor ceremony readied

ARLINGTON, Va. – The haunting image of a riderless horse trailing a flag-draped coffin symbolizes a fallen warrior. On Wednesday, the military ceremony will commemorate a commander in chief.

The Army’s Old Guard Caisson Platoon will dispatch a riderless, or caparisoned, horse – in this case, a former racehorse named Sgt. York – to walk behind a horse-drawn caisson carrying President Reagan’s casket to the Capitol, where the former president will lie in state.

The Caisson Platoon is part of the 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment at Fort Myer in Arlington, Va. Not since Lyndon Johnson’s death in 1973 has it been deployed on behalf of a president.

The platoon performs more than 1,000 ceremonies each year. A riderless horse is afforded only to Army and Marine Corps officers with a rank of colonel or higher, with presidents being an exception.

Sgt. York is a retired New Jersey standard-bred that was accepted into the military in 1997. In its racing days, the solid-black pacer was known as Allaboard Jules and raced at Freehold Raceway, Yonkers Raceway and other tracks. The horse ran 23 races, winning five and earning $14,881 in purse money before retiring in 1996.

Sgt. York’s journey to Fort Myer began when Marie Dobrinsky, a New Jersey Racing Commission official, concluded the animal had the proper look and temperament for the Caisson Platoon.

Dobrinsky “spotted this horse because he’s quite handsome,” said Ellen Harvey, a spokeswoman for the United States Trotting Association. “He’s solid black, has a good demeanor, was unflappable.”

The caissons used by the 3rd U.S. Infantry were once used to carry cannons and were equipped with ammunition chests, spare wheels and tools.

Sgt. Matthew Stanfield, 21, of Marshall, Texas, one of three riders assigned to Reagan’s caisson, has ridden in more than 500 funerals in his three years with the platoon.

Some platoon members were well-acquainted with horses before joining the platoon. Others, like Spc. Stephen Cava, 20, of Medford, N.J., were not.

“I think I had been on a horse once as a kid in the Boy Scouts,” Cava said.

He volunteered to join the 45-soldier platoon and underwent a 10-week training course to learn horsemanship and other skills. Cava said he wanted to serve in the platoon “because I knew it was a prestigious unit.”

Most of the horses assigned to the platoon are either a Percheron-Morgan cross or a Percheron-quarter horse, large horses known for an even temperament.

The six-horse teams are matched for color, either all white or all black. Black horses will pull the caisson Wednesday; Cava said that’s because the very best horses in the platoon happen to be black.

One of most stirring images following the death of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 was the riderless horse Black Jack – who also participated in the funerals of Presidents Johnson and Herbert Hoover and Gen. Douglas MacArthur – fitfully trailing Kennedy’s casket, seemingly joining in the nation’s mourning.

Ideally, Sgt. York will walk smoothly and steadily, but Cava said even the superbly trained horses of the Old Guard sometimes act out of character.

“Any horse over a long enough period of time will act up,” Cava said.