Te Story Behind The
Perfect Horse
Te behind-the-scenes story of the World War II rescue of the “dancing white horses” is a fascinating one.
By Pat Payne E 32 September/October 2017
lizabeth Letts is the author of the New York
Times best- seller The Perfect
Horse, published in 2016 and recently out in softcover. It is the story of the fate of some of Europe’s finest horses, includ- ing Thoroughbreds, Arabians and, most famously, the Lippi-
zans of Austria. Gathered together by the Nazis in an attempt to breed the perfect warhorse, they were rescued by the American military as the war ended, and eventually sent on to an uncertain fate in the United States. Elizabeth recently spoke to Warmbloods Today, discuss-
ing her experience of writing this book and what she learned from the process in a wide-ranging interview.
WT: How did the idea for this book develop? EL: I was the little girl who was fascinated by all things Lipiz- zaner. I read Marguerite Henry’s famous book about them cover to cover. But I didn’t know about what happened to them during the war. And it’s an amazing story. I was researching my previous book, The Eighty-Dollar
Champion, at the National Sporting Library & Museum in Middleburg, Virginia. I found a pamphlet about the first presentation of these horses, who had been captured and brought back from Europe, to the American public. The pamphlet was just a flimsy thing. But it included handwrit- ten notes on each of the horses. Of the famous Arabian Witez, it said something like ‘the world’s most extraordinary champion.’ I had never heard of these horses and their rescue, so it
piqued my interest. As I began to research this, I was fasci- nated. I watched old videos of the Lipizzans at work and thought, ‘we just don’t do horses like that anymore.’ Training like that is a lost art.
TOP: Austrian Colonel Alois Podhajsky, director of the Spanish Riding School, performed for General George Patton and appealed to Patton for the safe return of the Lippizan stallions at the end of the war. The two men had a special connection since both were Olympians and devout horsemen.
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Random House
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