One of Scotland's most famous police horses has died in retirement after clocking up the longest track record of any equestrian public servant.
A veteran of the miners' strike, Hampden riots, poll tax demonstrations and Old Firm scuffles, Fergus's reputation spread to thousands of people in the west of Scotland, where he worked as a prized member of Strathclyde Police's Mounted Division for 20 years.
He was known to school children, football fans, drunks and political dissidents alike. Officers who rode him praised the bay gelding yesterday as one of the most reliable police horses to have worked in the UK, where he won a clutch of medals at equestrian events.
Fergus was put down yesterday morning by lethal injection after suffering from arthritis.
In my opinion, Fergus was the finest police horse ever Walter Hogg
At 35, he was by far the oldest living police horse in Britain - 105 years old in human terms. The life expectancy for a horse his size does not usually extend beyond the late-20s.
Walter Hogg, who spent 10 years in charge of the Strathclyde mounted branch, and rode and trained scores of horses, said yesterday: "In my opinion Fergus was the finest police horse ever."
In his latter years, Fergus was looked after by Melanie Reid, assistant editor of The Herald, after being placed with her by the International League for the Protection of Horses (ILPH), which houses ex-police horses.
Adam Fleming, the retired police constable who chose Fergus for service 31 years ago and now works as an ILPH officer, said yesterday he felt a keen sense of loss at his passing.
"I've known that horse for about 30 years. He was a natural. You just had to get on him to know the horse had presence," he said.
"When I first tested him, we brought the usual array of bells, coloured flags and rattles. Those things scare the living daylights out of most horses but Fergus looked so calmly at them, as if to say: Is that all you've got?'"
That steadfastness was to serve him well when, as an inexperienced new recruit in 1980, Fergus faced down hundreds of Old Firm football fans who had invaded the pitch at Hampden Park and were fighting and hurling missles at each other and police.
His speed and steady nerves became legendary and for most of his career he was the first choice of horse for top-ranking police officers within the Mounted Division.
He worked throughout the miners' strike and was regularly employed at Ravenscraig, the scene for running pitch battles between crowds of miners and mounted police, where he worked seven-day, 12-hour shifts. He was also deployed during the Troops Out Of Ireland marches in the early-1980s and later the poll tax riots.
Fergus was also well-known by thousands of school children who went on trips to see him perform at training grounds. He became an honorary mascot for thousands more football fans who would give him chocolate on their way to see Celtic and Rangers play in order to give their team luck, Mr Fleming recalled.
The one quirk remembered by officers who rode on him or near him was that Fergus did not like being wet and would become irritated if it looked like it was going to rain. As a result, the horse became a living barometer for the mounted division.
Fergus was put down on veterinary advice after arthritis in his joints made it impossible for him to stand after lying down.
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