Tests have proved that Australia’s greatest racehorse, Phar Lap, was poisoned by arsenic in the United States in 1932, scientists said Thursday.
The giant New Zealand-born chestnut became an icon in Australia during the Great Depression, winning 37 of his 51 races, including one Melbourne Cup in 1930 and two Cox Plates in 1930 and 1931.
But Phar Lap took ill and died after being taken to the US in 1932, and conspiracy theories have swirled ever since, with Museum Victoria’s website saying that many suspected the horse’s death was the work of gangsters.
Researchers Ivan Kempson from the University of South Australia and Dermot Henry from Museum Victoria said hi-tech tests conducted on hairs from Phar Lap’s mane conclusively proved the horse was poisoned.
The pair tested the hairs for arsenic at the Advanced Photon Source Synchrotron in Chicago, although their task was complicated by the fact that the poison was also used in the taxidermy process on Phar Lap.
They were able to distinguish between the arsenic used in taxidermy and another amount of the poison that the horse had swallowed.
“This proves that Phar Lap had ingested a large dose of arsenic in the last 30 to 40 hours of his life,” they said in a statement.
However, their discovery does not prove that Phar Lap was nobbled by gangsters upset over his success in the US.
Museum Victoria earlier this year bought notebooks belonging to Phar Lap’s trainer, Harry Telford, that showed he regularly gave his horses homemade tonics, including arsenic and strychnine, to stimulate them.
The latest theory surrounding Phar Lap’s demise was that the strapper that accompanied the gelding to the US, Tommy Woodcock, used too much arsenic while making up a batch of tonic and accidentally killed his charge. — AFP