This is an open letter about a big lovable bay horse named Rebel. He was bought for me when I was diagnosed with cancer. I was doing chemo and radiation at the time, Rebel was the best therapy I could have received.

He knew I wasn’t well and couldn’t ride him, and my husband would bring him out of the field to me. Rebel would lay his big old head in my lap and we shared our moments together. He loved to be curried, he loved his apple treats, he just loved being loved. He was, as I called him, my gentle giant; you could do almost anything with him as long as you treated him with love and kindness.

To watch him run through the fields with his mane and tail flying in the wind was a beautiful sight, and he knew it too. The day I left for Pittsburgh to have my surgery done I went to Rebel to say good-bye. I loved him and would see him as soon as I could.

The surgery was very hard on me and it took several months for me to recuperate. On one of my many visits to the cancer doctor, I was told that in all likelihood I’d never be able to ride a horse again. That to me was very upsetting; I couldn’t stand the thought of someone else riding him and for me not to be able. That was a hard pill to swallow.

I regretfully sold him to a lady that promised he would be in good hands and I could come and see him whenever I wanted, but a short time after that she turned him over to a known horse killer. That person had starved horses to death when she lived in the state of Ohio.

The Humane Society stepped in and took the remaining horses she had and adopted them out to good homes; the woman was put on two years probation.

The woman moved to New Martinsville and started collecting horses again. I found out today that my big lovable gentle giant is lying over a hill, dead.

The only thing I can say is that he won’t suffer anymore under her hands, but I wish I could have gotten the help he needed to get him out of that situation. Nobody seemed to want to listen or cared. So run like the wind in heaven my Gentle Giant and suffer no more.

Eva Springer

Paden City