History of Sheep at Clermont
In
1802 the Chancellor Robert R. Livingston (1746 – 1813) imported
two pair of merin
o sheep from the “Royal Flock” at Rambouillet,
France to the United States. This was no easy feat since, decades earlier,
these sheep had been given as a gift from the King of Spain to the King
of France and they were closely monitored, carefully bred, and rarely
sold or given away. The Chancellor was Minister to France and while
abroad developed the opinion that the United States should become a
manufacturing country less reliant on Europe for fine manufactured goods.
He believed that with the introduction of merino sheep his homeland
could “make fine cloths at half the price at which they are furnished
by England.”
His brother, John R. Livingston urged him that same year to bring merinos to America: “Your park [at Clermont] is so admirably calculated to keep them [merino sheep] that I think you ought not to neglect it, particularly as it is consequence to your Country.” The Chancellor also recognized that his own interest would be benefited in addition to the benefits to his country. For some time he had concerns that his vast land holdings were being overworked through so many years of tenant farm use for crops. The Chancellor envisioned a tremendous demand for this new, little known source of fine wool that he possessed.
Later
that year, Colonel David Humphreys, recalled by Jefferson as Minister
to Spain, imported 75 merino ewes and 21 rams to Derby, CT. These were
to be sold at higher prices than the common “American” sheep.
Unfortunately, because merinos’ virtues were not readily apparent,
the sheep from Humphrey’s flock did not sell well and went virtually
unnoticed by those in the business. While the wool was closely curled
and finer and softer than most wool, to the untrained eye, the merino’s
coat appeared short and dirty yellow until washed.
To remedy the merino’s initial unpopularity, the Chancellor began buying up every full blood, ½ and ¾ breed merino that he could find at prices which amazed the sellers. His next step was to purchase more full bloods from Europe. He was only able to obtain a few, however, before the United States declared a trade embargo in 1807 that prohibited all foreign ships from entering American harbors. The embargo lasted until 1809. Just prior to the embargo, the Chancellor had suggested to the Secretary of the Treasury that the United States place an additional 6% duty on British “cottons, woolens, silk, paper, linens, glass and all such other articles as we may manufacture for ourselves or buy in other markets.” This, of course, would create a greater demand for American-made fine woolen fabric, which inevitably would be derived from the Chancellor’s Hudson Valley merino flocks. As it happened, the trade embargo of 1807 worked very well for the Chancellor and he patriotically supported it in letters to Jefferson.
Early in 1809, James
Madison wrote to congratulate the Chancellor on his “patriotic
zeal” as a sheep breeder. James Mease of the Cattle Society of
Philadelphia wrote that his group decided they had never “seen
such beautiful samples as the specimens of wool from the Clermont full-blooded
merinos. The staple was double the length of Colonel Humphrey’s
ram and had a silkiness and wavy appearance the other was entirely deficient
in.” In that same year, Chancellor Robert R. Livingston wrote
that all his lambs had been spoken for an some were already sold for
the next spring. His 15/16 lambs were selling for $125 and the 7/8 merinos
were going for $50 each.
The next year, Elkanah Watson described an annual event hosted by the Chancellor:
In 1810 I attended his famous sheep-shearing, which attracted much attention, and acquired subsequently great newspaper notoriety…the large company was entertained with the most elegant and sumptuous hospitality. At a public sale on this occasion, sheep were bought with great avidity, at prices varying from fifty to one thousand dollars…there was an animated competition, and there were some earnest disputes for securing the purchase of select animals…Dr. Mitchell produced a brilliant description of the festival, and always classical and erudite, gave as a toast, “the modern Argonautic expedition, whereby our Jason [the Chancellor] has enriched his country with the invaluable treasure of the golden fleece.
In his book, Essay on Sheep, an instructional volume of 1809 that helped popularize the merino breed to the agriculturalists of the new world, the Chancellor Robert R. Livingston suggests that the ancestor of the modern sheep [Mouflon of Tartary] was likely the cause of civilization. Because it’s young was easier to capture than the young of other animals, the sheep was the first to be domesticated according to the Chancellor’s hypothesizing. “A slight ray of reason must have shown the savage how much less precarious his subsistence would be, if he could draw it from an animal that fed at the door of his hut than if he was compelled to seek it in the chase. He would extend his flock; he would cease to trespass upon the hunting grounds of others; but he would appropriate a portion for the support of his flocks;…the right of property would be known and a nation be formed where before only wandering hordes had exisited.”
