Packhorse

Today, westernized nations primarily use packhorses for recreational pursuits, but they are still an important part of everyday transportation of goods throughout much of the developing world and have some military uses in rugged regions.

Packhorses were heavily used to transport goods and minerals in England from medieval times until the construction of the first turnpike roads and canals in the 18th century.

Many routes crossed the Pennines between Lancashire and Yorkshire, enabling salt,[1] limestone,[2] coal, fleeces and cloth to be transported.

As the Vikings moved eastwards from the Irish Sea in about 950 AD, it is likely that the pack horse routes were established from that time.

[8] As the need for cross-Pennine transport increased, the main routes were improved, often by laying stone setts parallel to the horse track, at a distance of a cartwheel.

[11] During the 19th century, horses that transported officers' baggage during military campaigns were referred to as "bathorses", from the French bat, meaning packsaddle.

This meant cities and towns were connected by roads which carts and wagons could navigate only with difficulty, for virtually every eastern hill or mountain with a shallow gradient was flanked by valleys with stream cut gullies and ravines in their bottoms, as well as Cut bank formations, including escarpments.

Afterwards in 1818−1827 its new management built first the Lehigh Canal, then the Mauch Chunk & Summit Hill Railroad, North America's second oldest which used mule trains to return the five ton coal cars the four hour climb the nine miles back to the upper terminus.

The same company, as did its many competitors made extensive use of sure footed pack mules and donkeys in coal mines, including in some cases measures to stable the animals below ground.

As the nation expanded west, packhorses, singly or in a pack train of several animals, were used by early surveyors and explorers, most notably by fur trappers, "mountain men", and gold prospectors who covered great distances by themselves or in small groups.

During a few decades of the 19th Century, enormous pack trains carried goods on the Old Spanish Trail from Santa Fe, New Mexico, west to California.

[16] In the third world packhorses, and donkeys to an even greater extent, still haul goods to market, carry supplies for workers and do many of the other jobs that have been performed for millennia.

A pack horse is required to be tolerant of close proximity to other animals in the packstring, both to the front and to the rear.