War Horse Chapter 12 Summary

How It All Goes Down

  • Their new job is to haul a giant gun around with four other horses: Heinie, who must be the butt of all jokes; Coco, who puts the you know what in horse's you know what with his baditude; and two golden Haflingers who don't have names.
  • The horses have to work in horrible conditions, trudging through deep mud that rubs raw the skin on their lower legs.
  • Both Heinie and Coco are killed, Heinie by illness and Coco by flying shrapnel.
  • Even strong Topthorn gets ill, and comes down with a brutal cough. We hope this cough doesn't mean the same thing as every other cough in literature and movies: certain death!