SPORT ANCIENT AND 



MODERN 



STAG-HUNTING 



IN the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the 

 wild stag was hunted on the hills of 

 the Forest of Dean. 1 In 1688 the deer 

 were limited to 800. In 1787 Mr. 

 Charles Edwin, chief forester, told the 

 Commissioners that he had as his perquisite 

 the right shoulder of every deer killed in the 

 forest, and also ten bucks and ten does. He 

 also claimed liberty to hunt, fowl, and fish as 

 he chose. His duty was to attend the king 

 with six men, when he hunted in the forest.* 

 In 1840 there were 1,000 deer which appear 

 on occasion to have been hunted with stag- 

 hounds, as we find record of a run from 

 Trippen-Kennet, Herefordshire, to the Nag's 

 Head enclosure in the forest. In the course of 

 this run the stag swam the Wye three times.* 

 In 1848, after a run of three hours, hounds 

 killed in the forest a stag which weighed twenty- 

 two stone. In 1850 government had all the 

 deer killed to remove temptation from the path 

 of the miners, and the forest ceased to be a 

 forest save in name. 



Turning now to the chase of the carted deer, 

 we find that the Cheltenham Staghounds were 

 established in 1837 by the Hon. C. F. Berkeley 

 to provide sport when the foxhounds were 

 meeting in the Berkeley country. The Cottes- 

 wolds form an ideal country for stag-hunting ; 

 there is little water, and as the stag can see a 

 long way he is thus encouraged to make long 

 points. At the election in July, 1847, Sir 

 Willoughby Jones, a Conservative, beat Colonel 

 Berkeley, the Liberal candidate, who held the 

 seat for Cheltenham, by 105 votes; and Lord 

 Fitzhardinge stopped his usual present of red 

 deer for the Staghounds and removed the hounds 

 to Berkeley. Mr. Theobald then offered to get 

 together a pack of Staghounds, and the Chelten- 

 ham sportsmen accepting him as master, the 

 opening meet of the new pack took place on 



1 Gibbs, A Cottwold VlUagi. 



' H. G. Nicholls, Foreit of Dean. 



1 The Tenkeiburj Reg. 



15 October, 1847,3! the Plough Hotel, High 

 Street. The stag was uncarted at Shurdington, 

 and ran up by the Seven Springs, where it was 

 taken after a short but hard run of about five miles. 



Sir W. Jones, however, only sat for Chelten- 

 ham for a few months, and the feeling to which 

 his election had given rise subsided. Lord Fitz- 

 hardinge began to hunt the district again, and in 

 March, 1848, an immense crowd met his fox- 

 hounds on the Dowdeswell road, four miles from 

 Cheltenham, where an address from the sports- 

 men of Cheltenham was presented to him in 

 recognition of the fortieth anniversary of his 

 annual visit to the town. There were 3,000 

 people on foot and 400 on horseback. 



Mr. Theobald's whip was ' Old Sam,' a 

 cripple, who only weighed seven stone. His 

 position on horseback was not a graceful one, 

 and he could not reach the saddle without help. 

 Mr. Theobald was succeeded by Captain West, 

 who resigned in 1857. Mr. W. White then 

 took them, but the town and county could not 

 support both the fox and staghound packs, and 

 Mr. White gave up the latter after one season. 

 In 1874 Mr. Richardson Gardiner of Cowlcy 

 Manor, M.P. for Windsor, started a pack of stag- 

 hounds at his own expense. He showed much 

 sport for a few years, but gave up in 1878. Mr. 

 W. B. Bingham of Cowley Manor had a pack 

 of Staghounds in 1885-6. These Staghounds 

 have had some famous runs. In 1878 Mr. 

 Gardiner's met at Woodmancote, above Rend- 

 combe, and ran by Combe End, through William- 

 strip and Barnsley Park to the Leach, nearly 

 thirteen miles beyond Bibury a grand gallop 

 over a grand country, 25 miles as the crow flies. 

 A horse for which Mr. Croome gave 150 was 

 so much exhausted by this run that he was of little 

 use afterwards. Another stag from Edgeworth 

 stood up for three hours and a half, and left the 

 hounds hopelessly beaten, having passed Glou- 

 cester, and crossed the Severn near Minsterworth 

 Mr. Croome only got to Matson, and he was 

 the last of the field to give up. This was a 

 fifteen-mile point, and the stag must have gone 



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