SPORT ANCIENT AND 



MODERN 



HUNTING 



FOXHOUNDS 

 The Oakley Hunt 



THIS hunt was established in the year 

 1 800.^ The first master was Mr, 

 Lee Anthony of Colworth, who 

 held office until 1809. He was 

 succeeded by the Marquess of Tavis- 

 tock, who held the mastership until 1816, and 

 hunted the country with his own pack. The 

 marquess's term of office was brought to a close 

 owing to some difiFerence of opinion which arose 

 between the hunt club and himself. He resigned 

 and sold the hounds. He was succeeded by Lord 

 Ludlow, who remained in office till 1822, 

 Nothing concerning the doings of the hunt can 

 be traced until the term of Lord Ludlow's 

 mastership ; the reminiscences of Lord Charles 

 James Fox Russell, published in 1881 under the 

 title Woburn Echoes, contain references to the 

 Oakley hounds. 



Lord Charles Russell, whose knowledge of 

 the Oakley hunt extended over a period of 

 seventy years, tells us that it was at Christmas, 

 1 82 1, being then a schoolboy of fourteen years 

 of age, he 



first met the Oakley at Holcot Spinneys, drew them 

 blank, found in Moulsoe Wood, ran by Bromham, 

 Astwood, Turvey, back to Moulsoe, on to Cold 

 Splash, by Cranfield open field, in the middle of 

 which, after three hours of heavy country, to the 

 utter amazement of the tyro, the horse stood still. 

 The second jocund day of the Christmas holidays was 

 assuredly one of note, as being that on which a good 

 man now flourishing won his spurs. Found in Cross 

 Aubyn's Wood, made the circuit of Olney open field, 

 crossed the Ouse, round the Gayhurst covers and 

 park, recrossed the river near Tyringham, and killed 

 in Chicheley Churchyard, where Billy Levi was 

 blooded before his friend had the chance. The third 

 day was from Marston Thrift to Wootton, back to 

 the Thrift away at the top on to Robinson's Spinneys, 



Baily's Hunting Directory. 



in one of which, yclept Longcraft, long since grubbed 

 and forgotten, the fox was killed and the writer 

 invested with the red ribbon of the chase The 

 fourth was from Moulsoe to Marston Thrift, over 

 Cranfield field, a long check outside the Thrift, got 

 on and up to him, and killed at Grub's Wood. A 

 second fox from the neighbourhood down to Turvey 

 Park, by Frere's Wood, Great Oaks, on to Stevington 

 Park opposite Oakley House, when the schoolboy was 

 whipped off and bade to seek refreshment for man 

 and beast. 



The Christmas of 1822 found the schoolboy 

 again with the hounds, and on the first of the 

 two days which he describes he found the brook 

 at Milton Keynes pastures 'staring him in the 

 face, and here I earned my first shilling, and 

 nineteen others, by jumping it,' Lord Charles 

 Russell was always one of the most eager and 

 most welcome men in the field, and his name 

 will ever be associated with the history of the 

 Oakley, His comments on the experience of 

 his two Christmas holidays are interesting as a 

 picture of the sport of those days : — 



As to distance I may say that the first Moulsoe run 

 could not have compassed less than twenty-three miles; 

 the fifth day, or third from Moulsoe, between seven- 

 teen and eighteen ; while the second day from the 

 same covert would describe somewhat more with its 

 two foxes. As to pace, I distinctly remember the 

 hounds running right away from the horsemen over 

 Cranfield field without a twig to stop them. 



The hunt took its name from its connexion 

 with the house of Russell and Oakley Park, 

 The Marquis of Tavistock, uncle of Lord Charles 

 Russell, resumed the mastership in 1822, having in 

 the meantime succeeded to the dukedom of Bed- 

 ford; his second mastership lasted until 1 829, when 

 he resigned. At this juncture the Hon. G. C, 

 Grantley Berkeley, at the instigation of Lord Clan- 

 william, placed himself in communication with 

 Lord Tavistock with the view of taking the vacant 

 office, Mr. Berkeley had hunted the stag in his 

 father's country, but for private reasons was 



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