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SPORTING SHOOTER - DECEMBER

It was many years ago; when I first started hunting hounds. We met on my Birthday, which is a week before Christmas. It was a day of heavy, yellow - tinged clouds. We had a busy local morning, and then at about 2pm Albert hollered away a ‘gert huge fox’ from a patch of whins. It was obvious that scent had changed and hounds settled down to run and I mean RUN. The early part of the hunt was on good sound heather and white grass, but it was soon obvious that hounds were heading ‘out over’ for the deeps of the Moor. The Moor is a huge sponge. The higher you climb; the wetter the ground. On the top is ‘The Stuggy’. There are pony tracks across this ground, but you need good weather and sound local knowledge. As we climbed, the going got worse. One by one the field peeled away and all the time the fierce cry of hounds came back to me on the wind – along with the first scattered flakes of snow. The snow thickened, blowing right in my face. I was alone and knew that I was on the edge of Black Tor Mire – not a good place. I should turn back. The cry of hounds was getting fainter, the ground worse. Then I heard a shout:

“Come fore yere, Sir! Come you along of me.” Through the murk I could just make out a small bent figure – a man lean as whipcord, in a faded red coat and riding a ratty little grey horse. I had never seen him before. Anyway, I tucked in behind him, following his dim shape through the blizzard, as it had become. We followed a faint track with the bright green mosses quaking on either side. Then, suddenly we were on firmer ground. We had crossed the Stuggy. It was downhill now and the snow suddenly lifted so that I could see the fox twisting and turning in the big rusher (sic) bed below, with hounds hard at him – Who-whoop! I leaped off my tired horse and rattled my horn. As I was stuffing the brush in my pocket, I turned to thank my guide – nothing – just my horse on the empty hillside, although someone had tucked the reins under a stirrup leather. I knew exactly where I was now – through the moor gate and down the stony lane was Warmecombe and my friends - the Tucker family. Horse and hounds revelled in deep strawed boxes and I was steaming in front of the old black range, telling Old Jan the tale:

“You never come over the Stuggy in this weather? Bless my soul” So I told him of my guide and how he had disappeared back into the blizzard. The kitchen went very quiet. Then Old Jan got to his feet and lifted a faded photograph from the wall. It showed a little whipcord man on a rat tailed grey amongst his hounds:

“That’s him!” I cried –“who is he?”

“That’s Limpety - the Gypsy Huntsman. He died out to Moor in a blizzard 70 year ago this very night.”

Was the story true? That’s for me to know and you to find out. Happy Christmas.

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