1975
MIKE HUSKISSON got through a degree course in zoology at University College, London, only having dissected one frog during that time.
While at college he set up the Cambridge group of the Hunt Saboteurs Association – the heavy brigade among animal welfare organisations and somewhat frowned upon by them for its tactics.
In his spare time Mike, a peaceful man who switched courses to plants and the environment to avoid what he considered to be unnecessary dissections, engages in elaborate war games to outwit huntsmen and deprive them of their quarry.
While other animal-loving groups write letters to MPs, the Saboteurs direct heavier artillery – orange flares, air bombs which sound like shotguns, spray for putting hounds off the scent – at targets all over the country, wherever hares are coursed and foxes, stags and otters hunted.
“We do anything we can to tip the scales a bit more in the animal’s favour.” Mike said. “If by the end of the day the huntsmen have failed to kill anything – then it’s our victory.”
Their task then is to beat a hasty retreat to avoid trampling hooves and flailing riding crops of riders whose weekend sport has been interrupted.
“If we manage that, we reckon they’ve lost on all counts – they haven’t got the animal and they haven’t got us,” he said.
Mike objects to the image of the hunt as pink coats and Boxing Day meets.
“What the hunt really is is a bloody mess at the bottom of an earth. We know because we run with the hounds and we’re there at the kill,” he said.
Mike is 22 and lives at 3 Blacksmiths Close, Abbotsley. He has lived in Abbotsley for seven years and has become used to the sight of hunting in the fields around the village.
“The people who do it have a totally different mentality. They’re something quite special really. I find it hard to describe them as human beings.
“It’s a cowardly sport. These huntsmen aren’t facing any danger. It’s one fox facing 60 hounds.”
He denies he is sentimental however. He agrees he would probably kill a rat in the larder or a fox in a chicken run.
And he has not surrounded himself with pets – a rabbit and a goldfish is all he can claim.
But he is determined to win this particular battle.
“It’s not like struggling for world revolution or anything where they go on without any immediate result. We aim to come between the hounds and their quarry, and each time we stop them killing anything we’ve won a victory. Our aims are very specific.”
The Cambridge group consists of only 10 people, but their tactics are minutely worked out to cause havoc at a hunt.
To throw everyone into confusion they can Holloa and blow the hunting horn as convincingly as anyone who rides with the Cambridgeshire Fox Hounds.
And backing him up as Mike gets up at dawn to wait around in damp woods till the action starts is a stern philosophy.
“Man isn’t really here to exploit animals. He owes something back to the evolution that gave him prominence.”
Last week Mr. Huskisson won what he regards as another victory when at Knutsford Crown Court the prosecution offered no evidence against him and another man accused of the theft of ICI “smoking” beagles.
They had agreed to be bound over for two years in the sum of £50.
Mr. Huskisson said after the hearing: “We are convinced there are no stains on our characters. It is terrific. We have won. My actions are vindicated.”
He had denied stealing three dogs worth £180 from the ICI laboratory at Alderley Park, Cheshire, in June.
He also denied having wire cutters, knives a screwdriver and other equipment in connection with burglary.
John Bryant (33), former manager of an animal defence centre in Dorset, had denied receiving two of the dogs.
ST. NEOTS ADVERTISER
DECEMBER 24TH 1975
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1983
TELL-TALE HAIRS THAT PROVE FOX WAS BAGGED
LAST WEEK when we published this picture – apparently showing a fox being freed from a sack to be hunted and killed – and photographs of it being dug out of its earth, there was some doubt, no matter how slight about the incident.
The under-cover man who took the photographs said it showed the moment of release.
The hunt said the fox was never ‘bagged’ but was simply dug out and hunted – and pictured as it ran past their terrierman, who was innocently waving a bag of tools at it.
TODAY doubt is dispelled.
Dumped
Scientific examination of the sack dumped after the meeting of the Dulverton West Fox Hounds almost exactly 11 months ago, has shown it contained a fox.
Hairs from the animal’s head and body were discovered inside it.
Last week we headlined our disclosures ‘Pictures that Demand Answers’ and quoted the Joint Master of the Dulverton West, three day eventer Bertie Hill, as saying : ‘If anyone bagged a fox, we would take him to court.’
A man did – his own kennel huntsman Terry Beeney, assisted by his own terrier man Stan Richards (the man in the picture).
Bagging foxes, long suspected but never before proved, is strictly forbidden.
If foxes are bagged to be hunted, the argument that hunting is done solely to kill the animals goes by the board.
Because a bagged fox – like the one in our picture – could be despatched quickly and painlessly while captive.
There would be no need to hunt it for miles across country to end its life.
The sack we sent to a Public Analysts’ Laboratory for scientific analysis was recovered after the kill outside Gunn, near Barnstaple, by Michael Huskisson of the League Against Cruel Sports.
It had been left on the ground by Mr Richards.
It lay, unremembered, in a plastic carrier bag in the boot of Huskisson’s car until the Sunday Independent suggested it should be analysed. Huskisson had never thought of having that done.
The analysis was done by scientists who had not read our report or seen our photographs.
After 11 months, some of the evidence we might have found in the sack had been dissipated.
There was no trace of the fox’s urine, though Huskisson had described how it was forced to urinate on its own tail to ensure a ‘good scent’ for the hounds to follow.
There were stains which MIGHT have been blood – the fox was bleeding from terrier bites when it was forced out of its earth with an iron bar - but they were not strong enough to provide hard scientific proof.
But inside the sack the laboratory found ‘short, light-coloured hairs’ from a fox ‘possibly from part of the mask or beneath the jaw’ and ‘longer hairs ranging from red to black in colour and probably body hairs.’
The laboratory chief’s report, couched in scientific terms, concluded: ‘I am drawn to the conclusion that the state of the sack is not inconsistent with it having held a fox for a matter of a few minutes.’
And that is precisely what Huskisson said it did.
The League Against Cruel Sports said last night that it would be pressing for an immediate – and independent – investigation into the affair.
And the call was echoed by other anti-bloodsports bodies.
SUNDAY INDEPENDENT (PLYMOUTH)
December 4, 1983 (Page 11)
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THERE was a heck of a bump as the fence I’d been sitting on over foxhunting collapsed in front of the television on Sunday night. Like other reasonable souls, I’d taken the comfortable position of seeing two sides to the question until then.
It certainly seemed a cruel sport, not something I’d ever do myself. But what if the farmers gassed the foxes instead? And weren’t some of those hunt saboteurs rather close to the loony animal liberation people?
And, after all, it was a tradition and it did look very fine on a crisp winter’s morn.
Then there was that clip on the news of the men from the Quorn digging a fox cub out of its hole and setting the hounds on it.
The sight of the frightened animal dragged from its hiding place was bad enough. The sight of so-called sportsmen digging it out with a spade was even worse.
Some Quorn chap came on to half-apologise for breaking the hunt rules by pursuing a cub and not giving it much of a start. But he might as well have saved his breath to cool his mulled stirrup cup.
It makes no difference whether the animal is a few months old or a couple of years old, whether it’s torn to pieces yards from its home or after running for miles for its life.
Surely fences like mine collapsed all over the country. Are there a few MPs out there, the odd Home Secretary maybe, who could put a stop to it? After all, bear-baiting was a tradition once, too.
DAILY EXPRESS
October 30 1991
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BLOODY
COWARDS
I CAN see the attraction of strolling round a gold course on a sunny day and smacking a few balls into a hole.
I can even understand why some blokes like to throw their bodies round a rugby pitch on a Saturday afternoon and then sink a few pints with the lads.
What I will never understand is the rich man’s sport of watching a fox being torn limb from limb by a pack of baying hounds.
Is it the blood that turns them on? Is it the fox’s screams as it is ripped to shreds that sets their pulses racing?
Or is it just the fact that these port-swilling pillocks get their kicks from a sport where they can’t lose?
If they were hunting bear or tracking lion, the challenge would be obvious. Bears and lions are big enough to bite back and, on that basis, it’s fair game.
Of course, that type of hunting takes courage, something many of these toffee-nosed nerds who go fox-hunting know nothing about.
Where’s the courage or the challenge when the only “sport” involved is in scaring a defenceless creature to the point of insanity then cheering as it meets its agonising end?
As for those chinless wonders of the Quorn Hunt, who broke the rules of fox-hunting this week, they should be strung up by their naughty bits with their own whips. It’s not enough that they have a licence to kill the fox.
They had to cheat to make the game even more bloody, by dragging the terrified creature from its hiding hole. But we shouldn’t be surprised at the antics of these hornblowing Hoorays.
You just had to look at Henry Betts (father of Alan who broke the Hunt rules by dragging a terrified fox out of its lair).
When Daily Star photographer Iain Lynn dared to ask why the hunt rules had been ignored, Mr Bett’s answer was to try to belt Iain with a stick.
Son Alan, who thinks nothing of brutalising animals, was too scared to put in an appearance.
The disgusting little coward was hiding at his girlfriend’s house.
How can Prince Charles expect us to listen to his rantings about the environment when he openly supports this type of barbarism?
I’d rather have our environment blighted with ugly buildings than blood. And apart from being cruel, the Hunt is pretty damned stupid.
Only in Britain could grown men wear silly hats, red jackets and swill punch while watching a defenceless animal being ripped to shreds.
If the members of the upper classes have this insatiable bloodlust, why don’t they let it out on each other?
DAILY STAR
OCTOBER 31 1991
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By RICHARD HOLLIDAY and JO REVILL
PRINCE CHARLES’S favourite hunt, the Quorn, lay in chaos last night after its chairman and all four joint masters resigned.
It has been purged of its entire top brass following last week’s Mail on Sunday exposure of its acts of barbaric cruelty against foxes.
We revealed how a video film, taken secretly by an anti-bloodsports campaigner, showed terriermen digging out a fox which had gone to ground.
A few seconds later, the pack of the Quorn hounds was waved on and tore the fox to pieces…breaking the sport’s own rules.
Reeling from embarrassment at the barrage of public outrage, the Quorn was plunged yesterday into the deepest crisis hunting has seen in recent years.
Out went hunt chairman, Tory peer Lord Crawshaw. And out went the four joint-masters, Barry Hercock, Joss Hanbury, Alistair MacDonald-Buchanan and Mrs Di Turner.
Buckingham Palace would not comment on whether Prince Charles would withdraw his membership. It was a ‘private matter’.
The sport’s governing body, the Masters of Foxhounds Association, whose first rule bans throwing dug-out foxes to the hounds, will hold its own inquiry this week to consider what action to take – and it could disband the 238-year-old hunt entirely.
Lord Crawshaw, whose family motto is ‘Consider The End’, said at his farm estate in Long Whatton, near Loughborough: ‘The whole affair has been distressing.
The buck stops at the top. But I can’t really feel responsible for proceedings on the day because I was elsewhere.’
Lord Crawshaw, chairman of the Quorn for 20 years, has been confined to a wheelchair since he broke his back in a fall from a horse when he was 19, but he follows the hunt in his car. He said: ‘Perhaps my going will concentrate minds to clean up acts.’
He agreed that the fox should be given a sporting chance. ‘The fox is vermin, but has a special place in Leicestershire. It is, after all, the county emblem.
Standards, I am afraid have fallen. People can do stupid things in the heat of the moment during the hunt. I don’t like to see cruelty to any animal – and neither do most hunt people. You have to balance that with containing the fox population.’
He will be succeeded as chairman by 56-year-old farmer David Samworth and vice-chairman will be Kenwyn Madocks-Wright.
Mr Madocks-Wright said last night he had been ‘sickened by events that led to the resignation of Lord Crawshaw.’
He added: ‘Lord Crawshaw is the most honourable man and it made me both extremely sad and angry that we were forced to accept his resignation.’
Captain Fred Barker, 53, heir to the Singer sewing machine fortune, has been asked to return to the Quorn as Master, a post he held for 13 years until 1988.
He was out shooting yesterday, but his family said he was still thinking about whether to take on the job. Mr Madocks-Wright said of him: ‘He is very tough on discipline. He will not tolerate any deviation from the rules.’
Jim Barrington, director of the League Against Cruel Sports – whose evidence led to yesterday’s resignations – said: ‘It is obvious that this has happened not because the Quorn broke the rules, but because we caught them doing it.’
An all-party group of MPs tabled a Commons motion last Thursday which welcomed The Mail on Sunday’s expose and called for ‘the pursuit and killing of animals for entertainment’ to be outlawed.
Both the pro and anti-hunting lobby turned out in force yesterday at the National Trust annual meeting where seven anti-hunt candidates failed to win places on the Trusts ruling council.
They had hoped to use their power to try to ban the sport from thousands of acres of Trust land.
Meanwhile, Leicestershire police are investigating whether terrierman Alan Betts, from Whitwick, Leicestershire – who was filmed in a separate incident shooting s fox which had gone to ground – was licensed to carry a firearm.
THE MAIL ON SUNDAY
NOVEMBER 3, 1991 (page 5)
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A VIDEO of the final moments of a squealing fox cub shot by a terrierman with Prince Charles’s favourite hunt was shown to a court yesterday.
The League Against Cruel
Sports alleged that Quorn Hunt kennelman and terrierman Alan Betts used the gun
illegally.
The unique private
prosecution was brought after pictures taken from the video were revealed in the
Daily Star last October.
And we urged Prince
Charles to pack in hunting.
Betts’s father Henry,
66, threatened Star photographer Iain Lynn when we quizzed him about his son’s
hunt exploits.
Yesterday magistrates at
Loughborough, Leics, fined Betts, 42, of
nearby Whitwick, £100 for having no firearm certificate.
Doherty, 31,
of Kirby Bellars, Melton Mowbray, was fined
£150 for failing to comply with the conditions of his gun certificate.
Broken
The court heard that
League “mole” Michael Huskisson infiltrated the hunt.
His 25-minute tape made
openly with a video camera at a Quorn meeting near Loughborough, showed men and
hounds digging for a fox which had gone to ground.
The lady master of the
hunt, with which Prince Charles regularly rides, sent for a gun to kill it
humanely.
Mr. Huskisson described
the fox being pulled out by its brush and hind legs and shot by Betts with the
gun which had been loaded by Doherty.
“Betts then threw it
to the hounds and they took it away and broke it up,” he said.
The Crown Prosecution
Service had earlier decided not to press charges against Betts and Doherty after
being handed a police report and a copy of the video.
Mr. Huskisson said he
won the confidence of Quorn members after following several hunts.
“I just tagged
along,” he said.
DAILY STAR
Thursday August 27th,
1992
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A KENNEL man for the Quorn Hunt has won his appeal against a prosecution brought by anti-blood sports campaigners because of a legal technicality.
Christopher Doherty (31) was fined £150 last year for failing to keep a pistol and ammunition secure, in a case brought by the League Against Cruel Sports.
The prosecution followed the release of a secretly-made video of a fox being chased and shot during a hunt near East Midlands International Airport.
But the appeal hearing at Leicester Crown Court yesterday ruled Mr Doherty, from Kirby Bellars, near Melton Mowbray, had been summonsed two months too late.
His conviction was consequently overturned.
DERBY EVENING TELEGRAPH
MARCH 6TH 1993
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Chris Doherty passed away on 6 December, after a short illness. He started hunt service as kennelman with the Quorn, where he stayed for six seasons. He came to the Hunsley Beacon Beagles as huntsman in 1995 and was a loyal hunt servant.
He loved his hounds and always had them looking fit and well and last summer had an excellent showing season, with two reserve championships and two championships. Chris will be sadly missed both on and off the field, as he was always cheerful and optimistic.
Our sympathies go to his wife Sharon and their four boys.
HORSE AND HOUND
JANUARY 14TH 1999