Thugs, Wreckers, and Bullies: the Truth about Hunt Violence

Lies, Damn Lies and Green Wellies

In the past three years, the hunting community has realised it has a serious image problem and has put substantial effort and millions of pounds into trying to make themselves more acceptable. Much of this effort has consisted of a smear campaign coordinated by the British Field Sports Society (BFSS) to cover up the brutality and violence of hunt supporters by "exposing" saboteurs as class war militants bent on violence and destruction. There is precious little evidence to support this theory, but the hardy folk of the hunting community will not let such trivia deter them and simply make up their "proof". Their campaign of smears has met with some success - solely on the basis of the sort of ill-founded propaganda exposed below, the Home Secretary has introduced new legislation to jail saboteurs for caring about animals.

In fact, hunts are wildly reckless in their treatment of their own animals and saboteurs often have to intervene to save the animals from injury. At the Portman Hunt in November 1993, a panic-stricken horse found itself neck-deep in near- freezing water after its rider tried to force it to jump a river which was plainly too big. A female saboteur who was trained in caring for animals tried to help the horse, by now collapsing, as members of the hunt stood around watching. The rider immediately ignored his horse's plight and turned on the girl, knocking her to the ground and then leaping on her, punching her in the face repeatedly. When the horse was eventually rescued with the saboteur's help, the rider apologised and admitted he should not have attempted the jump or attacked the girl who had only wanted to help an animal in distress.

Hunters regularly trespass on roads and railway lines in their pursuit of hunted creatures and then try to blame saboteurs for their own stupidity. For example, in July 1992 the Avon Vale Foxhunt lost control of their hounds on a busy road and a hound was killed. No saboteurs were present, yet the hunt accused a local saboteur of calling the hound into the road. He was over 15 miles away at the time. In contrast, the Spooners & West Dartmoor Foxhunt were honest enough to admit their failings when their hounds ran riot across the A386 near Yelverton in March 1992. Only prompt intervention by saboteurs saved both hounds and members of the public from injury. Hunt Master Charles Doughty said "The saboteurs could not have been nicer... [They] blew their horns beautifully to get the hounds out of danger and back to us."

This story first appeared in the Daily Telegraph which was forced to print a full retraction and apology when it had to admit the story was not true. The paper claimed in its defence that it printed the story in good faith, a phrase that cannot be applied to the hunt which made it up in the first place.

This story, which appeared in The Field, is just one of many published over the years claiming that saboteurs are a paid rent-a-mob. Despite frequent challenges to produce evidence to back up their claims, the hunting community have been unable to do so, because they are simply not true. In private, even they are prepared to admit that saboteurs are motivated by genuine concern for animals rather than financial gain. As Stephen Loveridge, BFSS press officer, admitted in a letter in January 1994:

"We know full well that there is no evidence that saboteurs are paid, and I am sure that they are not"

We regard the issue of class as entirely irrelevant to the central moral issue of cruelty. Saboteurs come from all backgrounds, age groups, professions and political points of view. On the other side of the coin, the worst perpetrators of cruelty and violence at hunts are terriermen who are solidly working class. So-called class struggle is deliberately used to cloud the issue and provide a handy diversion for hunters unable to defend themselves on moral grounds to spread alarm about "sinister political extremists". Perhaps they mean people like the now-famous "Granny Group" of saboteurs in Surrey? Every one of this brave group of senior citizens is over 60 and there's not a mohican among them. Unfortunately this does not seem to exempt them from violent attacks by hunt thugs. Or perhaps the hunt lobby mean such notorious class warriors as Rev. Bert Jones, a 65-year old church minister, who has been a hunt saboteur for three years.

Similarly, the word terrorist is frequently flung about in an attempt to smear genuine animal lovers, often coupled with lurid tales of bomb attacks. In June 1990, hunt supporter John Newberry-Street gained much valuable anti-saboteur publicity when a nail-bomb was found under his Land Rover. Further investigation revealed that he had planted the bomb himself and he later told police "I did it to discredit the animal rights saboteurs". He was jailed for nine months for his bomb hoax and asked for several other similar offences to be taken into account.

Ms Harris in fact has no criminal record at all, but this smear seems to be an attempt to detract attention from a series of sexual attacks by local hunt thugs. These include one particularly serious attack, when a six-strong gang of hunt supporters attempted to drag her into woodland, boasting loudly that they were going to gang-rape her.

A Catologue of Violence

There is a very real problem of violence at hunts - it overwhelmingly consists of assaults by hunt thugs against saboteurs. In the first 3 months of 1993 alone, some 75 saboteurs were victims of violent attacks by hunts, 13 of them requiring hospital attention as a result. In recent years saboteurs have been kicked, whipped, beaten with staves, spades and other weapons, ridden down by horses and vehicles, throttled, threatened with knives and shotguns, knocked unconscious and sexually assaulted in a range of attacks all across the country. There has also been an alarming rise in the use of vehicles as weapons despite the deaths of two saboteurs in recent years under the wheels of hunt vehicles.

No-one is Safe

Mr John Weavers, a member of the rural community hunts claim to represent, was quietly sitting at home one Saturday afternoon in 1990 when the Cury Foxhunt rampaged through his property. When he asked them to leave and complained at the damage caused he was headbutted by Geoffrey Thomas, master of the hunt, who then shunted one of Mr Weavers' cars into another.

An Appalling Example

August 1991 Old Surrey & Burstow Foxhunt Mark Bycroft, hunt whipper-in, and Nigel Trevithick-Wood, husband of a Hunt Master, beat and whipped one saboteur while hunt supporter Kenneth Banks kicked a second in the groin. At their trial the Recorder told Trevithick-Wood "You are a man who in the past has all too readily resorted to violence...As a senior member of the hunt you are setting an appalling example." This did not prevent the hunt from later appointing Bycroft huntsman.

Beaten With a Hammer

January 1994 Old Surrey & Burstow Hunt. Three saboteurs driving home after the hunt spotted a hunt official thrashing his horse to get it in a horsebox. They stopped to take photographs and the huntsman attacked them with a hammer, terrifying his horse which was only prevented from bolting when the female saboteur held and calmed the petrified animal. Her compassion was rewarded when the huntsman turned on her too, inflicting similar serious head wounds to those of her friends.

Scythe Attack

January 1993 Bramham Moor Foxhunt supporter Raymond Walker attacked saboteurs with a scythe, leaving two with head wounds and smashing van windows. In February 1994, he was convicted of affray and causing criminal damage along with two other hunt supporters, Mr & Mrs Winstanley, who pleaded guilty to affray for their part in the psychotic attack. All walked free from court with community service orders.

Five Days in Hospital

March 1994 Four Burrow Foxhunt. A mass attack on saboteurs started with the hunt whipper-in riding his horse several times over saboteur John Prescott, causing him massive internal injuries including 3 fractured ribs and serious internal bleeding. Saboteurs defended themselves and injuries were sustained on both sides. Only saboteurs were arrested even though many of them were injured in the unprovoked attack, including Mr Prescott who spent several hours in police cells vomiting blood before being allowed to go to hospital. He remained in hospital for five days, much of that time on a drip feed.

Researcher Attacked

January 1994 Duke of Buccleuch's Foxhunt. An independent academic, commissioned by the Scottish Office to carry out research on saboteurs and hunting, was knocked to the ground and kicked in the face by the huntsman as he tried to film a fox being killed. The hunt refused to apologise and later attempted to excuse their employee's actions by saying they thought the man was a saboteur.

Iron Bars

January 1993 Cheshire Foxhunt. More than twenty hunt supporters, some armed with iron bars, attacked a group of less than a dozen saboteurs. All the saboteurs were injured in some way, and two required hospital treatment: one had a broken jaw; the other had suffered two black eyes, a broken nose, and multiple bruising in the sustained and frenzied attack.

"Like a Lynch Mob..."

March 1993 Hursley Hambledon Foxhunt. A hunt supporter drove into a group of saboteurs standing at the side of the road; one saboteur was knocked down, bouncing off the vehicle's bonnet. The hunt thug then drove off at high speed leaving his victim's friends to take him to hospital. This was just the first of series of violent attacks throughout the day.

The most serious attack came after the hunt had finished, as saboteurs were heading for home. A group of 30 hunt supporters, many drafted in from neighbouring hunts, surrounded a van containing 9 saboteurs in what appears to have been a well- planned ambush. Armed with staves and fence-posts, they set about wrecking the van, smashing every window and panel, causing over £2,500 damage and severely beating the occupants. Having smashed the windscreen, they attempted to drag the occupants of the front seat through the shattered glass, smashed open the front and rear doors of the van, and then set about beating, punching and kicking everyone inside. One saboteur received hospital treatment for two cracked ribs and head injuries after being beaten repeatedly with a fence-post along with his girlfriend who also required hospital treatment for severe head injuries. Another saboteur suffered a broken nose and multiple facial injuries after being punched repeatedly in the head. All the other occupants of the van were badly beaten and many were cut by flying glass. One of the victims of the attack said later he had never been so scared in his life, "They were like a lynch mob, howling for blood."

"From now on, we're going to start hunting the saboteurs..."

This is BFSS spokesman Nick Herbert's chilling announcement of the introduction of "stewards" to "deal with" saboteurs. The full sinister potential of his words was soon realised, as all over the country violent attacks on saboteurs reached epidemic proportions. It quickly became apparent that stewards, ostensibly introduced to tackle trespass, were actually being used as a quasi-legal cover for a new wave of violence designed to create unprecedented levels of tension at hunts. As violent attacks on saboteurs reached the point that at least one saboteur was being taken to hospital by ambulance every week, hunters launched renewed calls for legislation against peaceful protesters, citing their own violence in support.

"£5 for a broken leg, £10 for hospital"

In February 1992, the Mail on Sunday reported "at last week's hunt terriermen were told if they broke a saboteur's leg they would get a bonus of £5. It would be £10 for putting a saboteur in hospital." This is by far from being the only reported case of hunts offering their heavies money to attack saboteurs over the years. Now they could do so quite openly and claim the money was being paid for "stewarding".

Targeting Women

Many stewards have directed their attacks against female saboteurs, either simply beating them up or using the threat of sexual attacks.

December 1992 A woman was airlifted to hospital after being beaten unconscious by stewards at the Cheshire Foxhunt armed with cudgels.
February 1994 At the Hursley Hambledon Foxhunt, a woman was trapped and held down; her breasts were molested and she was threatened with having a lighted cigarette stubbed out in her face.
August 1992 Four stewards at a grouse shoot in Yorkshire surrounded a woman and subjected her to a lengthy sexual assault. Under the pretext of searching her, they pinned her to the ground and groped her body, thrusting their hands inside her clothing. The main instigator of this attack was subsequently employed by several other hunts where he continued to single out female saboteurs for sexual attacks.

Urban Thugs

Some hunts, presumably feeling their own homegrown heavies weren't "hard" enough to inflict the level of damage they wanted to see, began employing some of the seediest elements of the inner-city underworld to really "sort out the antis".

February 1994 At the Oakley Foxhunt in Bedfordshire, saboteurs were threatened with a flick-knife by a nightclub bouncer acting as a steward.

January 1993 At the Garth & South Berks Foxhunt, a woman was beaten unconscious and left lying in a pool of blood by a Reading bouncer drafted in to intimidate saboteurs. She was the most seriously injured of the 20 saboteurs attacked by stewards during the day.

Violent Criminals

We can get an indication of how hunts view the role of stewards from the type of person they employ. The general rule seems to be the more dangerous they are the better. In February 1993 Richard Cheshire, employed as a steward at the Bicester with Whaddon Chase Hunt despite (or because of?) his criminal record for violent attacks and his reputation as a notoriously violent thug, deliberately pushed a saboteur in front of a moving quad bike. The vehicle was driven by hunt terrierman, Michael Smith, who swerved into his victim to maximise the impact. Both were later jailed for two months for their "reckless disregard for life" but were welcomed by the hunt when released. Smith still lives at the hunt kennels; Cheshire is still welcome at the hunt where he continues to threaten and attack saboteurs.

This was just one of the dozens of attacks on saboteurs at the Bicester with Whaddon Chase Hunt that season, at one stage running at the rate of two attacks a week. It is the favourite hunt of several leading lights in the hunting world including Labour peer Anne Mallalieu and Penny Mortimer, wife of "socialist" playwright John Mortimer. On the other side of the political spectrum, Michael Heseltine plays host to the hunt at least twice a season and his wife is a stalwart supporter.

Paramilitary Thugs

One of the favourite "professional" security firms of the hunting world is Countrywatch who are easily recognised by their Nazi-style brownshirt uniforms with military trimmings and propensity for violence and weapons

January 1993 Saboteurs at the Old Surrey & Burstow Hunt were attacked by 20 paramilitary Countrywatch employees. Several were severely beaten and one was punched in the face while he was being held by a police officer.
February 1993 At the start of a Surrey Union Hunt meet, Dorking police confiscated a minor arsenal of weapons from a Countrywatch vehicle. The haul included iron bars, billiard cues, and high-powered catapults.
February 1993 At the Puckeridge & Thurlow Hunt, a Stevenage saboteur was beaten unconscious by employees of a different "security" firm.

Military Thugs

It appears that the Ministry of Defence is not just happy to subsidise its officers foxhunting at the taxpayers' expense, but also to subsidise those who are opposed to hunting being beaten up. Serving soldiers have been employed at a variety of hunts including:

Chiddingfold Leconfield & Cowdray Hunt Irish Guards are employed as stewards in increasingly violent clashes with saboteurs. A local saboteur commented, "It is very worrying that combat-trained troops are being used against peaceful protesters."
Northumberland Beagling Festival Soldiers join the "SAS-trained" stewards of private security firms.
Yorkshire 1993 Soldiers from the Catterick base are used against saboteurs at hunts all over the region.

"The presence of stewards might just escalate the problem..."

Chief Inspector Jon Wilce, Surrey Police, Police Review

Rotten to the Core

The hunting community often tries to dismiss violence against saboteurs as isolated incidents resulting from provocation and in fact the BFSS has published confidential guidelines urging hunt masters to adopt just such a defence if questioned by the media. The HSA has long felt that many hunts have allowed a culture of violence to develop in which engineering confrontational situations, intimidation and outright violence, both threatened and actual, are acceptable approaches to dealing with saboteurs. The deployment of stewards, in particular, has been a cynical step that has provided useful cover for such activity. It cannot be mere coincidence that since the introduction of stewarding, under the guiding hand of the BFSS, more saboteurs have been hospitalised and more hunt supporters jailed than at any time in the HSA's 32-year history.

Now, one brave woman, a former hunt supporter of many years' standing, has decided to stand up and speak out against this culture of violence. Her name is Lynn Sawyer and she was at one time as committed to hunting as she is now repelled by it. She acted as a mole for the BFSS and found that saboteurs were not violent extremists motivated by class hatred, a tale she and every other hunt supporter had been force-fed for years. Instead, she found that saboteurs were on the whole deeply committed, sincere individuals who acted out of great and genuine concern for animals and that her own side were deliberately distorting the truth and provoking violence simply to suit their long-term political aims. Ironically, it was only the depth of her involvement in hunting that allowed her access to the inner echelons denied to most hunt supporters, where she encountered the brutality behind the respectable facade which was to make her question her support for bloodsports and ultimately turn her back on that world for ever.

The rest of this section is in Lynn's own words. We have left her tale as she wrote it as well as her open letter to the hunting world. Both pieces speak eloquently of the determination of the hunting hierarchy to continue on the path of violence and confrontation and the inability of the bloodsports community to set its own house in order.

Lynn's Story

My hunting career began with the Essex Foxhounds in 1982 when I was fourteen. By 1990, I had hunted with many different packs, including the East Essex, Essex Farmers' & Union, Puckeridge & Thurlow, Cottesmore, and West Kent Foxhounds; the Eastern Counties, Northamptonshire and Kent & Sussex Minkhounds; the Epping Coursing Club; and many West Country foxhound and staghound packs. Those eight years were spent running, or occasionally riding, to hounds; wielding a spade at digouts; helping out with hound exercise and doing odd jobs around hunt kennels; stewarding at point-to-points; collecting signatures on pro-hunt petitions and donations for the BFSS; and working on BFSS stalls and persuading the public at shows and by writing to the press.

From 1984-90, much of my time was spent gathering information for the field sports fraternity on anti-hunting activity. This meant doing anything to gather information including taking vehicle registrations (over 130 on file by 1990!), photographing sabs, delving through animal rights literature and music bought in specialist shops, attending animal rights meetings and gigs, chatting to the police and generally finding out what I could (none of which I am proud of now).

For several reasons in 1990, I could no longer continue these activities and I then spent four years trying to ascertain what exactly my feelings were. I spent time with the Shire hunts (the Quorn, Cottesmore, and Belvoir Foxhounds) and revisited the Essex before deciding earlier this year that it was time to speak out in the hope of stemming the tide of grossly exaggerated anti-sab propaganda and the violence it has brought to the field.

I went to great lengths to discuss the issue of hunt violence with the BFSS and other pro-hunting people [including John Hopkinson, Stephen Loveridge, Peter Smith and Nick Herbert of the BFSS and John Swift, director of the British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC)] before, and indeed for some time after, it became clear that I could not permeate their rather narrow-minded way of thinking or change or influence any of them without being patronised or being singled out as a trouble-maker.

An Open Letter to the Hunting World
This is an open letter to those who I feel have a right to be informed of my recent decision to abandon my position of neutrality on the hunting issue in favour of the animal rights movement. For those who are not already aware, I ceased to be a hunt supporter four years ago because I was very uncomfortable with the way in which I was expected to behave in that role and due to the reaction I received from some pro-hunt leaders when I disagreed with their tactics. Four years of sitting on the fence has given me time to reflect upon my past as a hunt follower, a BFSS voluntary worker, a farm worker, a meat-eater, etc. Endless hours have been spent studying animal rights literature, keeping up to date via the sporting press, attending hunt meets and listening whilst in the field to the views of a wide spectrum of people from both sides. This decision is probably the most difficult that I have ever had to make, it has not been taken lightly and I am simply being honest with the readers of this letter and with myself. My reasons are as follows:

1. Whilst maintaining my deep respect for the sanctity of human life and dignity, I have extended my concern to ALL sentient beings. I now believe that it is abhorrent to kill, unless in exceptional cases such as euthanasia, or to cause suffering to any living creature for our own benefit. This means that I am now a dietary vegan and I will be boycotting leather, silk, wool, etc. in the future. I can no longer ignore my remorse at the large amount of suffering that I have caused, nor can I ignore what is happening in the abattoirs, in the laboratories, in the oceans, down on the farm and out in the field.

2. Whilst I will admit that saboteurs are not all paragons of virtue, I can testify that during twelve years of observing sabs active in the field, including six years of information gathering for the BFSS, I was treated with courtesy on most occasions, witnessed others being treated in a similar fashion and non-violent, effective tactics. I am fully satisfied that most sabs are altruists and that there is more than adequate legislation to deal with anyone, from either side, who threatens or uses violence.

3. British history is full of cases when people have had no option but to use non-violent direct action unless they wanted their grievances to be totally ignored by a self-serving establishment. The suffragettes were not deterred by prison and their modern counterparts, the sabs, the road protesters, CND, or any other group or individual who refuse to be patronised by the state are not going to abandon deeply held beliefs when they face the same historical fate. The Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill seeks to criminalise all those seen by the government as weak enough, unconventional enough or easy enough to brand as a threat to society to use as scapegoats for their incompetence. This endangers the civil liberties of EVERYONE and it obliterates the right to protest effectively, the right of freedom of movement, the right of freedom of association and the right to live in a way that differs from what the government thinks is normal. I suggest that people read this draconian piece of literature and consider its implications very carefully. I cannot maintain a position of neutrality in the face of such a vicious attack on civil liberties.

4. The instigators of the use of stewards in the field could not have possibly thought up a more effective way of raising the levels of violence to unprecedented levels. It seems rather too convenient that when sabs used the inevitable, time honoured mass hit tactic when faced with large, less than diplomatic hordes of "the lads", who dragged them off public rights of way under the aegis of the BFSS, that Mr Howard then launched his attack on the less powerful, less influential group involved in the resulting battles. I hope that I am wrong in assuming that this was the desired outcome of those who put the lives of hunting folk, stewards, sabs and police officers at considerable risk by their confrontational tactics, because if I am right then the ramifications of this bill are even more sinister. Once again I cannot turn a blind eye to this sort of manipulation and bullying.

I apologise to those who will feel betrayed by this change of heart, especially those who have had the decency and integrity to listen. I will never support the use of violence against people and I guarantee that past confidences will remain confidential.