Bryan Pheasey 1925-2006


Huntsman & Kennel Huntsman Bicester & Warden Hill 1964-1989


This is an extract from the Tribute by his son David at the Service of
Thanksgiving

"Bryan Henry Pheasey was born in Etwell,  Derbyshire.   He had two sisters,
Vi and Audrey.   Their father was a Stud Groom and their mother the
saddler's daughter.


When he was about 10 or so, his father bought some Hackneys from the
Manchester Evening Post who were 'motorising'.  They bred from one mare and
early one morning Dad and his father found that she'd foaled herself
overnight down near the river .They decided to call the filly foal 'Wye
Valley Magic' and it went on to win the championship at almost every show in
the North of England.  He grew up with ponies and horses, bringing them on
and hunting them until they were ready to sell.

 

We all had a family break in Derbyshire last December, revisiting places
where my Mother and Father grew up.  There is a very steep hill out of
Asbourne towards Buxton, Dad was pleased to see the water trough is still
there from his boyhood.  It was where his father always had to stop the Reo
Speedwagon horsebox and fill the radiator, otherwise it would boil long
before it made the top of the hill.

 

During the early war years he was very busy.  He was in the Home Guard for a
while and Dad had to hold the ponies while the men were setting off
explosions.  He did get into a bit of trouble with them though because they
found out he'd also been taking one of the ponies out with the Meynell. 

 

When he was 17½ , he volunteered for the RAF and  trained to be a Wireless
Operator - Air Gunner (a WOP AG).  But luckily he was posted to Bombay,
becoming an NCO, running a transport section delivering RAF equipment.  He
and his friends liked to swim in the water tower after dark to cool down,
they also made their lorries backfire - frightening mule trains which then
bolted, and they sometimes used the staff car to go to the pictures - always
'winding the clock back' to cover their tracks.  This worked until some
audit figures indicated old Humber was doing only 5 miles to the gallon.
But then, they were only 20.

The winter 1946/47 was extremely cold and Buxton had deep snow. Dad sent Mum
a photograph of him sweltering in Bombay.

 

After he was demobbed he returned to Buxton and in 1947 married Nora Fearn.
After a grand reception they set off in Dad's Wolsley Hornet for their
honeymoon in Windsor, stopping halfway at the White Lion in Banbury. 
 

Dad was employed as an apprentice electrician and although it was
interesting, didn't match up to the world he had grown up in. So after a
very short while he joined the High Peak Harriers and whipped in to George
Steel for 5 seasons under the Mastership of the Misses Wilson.  Julie and I
were born there in Bakewell. They were happy times. 
 

George Steel was a good man and Huntsman and he taught Dad all the basics of
hunt service, and after 6 seasons with the High Peak he moved to be first
whipper-in to Jack Simister at Lord Fitzwilliams hounds in Milton Park near
Peterborough.  This must have been the hunt servant's 'advanced course'.
The big Old English foxhounds combined with the management style of Jack
Simister made for a hard but very correct and sound apprenticeship.  He said
he learned to do things before anyone else had even thought of them.   


In 1957 he got a great opportunity, one he'd been waiting for, and moved to
the Grafton to whip in to Joe Miller, where the Senior Master was Colonel
Foster.  They were extremely happy years where many great friends were made,
a number of you are here this afternoon.  My sister Carol was born in
Paulerspury.


He had great respect for Joe - both man and huntsman.  Joe never swore or
raised his voice, or appeared to lose his temper.


Around that time a new horse ran away with Dad.  After jumping a hedge to
escape the gaze of the field and doing a few circles, hounds divided and he
and John Shepherd went after them - but found them hard to live with, let
alone stop.  I think this was from Ascote Thorns just North of Towcester on
the A5 and they stopped them little short of Moreton Pinkney,  6 miles as
the crow flies.  When they rejoined Joe, Dad's second horse had been sent
home and by the end of the day his runaway had resolved never to do it
again.  I think he said this horse was bought at the end of the season by
Ann Hawkins (then Ann Halt) who successfully evented it and sent Dad a
picture of it jumping a haycart at an event in Scotland.  He said the horse
was bought there and then and carried the Field Master of the Eglington for
13 seasons.


One hound they failed to retrieve from the Morton Pinkney run was Harvester
who was later reported to be on road at Cannons Ashby.  Dad arrived there in
the Morris van at about 10.30 that night to meet him coming straight down
the middle of the road.  He wondered how he was going to catch this rather
independent dog-hound, and, if he was going to get a nip for his trouble. As
it happened, Dad opened the passenger side door and he got straight in and
sat up like any other important passenger, all the way home.  Dad said, he
knew Harvester was looking at him, but every time he looked back at him the
old dog looked away.


In 1962, after 5 extremely happy years with the Grafton, he went as Kennel
Huntsman to the Avon Vale. Capt Neil Parker was to hunt hounds and Major
Bartholomew was Senior Master.  The kennels are in Spye Park, at that time
the home of Lord and Lady Spicer.  This is a special place with no through
traffic, heavily wooded, with two lakes and a view which stretches down the
valley to the river, and at the other end of the park, down Sunrise Hill to
Lacock.  Dad loved the pretty Avon Vale country, he loved the people and
they loved him.  He and my mother had so much fun during their two seasons
there and formed friendships which have lasted ever since.  Sport was also
very successful indeed, they were a clever pack of hounds, and Neil Parker
was a top horseman and huntsman.   He and Dad made an excellent team and got
on very well.


In 1964 came an opportunity to hunt the bitch pack at the Bicester and
Warden Hill.  This was really what he wanted to do, but he found it very
hard to leave the Avon Vale, particularly because of the many great friends
there.  But to the Bicester it was with Sir Richard Cooper, Miles Gosling,
and Dick Smith-Bingham as Senior Master (all sadly no longer here).  It
would become a remarkable 25 years of hard work, happiness and success.  He
made even more good friends to add to those already gathered particularly
from the Grafton and Avon Vale.  He earned this success and tremendous
popularity by - certainly hard work, in the hunting field and everywhere
else too, certainly through a talent for his job, his love of hounds and
interest in their breeding, and by being thoroughly dependable and
knowledgeable, but above all for his friendly and positive attitude.  Nobody
could open a gate for him without getting a compulsory smiling 'thank you'
and a friendly comment by name.  He knew all the Bicester people and always
used their names.  Even on days when things weren't working out so well he
was the same.  He was just an irrepressibly good humoured man.  To say he
enjoyed working with a succession of talented Masters, Huntsmen and Staff
over the 25 years at the Bicester is an understatement in the extreme.


This (supposedly) came to an end with his retirement in 1989.  The great and
sadly missed John Howard Jones organised a 'This is Your Life' evening for
him in John O'Neill's barn.  He even got the actor and supporter of hunting
Robert Hardy to compere it.  It was a great night. 


On his retirement, Ian McKie asked him if he would like to choose his
favourite horse to continue hunting (now in an amateur capacity).  He chose
the one horse (The Snob) which neither the hunt nor Mr McKie owned.  But Mr
Sumner kindly lent him Snobby on a permanent basis.   He thought a great
deal of Mr and Mrs McKie who were very good to him and let him keep Snobby
at the Mill.  He also liked to help maintain the horse swimming pool and
gallops, in fact, he never did retire at all.  To my mother's frustration,
he still got up before it was light (but she knew he would never change) and
also enjoyed helping at the Preston's and drove cars all over the place for
Martin Cook. 


He continued to enjoy hunting right through to 2005, when Patrick Martin
suggested he should hunt the hounds to mark his 80th birthday.   This
resulted in a great day hosted by Robert Hawes - meeting at Monks House.  At
around 2.30 hounds ran quickly from near Shelswell House across the road and
on towards Chetwode.  Afterwards as we hacked home across the park we
followed Dad and Patrick riding side by side with the hounds around them, it
looked like the end of an era rather than the end of the day.  However, it
was not yet the end of the day, perhaps also an omen for hunting.  Nearing
the bottom of Willesdon they somewhat accidentally let hounds run on,
resulting in them finding and accounting for a fox in the small covert Mr
Richard Cooper has now named Bryan's covert.   There were several other
great events in celebration of his 80th year, but towards the end of 2005 it
became clear he was seriously ill.  He was incredibly the same cheerful and
positive man through to the end on the 24th May.  Counting his blessings - a
wonderful wife and partner for nearly 60 years, they were devoted to each
other, a strong and close family which was always of the utmost importance
to him, richness beyond measure in his many great friends, and a life which
he chose, and would choose again, almost by the minute, without hesitation.