User:Davidgblackburn/sandbox

The Pau Hunt was established in 1842 by the Société d’Encouragement as a spectacule authorized by the government of Louis Philippe to hunt predatory animals such as wolves and foxes. Internationally, the Pau Hunt, dominated by American and British Masters, was one of the most renown hunts until the breakout of World War II. Its country, between Gardères and the hills surrounding Pau was nicknamed “Leicestershire in France”.

Innovative hunt masters and committee members organized their first recorded drag hunt in 1847. They organized the capture of game and its later release at meets as early as the 1850s, cross country matches and point-to-point races in the 1890s.

In 1947 the association reorganized as the "Pau Hunt Drags". Continuing its tradition of drag hunting, meets are held in unplanted fields with the expressed permission of amiable property owners.<ref

A plethora of private photos, articles, publications, photos and works of art during its heyday are housed in private collections, including the collection of the English Club of Pau.

The Hunt at Tarbes (1832-1842)
Under the license of Royal Wolfcatcher, Mister Dupont invited winter British colonists to lodge at a hôtel at Tarbes, hunt in the mornings and then dine together. Dupont was attentive to his hounds and managed clean kennels. He preferred hunting wolves and hare, and avoided fox hunting, fearing the ruin of his hounds' noses. His nephew and huntsman at Tarbes, also named Dupont, continued serving as huntsman for the Pau Hunt until at least 1858.

In 1837 Sir Henry Chudleigh Oxenden began wintering at Tarbes, where he leased Aureilhan Castle in 1839, the year after his father's death. He imported hunters and hounds for fox hunting around Tarbes and Lannemezan with J. Cornewall and Samuel Benjamin Auchmuty. Oxenden returned to Broome Park in the summer of 1841 and then permanently in 1842. Lady Oxenden (née Charlotte Brown) died in March 1843. Oxenden sold his horses to M. Larienty and offered his fox hound pack to his friends at Pau.

The Hunt at Pau (1842–1848)
Oxenden gifted his pack to the newly formed hunt at Pau in December 1842 with at least 14 foxes hunted during the season 1842-1843. Cornewall hunted with MFHs Lt. O’Shirley, Roussel, Charles Whyte, Pery Standish and William Cecil Standish. In 1845, keeping just one hound "Fallacy" from Oxenden's pack, Pery Standish brought in a new pack of hounds to newly built kennels near the village of Soumoulou. Jasper Hall Livingston is accredited with saving the hunt by purchasing the Standish pack upon the brothers' departure. MFH Livingston, joined by his nephew Charles Carroll Livingston, held their first recorded Drag Hunt at Pau on Saturday, November 26, 1847 on the Route de Tarbes between Pau and Gardères making a distance of 21 km (13 miles) in one hour: a welcomed diversion from the actual meet.

Before the steam engine, train service and automobiles, innovative sports were designed to increase speed and skill levels of both horses and riders. At Pau, the government sanctioned Société d'Encouragement awarded cash prizes at the racetrack (hippodrome), inaugurated in 1843, as an incentive for private breeders to improve the health, speed and endurance qualities of the horse, that was the primary mode of transportation of humans and goods. In addition to their role in tourism, commerce and trade, horses were indispensable for national defense where they were used to hunt and rout the enemy.

Revolution (1848)
No hunt was held at Pau. Jasper Hall Livingston hunted boar at Roux Castle and lost most of the hounds. Livingston went to England to purchase another hound pack, accompanied by Huntsman Dupont.

Development of the Hunt at Pau (1849–1875)
Livingston returned to Pau in 1849 with hounds for the 1849-1850 season. He sold the pack to Richard Francis Lalor Power in 1854, who moved it to a kennel in Lescar. In 1857, Power purchased a house he named Billère Lodge with land strattling Billère and adjacent Pau, where he built kennels, stables and the Villa Bilhère. During the early period, Livingston and Power developed the Pau Hunt, along with additional hunt-like sports of drag hunting and the capture and release of foxes and larger game including fallow deer.

Drag hunting was originally a competition between hound breeders' packs and not followed on horseback, the most famous race was won by Bluecap in 1763. Like horse racing, the drag compared speed and endurance, the measurement of which is limited during a fox hunt to the speed and endurance of animal being hunted. When laying a defined, artificial trail, speed and endurance could be augmented considerably. At Pau, the innovation of riding to drag hunts, along with complicated obstacles for jumping, had the additional benefit of training horses and riders.

The capture and release of wild animals was used to plan and expedite a hunt, most frequently capturing, or "bagging" foxes, and later releasing them for the kill at the end of a drag hunt as an incentive/reward for the hounds. The bagged fox was also used in fox hunting at Pau, with advertisements appearing in the local press for foxes, which would be kept captive for release at the beginning of a meet to avoid the delay of hunting a fox in the wild. A similar concept was developed for fallow deer, bringing them to meets in cages, releasing them and then hunting them as if they had been naturally wild.

Sources state foxes became less numerous and traditional fox hunting was replaced with hunting bagged foxes. This sport alternated with Drag Hunting. For some traditionalists, these new sports were seen as corrupting wild game hunting on horseback.

An 1858 article by the Marquess of Foudras mocked these new sports at Pau. The response of Livingston and Power was to mock the Foudras article through a commissioned series of lithographs by Pierre-Eugène Marc in album format with the title translated as "A Hunting Album, The Pau Drag". First released in 1860, this parody of the Foudras article was depicted in 10 lithographs by Pierre-Eugene Marc. An additional three lithographs Marc and two by A. Duruy were available between December 1860 and 1863 mocking additional critics, plus one additional lithograph replacing the first of Marcs. Famous participants of the Pau Hunt during this period included William Hamilton, 11th Duke of Hamilton, Ward McAllister and Marshall Pierre Bosquet.

Sometime between 1861 and 1864, Power was replaced by Captain Philip Savage Alcock, who hunted with a pack of harriers. The Pau Hunt's popularity continued increasing with the arrival of train service to Pau in 1866, drawing more winter colonists along with increases in private property damage due to the Hunt. Local farmers demonstrated, while the popularity of the Pau Hunt mounted amongst British, Americans and French riders, the French henceforth comprising over one-third of the kennel committee.

Alcock was replaced by Jasper Hall Livingston in 1868, who managed his own kennels at Villa Livingston, now Villa Dampierre. Livingston was replaced in 1874 by William George Tiffany. The committee began writing by-laws and relocated the hounds to what were believed to be permanent kennels at the Petit Chantilly, now Villa Beverly in December 1874 with most of the expenses paid by Tiffany and Norman Story, who shared Villa Navarre. Landowners continued demonstrating.

On January 26, 1875, Tiffany and Story were hunting and ordered a peasant to open a gate. When the peasant refused, Story went to jumped over the gate, while the peasant swung it open making Story's horse fall on him. Story died the following evening. A general meeting was held the following day, approving the by-laws of the association and the prefect, with a plan to compensate landowners for damages. The by-laws were finalized for the La Société de la Chasse à Courre on April 5, 1875 at which time Tiffany resigned as MFH.

Difficult Years (1875–1880)
Major William Henry Cairnes became MFH and implemented the first and already planned Hunter's stakes, which took place March 3, 1875. During his teneur, a decision was made to bring in an English huntsman, retaining the French one, Pascal, as Whip. In ill health, he was replaced by Captain W. Browne in 1878, who refused the title MFH. Lord Howth served as MFH for the 1878 - 1879 season, followed the next year by John Stewart.

This period is tulmultuous and ends with the liquidation of the Pau Hunt. Pau, had been known as a place where those with pulmonary diseases could hunt. The difficulty level, popularity and frequency of drag hunting was seen by Lord Howth as exclusionary to less capable riders, himself included. Howth made it his quest to make 'real fox hunting' accessible to those in ill health, while other members preferred the expediency of bagmen for fox hunting and wanted more drag hunts with the release of a bagman at the end. An additional method, dubbed 'a new departure', became popular combining a drag hunt with a fox hunt, releasing a bagman for the second segment.

The Count of Bari moved into the Villa Longchamp with a pack of hounds. The Pau Hunt, claimed he had no right to hunt in their territory and finally liquidated on April 12, 1880 notifying the town counsel they could no longer operate the hunt with a competing pack.

Suspension of the Kennel Committee (1880–1882)
Negotiations between the town hall, the Count of Bari and James Gordon Bennett Jr. reconstituted the Pau Hunt on December 2, 1880. This resulted in Bari gifting his hounds to the municipality, Bennett being named master who took control of the hunt with the assistance of Thomas G. Burgess. Bennett purchase 40 couples delivered in 1881 and turned them over to the municipality when he resigned as MFH in October 1882 with Thomas Burgess replacing him as MFH with a newly formed committee named November 1, 1882.

A Famous Hunt (1882–1910)
...THIS IS MY BREAKPOINT

Further development of drag hunting with dedicated hound pack, cross country and point-to-point matches, and paper chases in the early 20th century. Alliance with regional and local government with subventions, advertising, permanent kennels and employee lodging, and assistance in controlling local landowners.

The united nations of hunts.

1910 – 1939
The Prince, Vaufreland and Barron years, development of sport, WWI, prohibition, gambling interdiction, construction projects in Pau, depression