The Pau Hunt was established in 1842 by the Société dâÂÂEncouragement as a spectacle for tourists authorized by the government of Louis Philippe to hunt predatory animals such as wolves and foxes. Dominated by American and British Masters, it was one of the most renown and glamourous hunts until the breakout of World War II. Its field, between Gardères and the hills surrounding Pau was nicknamed âÂÂLeicestershire in FranceâÂÂ.
Innovative hunt masters and committee members organized the capture of game and its later release (bagmen), and their first recorded drag hunt in 1847. Cross country and point-to-point events later called The HunterâÂÂs Stakes and finally Pau Hunt Races were first held in the mid-1840s, closing the season for over 90 years. 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.
In 1947 the association reorganized as the "Pau Hunt Drags", and continues its tradition of drag hunting.
Under the license of Royal Wolfcatcher, Mister Dupont invited Pau's British winter colonists, including hunter and explorer James Erskine Murray in 1835, to lodge at Tarbes, hunt in the mornings and dining in the evening. Dupont was attentive to his hounds, managed clean kennels and preferred hunting wolves and hare - 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.
There was a separate Béarnais hunt at Pau in 1835 that Murray described unfavorably. Its country was strictly limited to one forest (le forêt domaniale de Bastard) - and corresponds with a royal patent dated 1771; however, no documents have been found that certify the 1771 and 1835 hunts were the same. Murray had not been familiar with the Béarnais method of capture and release that would be adopted by later Pau Hunt masters and criticized as unorthodox and American forty years later.
In 1837 Sir Henry Chudleigh Oxenden began wintering at Tarbes where he leased Aureilhan Castle in 1839 after his father's death. He imported hunters and hounds for fox hunting around Tarbes and Lannemezan. J. Cornwell hunted with him. Oxenden returned to Broome Park in the summer of 1841 due to financial difficulties, and in late autumn 1842, sold his horses to M. Larienty and offered his fox hound pack to his French and British friends at Pau.
After Oxenden gifted his pack to friends at Pau, the local newspaper, dated 3 December 1842 announced the authorization to hunt predatory wolves and foxes by the Société d'Encouragement, with at least 14 foxes hunted during the first season 1842-1843. Cornwell hunted with MFHs Lt. OâÂÂShirley, Roussel, Charles Whyte, Pery Standish and William Cecil Standish. In 1845, keeping just one of Oxenden's hounds "Fallacy because she had a good nose", Pery Standish brought in a new pack of hounds to newly built kennels in today's village of Soumoulou. The season ended with the first recorded cross country and steeplechase matches on 31 March 1846.
Jasper Hall Livingston was 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 before the meet.
Before the steam engine, train service and automobiles, innovative sports were developed to increase speed and skill levels of both horses and riders. Many of these techniques are no longer used due to animal rights and property issues. At Pau, the government sanctioned Société d'Encouragement awarded cash prizes at the racetrack (hippodrome) that was inaugurated in 1843 as an incentive for private breeders to improve the health, speed and endurance qualities of the horse, which were the primary mode of transportation of humans and goods and indispensable for national defense.
No hunt was held at Pau. Jasper Hall Livingston hunted boar at Roux Castle and lost most of his hounds.
Accompanied by Huntsman Dupont, Livingston went to England to replace his hound pack 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 farmhouse he named Billère Lodge with land strattling Billère and adjacent Pau, where he built kennels, stables and the Villa Bilhère. The third edition of a travel guide by Dr. Alexander Taylor published in 1861 states there were two packs; one at Power's in Billère for subscription and a private pack at Villa Livingston, both used to continue developing difficult hunt-like sports of drag hunting and the capture and release of foxes and larger game including fallow deer. The speed and endurance of hounds during a hunt was determined by the fox and were augmented considerably by laying an artificial trail with defined obstacles, improving training for horses and riders. The capture and release of wild animals (this is no longer done) was used to simplify and expedite a hunt, most frequently capturing and "bagging" foxes then later releasing them at another meet where they would be unfamiliar with the country, keeping them from going underground. A bagman could be released at the end of a drag hunt as an incentive/reward for the hounds. As early as Livingston, the hunt advertised to buy caught foxes in the local press. A similar concept was developed for fallow deer, bringing them to meets in cages, releasing them and then hunting them. None of this is done today. Lord Howth rebuked claims foxes became less numerous and was the reason traditional fox hunting was replaced with hunting bagged foxes, eventually alternating with drag hunting. He wrote that new sports corrupted traditional 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 lithograph by Marc and two by Jean-Alexandre Duruy were available between December 1860 and 1863 mocking their critics. Famous participants of the Pau Hunt during this period included William Hamilton, 11th Duke of Hamilton, Ward McAllister and Marshal Pierre Bosquet.
Sometime after 1861, Power had financial difficulties and was replaced by Captain Philip Savage Alcock for the 1864-1865 season, who hunted with a pack of harriers. Local property owners began demonstrating due to property damage, but local politicians attempted to appease them because of the popularity of the Pau Hunt among tourists including the French who comprised over one-third of the kennel committee.
Alcock resigned and was replaced by Jasper Hall Livingston in 1868, with kennels at Villa Livingston. Livingston's hunt was fashionable and began appearing in publications not related to sports; an article by children's book author Aunt Fanny, Frances Barrow which was later published in Schribner's Monthly Magazine, and in Miss Maria Grant's two tomb romance novel The Sun-Maid set in Pau and published in 1877. Livingston did not arrive for the 1873-1874 season and was replaced by Major William Henry Cairnes followed later in 1874 by William George Tiffany, who along with Norman Story moved the kennels to Villa Navarre, began keeping kennel financial records and began writing by-laws. They then 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 Story. Landowners continued demonstrating due to property damage.
On January 26, 1875, Tiffany and Story were hunting and ordered a peasant to open a gate, who refused, and then suddenly swung it open when Story started jumping it, making his 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 by prefect Jean de Nadaillac, along with a plan to compensate landowners for damages. The by-laws were finalized for the La Société de la Chasse àCourre on April 5, 1875 at which time Tiffany resigned as MFH.
Major William Henry Cairnes became MFH and brought 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 with a new pack for the 1878 - 1879 season, but did not complete the season and was followed the next year by John Stewart. This period was tumultuous and ended with the liquidation of the Pau Hunt, which had always been known to be accessible to subscribers with pulmonary diseases. The difficulty level, popularity and frequency of drag and bagman 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, by releasing a bagman upon hearing the pack's approach near the end of the drag hunt's artificial trail, beginning a fox hunt for the second segment.
The Count of Bari moved into today's Villa Longchamp in 1874. After Lord Howth's tenure, he brought in a private pack of hounds in 1879 and began a second hunt with Tiffany proposing Bari become the Pau Hound master. The Pau Hunt, claimed he had no right to hunt in their territory, but Bari replied he had no intention to negotiate and would continue the competing hunt during the 1880-1881 season. On April 14, 1880, the kennel committee voted 12 to 7 in favor of dissolving the committee and liquidating the Pau Hunt. They notified Mayor Aristide de Monpezat that they could no longer operate the hunt while there was a competing pack.
At the beginning of the 1880-1881 season, Thomas G. Burgess, whom Lord Howth described as in ill health, wrote for the assistance of James Gordon Bennett Jr., who arrived from Paris. After meeting with the mayor, influential Bennett met with the Count of Bari, who gave his hounds to the town hall. The hunt was immediately reconstituted on December 2, 1880 with Bennett as Master assisted by Thomas Burgess. Bennett purchased 40 couples that were delivered in 1881. In 1882, Mayor Nicholas Renault insisted the Société de la Chasse àCourre be reconstituted to conform with the law, proposing they alternate packs to satisfy the needs of all riding levels. Satisfied, Bennett agreed and gave the new pack to the municipality with Thomas Burgess replacing him as MFH with the newly formed committeeâÂÂs first meeting on 1 November 1882.
Dubbed âÂÂThe Capital of SportsâÂÂ, the relatively mild climate, outdoor activities, three clubs and a variety of places to worship made the capital of Bearn a famously fashionable winter resort. Master Mr. Neilson Winthrop (the brother of Egerton Winthrop) was followed by Mr. Frederick William Maude, Sir Victor Brooke, William Knapp Thorn, Lt.-Col. Talbot-Crosbie and Maude again. The first French Master was Baron Robert Lejeune and then Arthur Smyth Este "Baron d'Este", with Mr. Charles Henry Ridgway and Mr. John Harvey Wright Jr. at the turn of the century.
Events featuring cross-country and point-to-point matches were called Hunters Stakes in 1875 and later renamed Pau Hunt Races, marking the end of the hunting season. Entries were limited to horses that had been certified as having hunted at Pau during the season. The expense of the races, voluntary subscription fees and continued property damage made finances problematic. Masters Maude, Brooke, Lejeune and Este refused to underwrite the hunt's deficits, while regional and local governments provided subventions for advertising.
The hunt secured some financial security through the gift of today's Pau Hunt kennels in memorial of American Alfred Torrance by his mother Sophia Johnson Vanderbilt and his cousin Mr. William Knapp Thorn Jr., the daughter and grandson of Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt. Thorn arranged his aunt's purchase of a farmhouse, followed by the construction of modern kennels, a fox house, staff lodging and a telephone line between the Pau Hunt and the English Club, making it a world-class facility that was donated to the town of Pau and opened for the 1891-1892 season with the condition foxes continue to be hunted.
The hunt continued to develop drag hunting with separate fox and drag hound packs and later paper chases. Lord Howth continued defending fox hunting for those with poor constitutions and proposed modifications to make drag hunting easier, such as locating meets' closer to Pau to limit fatigue for the return. In 1884 Howth published an article Invalided Sportsman describing his position. In 1887, Donatien Levesque published a direct response, Les Drags de Pau, defending the efforts of Livingston and Power - drag hunting trails could be designed to go around private property, limiting damages and improving upon the sport of fox hunting, which was often limited to a brief gallop. In February 1893, after reading an article in The County Gentlemen Sporting Gazette Hunting in Pau, Howth responded in the next issue by criticizing bagmen in Pau and its lack of real fox hunting. The following week the gazette published a severe reprimand submitted by Maude. The final word was Lord Howth's, Leicestershire in France or the Pau Hunting Field, published in 1894 and translated into French in 1907.
Beginning at the end of Baron Lejeune's tenure, an annual sale of Pau hunters was held by Cheri auction house in Paris, where up to fifty horses were transported by train from the stables of subscribers. A 1902 article states the stable owners in Béarn kept 300 horses and that their minimum annual winnings were over 10,000,000 in 2025 Euros. Hunts were three times a week wearing red coats with green collars for the foxhound pack and green coats with red collars for the draghound pack, still followed by carriages and now joined by motorcars. The years of Charles Henry Ridgway's mastership ended the hunt's financial difficulties.
The Pau Hunt Races closed the winter season and were first held by the Société d'Encouragement. The first recorded was 31 March 1846 with Lieutenant O'Shirley winning the cross-country match on Andre Manascau's Malle-Poste previously owned by Sir Henry Oxenden. American Jasper Hall Livingston and Béarnais property owner M. Blair rode their own horses Yankee and Beeswing, while Hope-Johnstone rode Eclipse owned by M. Auguste de Perpigna. On December 27, 1897 the Pau Hunt modified its statutes to officially recognize the events, naming them the Pau Hunt X-Country Races organized under the rules of the Société des steeple-chases de France. The most famous race was held 3 April 1903 between the stables of Frederick Henry Prince and Annie Hutton. Each stable provided six hunters certified by the MFH with six jockeys wearing their respective racing colors. The course was designed by Master Charles Henry Ridgway and committee president William Knapp Thorn Jr. The winning stable with all of its horses crossing the finish first was that of Miss Hutton. The winning hunter, Sahlia was ridden by the Viscount d'Elva wearing Mr. Prince's colors.
The winter tourist colony would disappear at the end of this period. In 1910, its second generation was either deceased or aging. During the 1910-1911 season, Charles Henry Ridgway was ill and ceded mastership to financier Frederick H. Prince, while Joseph "Pito" Barron replaced hunt president William Knapp Thorn Jr. who had died unexpectedly. Henri Fortuné Piscatory de Vaufreland joined them as secretary and eventually chronicled his perspective of equestrian sports and the 20th-century winter colony.
Frederick and Abby Prince rented Villa Sainte-Hélène from the Grant de Longueuil family, where they held hunt dinners each Saturday. Opening day dinner was held in November at Villa Bilhère as had been the tradition for decades. More and more counties and states had prohibited alcohol while fewer and fewer states permitted betting on horses. Owners such as Harry La Montagne moved their stables to France only to have their hunters and thoroughbreds requisitioned at the beginning of World War I, when tourism paused and many permanent residents left. Many of the men from the Pau Hunt went to war, some fighting with France and some losing their lives including Norman Prince. In 1917, the Baron d'Este wrote an advertorial for Pau's annual tourism publication, creating the legend of the Duke of Wellington's troops founding the Pau Hunt in 1814, including an impossible 43 mile (63 km) foxhunt between Orthez and Luquet by British officers and enemy French dragoons. Prince joked that Wellington played checkers with Napoleon's soldiers in the nearby Happy (heurèuse) Valley.
After the war, Prince's generosity sustained both the Pau Hunt and the English Club. He brought hunters in for the 1919-1920 season and purchased Villa Sainte-Hélène the following year. He was joined by American and British stable owners during prohibition and horse betting interdictions in the United States. The Princes, La Montagnes and Belle Baruch were all painted hunting at Pau by Sir Alfred Munnings.
After the Wall Street crash of 1929, the Pau Hunt used Lord Wellington in promotional articles, including the European edition of The Chicago Tribune, the home of Prince's empire. They listed Wellington as one of its former masters in Baily's Hunting Directory. During the Great Depression, prohibition and betting restrictions were lifted, fewer tourists come to Pau and the core third generation were now aging.
Anticipating war, Bernard Baruch pressed his daughter Belle Baruch to move her stables to Hobcaw Barony in 1936 for her own safety and to avoid potential requisition of her horses. Prince was 79-years old when he left Pau in 1939, Pito Barron died in Billère in 1947. Vaufreland worked on his chronicles during the war and helped revive equestrian sports in Pau after the war.
The following list ignores a plaque entitled "Masters of the Pau Hounds" that has an erroneous list of masters and originated from a 1907 publication by Charles Baconnière de Salverte, Les P.H. Modernes sous le Mastership de C.H. Ridgway esq. par Thya Hillaud.