Master and Huntsman Billy Vance (80) watches his Fermanagh Harriers at work. / Noel Mullins photo
How many huntsmen are hunting hounds at eighty years of age? Or to add a twist to that question, how many huntsmen having achieved that age have already hunted hounds for the previous fifty seasons?
Billy Vance, Master and huntsman of the Fermanagh Harriers, has achieved this remarkable milestone. To see him hunting hounds is inspiring, humbling, and brings home just how lucky we all are to be able to follow great horsemen like him across the countryside.
Vance is special—a consummate and stylish horseman across what can only be termed as challenging hunting country with drains, banks, walls, and wire to contend with. And he is usually riding horses he bred himself. He is a genius with a pack of hounds, but don’t get in his way when they are running! If Ireland is in need of role models in these difficult economic circumstances, then Billy Vance fits the bill. He never seeks attention, yet is respected not just in his own hunt but by the hunting fraternity at large. And it is sometimes difficult to get a photograph of him.
“I am not into photos!” he says.
Billy, it could be said, came late to hunting as it was not until 1947 at age seventeen that his uncle T.D. Vance, a solicitor in Oldcastle, County Meath, took him out with the Ballymacad Foxhounds. From then on he was taken by the sport, particularly the cry of hounds, jumping natural obstacles, and point-to-pointing. On many occasions he hacked twenty miles to a meet, hunted all day, and hacked home at night.
He became Master and huntsman of the Fermanagh Harriers in 1963 having hunted a trencher fed pack for a few years previously. He will celebrate fifty seasons hunting the Fermanagh Harriers next season. On days off he can be seen hunting with the adjacent foxhound packs, the Ballymacads and the Meaths, on his smashing grey mare Sonnet (by his Connemara pony stallion Tabragh, out of his remarkable point-to-point mare Annie Sue V1).
Billy rode in point-to-points from 1954 to 1986 winning a number, and was placed on two occasions in the La Touche Cross Country race at the Punchestown Racing Festival in County Kildare on Annie Sue V1. The mare went on and won the prestigious race in 1985 with top amateur jockey, now trainer Tony Martin aboard. She is a subject for a racing story on her own, having won a remarkable twenty-three point-to-points—probably a record for a mare.
Billy remembers going to a point-to-point some years ago. He first transported his horse on the train from Clones to Enniskillen, and then hacked him out to the course in Dunbar before competing in the race! Billy’s daughter Susan had the distinction of sharing the Ladies Point-to-Point Championship in 1997 with three other jockeys.
Billy’s son Johnny is a familiar sight riding on the point-to-point circuit since 1985, having had many successes with Ninaprettyballerina. She won three races, is now retired, and just had her second foal. Johnny has a few that he will campaign starting in February: Potters Wall, Filduff, and Finea.
Johnny got a good introduction to hunting from his father. For example, twenty-seven years ago when he was fifteen years of age he arrived at a meet with Billy and no followers turned up. Hounds hunted for a solid two hours, and neither Billy nor Johnny opened a gate on the entire run!
The Hunt
The meet this day was at Nutfield Cross, Lisnaskea, near Enniskillen, in Northern Ireland. Billy’s fellow Joint-Masters are his son Johnny and Patrick Murphy. Whipping-in is Michael Bevan and Billy’s daughter Susan. Richard Trimble, Joint-Master of the Meath Foxhounds is secretary of the point-to-point. Edward Persse, who was Field Master this day, is a brother of Kildare Joint-Master Sandy Persse. Treasurer Jim Lappin was collecting cap money quickly as he was rushing to get away to pick carrots. He was promising a few free bags to any volunteers, but managed to capture only one victim.
Billy leaves on the stroke of noon and not a minute later, as punctuality in a way defines part of his character. No sooner had he taken hounds into the second field in Alan Hurst’s off the road, when hounds found and screamed away left-handed towards the red sheds in Barry Hennessey’s. At the top of the hill they weaved in an arrow shape almost like a flock of birds—right-handed and back again left across Eric Johnson’s.
Billy was flat out in an effort to keep with them as there were more than enough tricky obstacles for his horse. It was interesting to see him quietly tracking them—no horn blowing, no shouting, no distractions from the job they were bred to do.
From there hounds crossed Declan Murphy’s, skirting the furze and plantings and on to the New Plantation at Knock. Hounds were in fine voice, disturbing another fox that realised this was not a pack to get involved with, so he headed for the hills. The pack hunted back down by the Stranafebley road into Johnson’s through the Deerpark, crossed the road, and checked.
Hounds had split so Joint-Master Patrick Murphy and his daughter Michaela took half the pack on while Johnny Vance took some and met Billy who had the rest. Billy hacked down the road and jumped into Rosemary Breens. As he jumped the wire into the next field he quickly cast around the Fort of Breens, and hounds had another customer on the run back across the road again into Alec Hurst’s and across Declan Murphy’s, this time parallel with the Lisnaskea to Brookeborough road. Billy and the followers took to the main road as it would be impossible to cross the wet bog ground which was like glue. Hounds raced across the concrete road leading into the rural hairdressers, Unisex Hair by Hollye. Here they straightened up and turned back left before turning again right-handed for about a mile and then high up towards the Deer Park yet again. Billy galloped down the road to see if they were on the right line or heel. As someone struggled to open a gate for him, he flashed over a wire paling beside it, shouting back, “I can’t delay; have to get to my hounds!”
Running back into the same country a second time with horses that were cooked and a number of riders struggling to catch up, it was decided to call it a day. And what a day it was! There were many casualties: Geraldine Reilly’s horse lost two shoes, and young Michael Blakiston-Houston fell in a bog on his pony Paddy. At the last wall that had a strand of wire on it, Geraldine Reilly collided with her husband Tommy in midair, landing upon him on the ground. They were reunited, but not with their horses!
Joint-Master Patrick Murphy and his wife Rosemary assisted by Anna Murphy and Emma Vance entertained more than fifty followers in their home. As for Billy Vance, he put a smile on the followers’ faces with the quality of hunting he provided in difficult wet conditions. One can’t help thinking that if he were a football player, his fans would be chanting enthusiastically from the stands, “There is only one Billy Vance.”
Posted December 11, 2015
Noel Mullins is a lifelong foxhunter and sporting photo/journalist. Click to visit his website and view his books and articles.