Lord Hemphill
Peter Patrick, Lord Hemphill, ex-MFH
Peter Patrick, the Fifth Baron Hemphill, passed away on Friday, April 6, 2012 at the Galway Clinic after a short illness. He and his wife Lady Anne Hemphill are well-known to many North American sportsmen and women who have hunted with the Galway Blazers. His father, the Fourth Baron, married his mother Emily Sears in Saint Patrick's Cathedral in New York.
Lord Hemphill was an exceptional individual—charming, entertaining, and a great friend to the Galway Blazers where he served as Joint-Master in the heyday of hunting in Ireland. He made his estate, Tulira Castle, regularly available to the hunt. American film director John Huston was a fellow Joint-Master when he lived at St Clerans not far from Athenry. The two men hunted and socialised together with their respective wives, Toni and Lady Anne, the latter serving as Field Master of the Blazers for many years. They all sailed frequently in Galway Bay with many of the prominent visiting Hollywood film stars, often visiting the Aran Islands where a sing-song was always on the agenda at a local hostelry!
The Galway Blazers Puppies Enter Glorious Tradition
MFHs Michael Dempsey and Vincent Shields
The Galway Blazers Puppy Show drew a large attendance at the Kennels in Craughwell, County Galway, Ireland.
Michael Dempsey, internationally known Joint-Master and former huntsman of the Galway Blazers for the last 32 seasons, has maintained some Old English bloodlines in his pack. He likes a light hound that can bank the Galway walls and leave the stones in place. Vincent Shields was attending his first puppy show as a newly appointed Blazers Joint-Master, while retaining his current Mastership of both the East Galway Foxhounds and the Roscommon Harriers.
One is ever mindful of the great tradition of hound breeding at the Blazers’ kennels, particularly when thinking of previous huntsmen like Captain Brian Fanshawe, Paddy Pickersgill, and above all American-born Isaac Bell who hunted the pack from 1903 to 1908, and who made such a lasting contribution to what is now known as the modern English foxhound.
