Archive of literary and other written references to The East Kent Hunt  

A Guide to Elham and District 195?
A saunter through Kent
Starbrace - a novel with EKH connections

An Official Area Guide boasting of its hunt
The photograph of Six Mile Garage is also of interest because it has been scanned from a small publication "Elham Rural District Official Guide" issued under the auspices of Elham Rural District Council. Imagine a District Council in 1999 or beyond publishing a guide with a picture of the local hunt presented as an attraction.

Even more glorious is the fact that the second paragraph of the Foreword, written by John Bowdon (Clerk to the council) states:
 

• It is hunting country, and in the parish of Elham are situated the kennels of the East Kent Foxhounds. In short, the area is typical countryside at its very best.

A Saunter through Kent with pen and pencil

At the beginning of this century (the twentieth in case this page remains un-updated for too long) Charles Igglesden, editor of The Kentish Express newspaper began to publish a series of books in this series. In 1901 he produced the volume that included Elham and this account:
 

• The name of Elham has for a great number of years been associated with coaching and hunting. From Folkestone to Canterbury, via the Elham Valley, is a favourite coaching route, and it is at Elham that the kennels of the East Kent Foxhounds are situated. the baying of hounds remind you of this fact. The buildings are of comparatively recent date. Fifty years ago they were at Underhill, between Newington and Seabrook, and when Mr. Frederick Brockman succeeded his brother at Beachborough he built new kennels. This was some forty years ago. Lord Guilford then took the hounds and erected kennels at Waldershare, but when he relinquished the mastership the pack was located at Elham and has remained there ever since. the master is now Mr. Selby Lowndes.

The "comparatively recent" buildings were demolished a year or three back as new kennels had been built above the site of the old ones and a deal struck with the developer that he should build houses on the site of the old kennels. The loss was sentimental as the buildings were unsuited to the modern demands of a flesh house and good hound management. The new kennels were opened and blessed - an event that will be described in a later addition to this page. 

Starbrace - a novel by Sheila Kaye-Smith 

In this novel, published by George Bell and Sons (LONDON 1909) there is a chapter entitled "The Meet at Wheelbarrow Town".
The location is the name given to the southernmost part of the still existing Common at Stelling Minnis. Indeed Minnis means Common in the sense of privately owned open space over which a number of Commoners have rights that might include grazing, turbiary and estovers. A synopses of the chapter is given below:
 

• "Theodora . .  wore her habit and Martin his scarlet coat, for that morning they were to ride to the last meet of the season."

  [Miles, a young man joins the hunt having avoided the punishment set by the chaplain.]

  "Hounds must have left Wheelbarrow Town, but he questioned the first labourer he met . . . and fell in with the hunt at Yockletts, for the fox which had been started near Cherrygarden Farm had gone to ground at Little London, and the hounds were drawing Yockletts Bank. . . . .

  They had hardly joined the group when from Yockletts Bank, came shouts of "Tally ho!" and "Forrard on! Forrard!" accompanied by the music of hounds. The next moment boys, girls and horses were tearing through the hazel undergrowth, while the horn sounded shrilly, and the shouting was swelled to a din by Miles's stentorian voice.

  They poured out of the wood into the field by Wadden Hall, fox ahead, hounds following on a breast high scent, Miles and the roan careering over the spurge and plantain like two children out for a holiday.

  The fox, though he went at a rattling pace for half an hour, was soon pulled down in a hurst near Spong Farm. It was only three o'clock, so the hounds were taken to a wood known as Doghouse, where many a stout pilot had been unearthed that season. But though more than one fox was started, scent did not hold in covert, and the field spent over an hour trotting up and down boggy rides where the horses' feet sank in the mud above the pasterns.

  A fox was started at Ittinge late in the afternoon, and after a sharp thirty minutes, was killed near Hospital Farm. Then as the shadows were drawing in, the field parted after a farewell glass at the Merry Marjorie on the Stone Street.

  • "A whole six months, Pharisee," he said to the roan, "a whole six months afore we hunt again and see Mus' Reynolds slipping through the grass, his cunning liddle eyes all shining wud wickedness."
     

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