The Victoria History of the County of Lincoln/The Belvoir Hunt
THE BELVOIR HUNT
The greater part of the Belvoir[1] country lies in Lincolnshire. The northern boundaries extend from Newark by way of Leadenham and Sleaford eastward to the North Sea, but the fen country east of the railway from Sleaford to Bourne is not hunted, the wide drains and outfalls making it impassable for horsemen. The Blankney is the Belvoir's immediate neighbour on the north, and the Cottesmore marches with it on the south. There is nothing to show when the boundaries of the Old Burton and the Belvoir were fixed, and no change seems to have taken place since the earliest records. Grantham, in the centre of the hunt, and Sleaford, on the Blankney borders, are the best Lincolnshire hunting centres for followers of the Belvoir.
The best country on the Lincolnshire side lies round Folkingham, where there is a wide extent of grass and two capital gorse coverts—Folkingham Gorse and Heathcote's Gorse; the Sapperton and Newton Woods also always hold stout foxes. There are some large woods on the southern part of the Lincolnshire country. Aswarby, Culverthorpe, Dembleby Thorns, Haydor Southards, and Rauceby, are the best coverts in the north. Round Stubton Gorse, the starting point of many a good gallop, there is another fine stretch of country.
Perhaps the best run recorded on the Lincolnshire side was that from Ancaster Gorse on 15 December, 1865, hounds going by Ingoldsby and Laughton to below Dunsby and thence to the Forty Foot Drain at Hacconby, where they killed their fox.
Among the prominent followers and fox-preservers on the Lincolnshire side are the Whichcotes of Aswarby, Mr. J. E. Welby of Allington Hall, the Gregorys of Denton, the Reeves of Leadenham, the Fanes of Fulbeck, the Nevilles of Stubton, the Turnors of Stoke Rochford, Heathcotes, Tollemaches, Thorolds of Syston, Brownlows of Belton, and the Parkers, Hutchinsons, and Hornsbys of Grantham. Mr. Hardy, the Grantham banker, was one of those who invariably got to the end of the best run; and Mr. J. Litchford of Boothby Hall, a squire of the old school and somewhat of a character, was a great authority on hunting; his knowledge of woodland hunting was exceptional. Colonel Reeve of Leadenham and the Rev. T. Heathcote of Lenton were very prominent men in their day, and Mr. Bemrose and Mr. T. Casswell were hard-riding farmers. The most noted of the Belvoir parsons was the Rev. J. Houson, rector of Brant Broughton and Great Coates. When in his seventy-fourth year he had the best of a forty minutes' run from Folkingham Gorse to Aslackby Wood, and Major Longstaffe (in his time a very good man with hounds) says at eighty years of age he could lead the Belvoir field.
- ↑ For history of this hunt see V. C. H. Leic.