Sheffield Harriers Hunt

         Sheffield Harriers outside The Stanhope Arms at Dunford, c.1900–1910

Whilst researching my 3 x great grandfather’s role as “Huntsman” with the Sheffield Harriers for almost 40 years in the nineteenth century, I came across the attached newspaper report. The activities of the Sheffield Harriers Hunt were well reported in the Sheffield newspapers and they often hunted in the Totley area. They hunted hares, not foxes, and hunted on foot rather than on horseback.

 
The attached report from the Sheffield Independent of Monday 6 January 1890 concerns a Totley resident Edward Vaughan, who was working on the construction of the Totley Tunnel at the time of the incident.

       Extract from Sheffield Independent, 6 January 1890



A rather sad tale, but not without interest. A man by the name of Edward Vaughan died in 1928 aged 66 at the South Yorkshire Lunatic Asylum and may be the individual concerned.

The second extract reports on the Sheffield Harriers hunt of February 1877 which started from Owler Bar and pursued hares around the Totley area. (I believe the reference in the article to Stoney Middleton is a typographical error and may refer to the Stoney Ridge area around the old toll bar near Fox House. I doubt any hunter on foot could run from Totley to Stoney Middleton and back to Totley)! 

        Report of the Sheffield Harriers hunt of February 1877

This extract also provides an insight into the social aspect of The Sheffield Harriers Hunt. This was a Hunt comprised predominantly of Sheffield artisans and publicans. Many members were “little mesters”; cutlers, grinders, file cutters etc and as the Hunt hunted on Mondays it was important that participants were able to observe “St Monday”, which effectively precluded those employed and not self-employed. 

The third report, from The Sheffield Independent of Saturday 28th December 1872 concerns the Earl of Fitzwilliam’s Hunt rather than the Sheffield Harriers Hunt, though David Sellars and other members of the Harriers acted as Hunt Followers on foot. This fox hunt took place on Boxing Day 1872. (The Harriers were hunters of hares but were not amiss to participating in the hunting of foxes by the “aristocratic” hunts such as the Fitzwilliam Hunt, Lord Galway’s Hunt etc.