Three members of the Eggesford Hunt brutally attacked sabs. Property was stolen and a sab had to be airlifted to hospital.
DCHS, along with one of our good friends from Somerset Hunt Sabs, hit the Eggesford Hunt’s meet at Cliston, Sampford Courtenay. Conditions were very wet with rain for most of the day and many of the streams having overflowed their banks to flood paths. Most of our sabs ended up soaked, with boots full of water by the end of the day, but a bit of water will never deter us.
For the first part of the day huntsman and hounds spent a lot of time around the Solland Quarry area, with our sabs always close by. Terrier men on equipped quads meanwhile hung about at the meet for several hours, with sabs stationed there to keep an eye on them. These terrier men are the ones who dig out – where a fox goes to ground after being chased by hounds and is dug up and either killed or stored by the hunt to be released and hunted again at a later date. While the usual thugs were busy blocking our vehicles in on the road (police had to be called to move them on), various foot teams kept the hunt in sight at all times. At one point, huntsman Jason picked up an apparently flightless bird from the ground and chucked it at one of the sabs. Whether the bird had been injured by hounds we don’t know. Sabs were making arrangements to take the bird to the vet, but fortunately it regained its strength and flew off a short while later.
In the early afternoon hounds chased a fox who went to ground in a badger sett near Westacott Farm. Huntsman Jason Marles, hunt riders, followers and terrier men all gathered where the fox had taken refuge but sabs soon arrived at the scene, preventing a dig-out from taking place. Remember, earlier this year two of the hunt’s terrier men were caught digging a fox out of a badger sett, an incident for which they received a caution from police. The hunt reluctantly moved on, but some sabs remained guarding the sett until we were sure the coast was clear and the fox would be safe.
Sabs followed the hunt as they moved off, and Duncan Tucker who had earlier driven at sabs on the road, repeatedly drove at them on his quad bike as they crossed a flooded path. His behaviour is apparently not approved of by all the hunt as a hunt follower actually came to apologise to us about Duncan’s behaviour. Apparently nobody had words with Duncan himself, however, as his behaviour only got worse as the day progressed.
A short while later hounds got onto yet another fox very close to Westacott Farm. Jason encouraged his hounds as they found the scent of a fox in a dense shrub, and sabs saw a fox bolt from the cover, with hounds in close pursuit. Sabs up ahead of the hounds were ready to rate hounds and cover the scent of the fox when it passed, however hounds lost the scent after some distance. Sabs were close by at all times and we are fairly confident that fox escaped.
Throughout the day sabs came across the remains of several farm animals, just left in the fields to rot, scenes unfortunately common in the countryside. However, in some positivity we also encountered local farmers who were strongly anti-hunt, giving us permission to be on their land to sab the hunt. The hunts would have us believe that people living in the countryside are all in favour of them. This is not our experience. We frequently encounter anti-hunt landowners while out. Some are scared to speak out for fear of what consequences it could bring them, but they are often helpful to sabs.
Hounds later in the day appeared scattered. Lost hounds were spotted around Chatterfin Plantation, while Jason tried to gather his hounds to the south. Duncan Tucker arrived and in yet more aggressive behaviour drove full speed at sabs, with Chris Marles (father of Jason) riding passenger. Hounds again got on a line and Jason blew the horn call ‘gone away’, signalling a fox had broken from cover. Sabs in fields to the south-west of Honeychurch used horn and voice-calls to call the hounds off the fox and towards them, thus buying the fox a good ten minutes to get away.
This is when two female sabs were brutally attacked and one of them was injured and robbed. Footage of the incident is now with the police and we look forward to sharing further information and footage when they have completed their inquiries. We won’t be sharing anything more about the details of the attack at the moment, so as not to prejudice the case.
Whilst the attack was ongoing, other hunt members simply looked on and even afterwards they surrounded the two female sabs, threatening them further and shouting at them to leave. More sabs arrived at the scene to help the injured sab to safety, and again riders and hunt followers on quads thought the whole thing was hilarious.
Police arrived and took statements from sabs who had been present at the attack. Police are now in possession of our video footage of the attack and we will be taking this further. The violence was entirely unprovoked and shows yet again just how dangerous the hunts can be. Let us be clear: Any suggestion that sabs endangered hounds in any way by calling them off the fox they were chasing is preposterous. Predictably, Marles accused us of calling hounds to a road but the nearest road from where the incident occurred was at least five fields away in every direction, and this can be shown in our footage.
It’s sadly not unusual that when we successfully stop their sick illegal ‘sport’, hunts respond with violence and robbery. Earlier this year, two of our sabs were violently attacked by terriermen from the Modbury Hunt, who punched and kicked them, drove over them with their quads and robbed them of their possessions, including cameras that had filmed the attack. Just a few months later, two other sabs were attacked and robbed at a meet of the Culmstock Minkhounds, and you might remember only a few weeks ago Duncan Tucker from the Eggesford Hunt broke into our Land Rover while we were blocked on the road. He stole kit and threatened the driver and other sabs.
While the injured sab waited for the ambulance, the police arrived, as did a hunt follower who attempted to pull the police into conversation about the sabs. When that failed, as police were busy assisting the injured sab, the hunt follower drove off, and nearly ran over the injured sab and a police officer in the process!
An air ambulance arrived to assist our injured sab. While the paramedics did their job, a hunt supporter came down the road and unbelievably started taking pictures of the injured sab getting medical care. When asked to leave he was entirely unapologetic, arguing that sabs had been filming them all day. We film the hunt to document criminal activity and for our own safety! On occasions where hunt riders have, for example, fallen off their horses, we have not stood around filming them, nor would we wish to. The hunt never fail to sink to new lows.
The injured sab, who had abdominal injuries and was struggling to breathe, was airlifted to Derriford hospital and the rest of us headed home after a very long day. Our sab has since been discharged from hospital and is still in considerable pain. We have consistently warned that unchecked illegal activity and violent behaviour by hunts leads to a sense of impunity and an escalation in violence directed at sabs, and it should be no surprise that those who delight in the killing of wildlife are not ashamed to assault a woman. We hope the penny will drop at Middlemoor! Remember this is the hunt that contains convicted paedophiles as well as Jason’s father who was convicted of ABH for an assault on a hunt monitor and later spent six months in prison for attacking another elderly female monitor. Yet unbelievably there are also teachers, prison officers and police officers who ride with the Eggesford and they should be utterly ashamed of themselves.
Throughout the day many foxes were helped to safety by sabs, and our effectiveness is what drove the hunt to such drastic measures. We will not be stopped by violence. We are determined as always to save as many lives as possible and expose the behaviour of these blood-junkies.
We will be working with police to bring those responsible to justice. We also want to express our admiration and thanks to Devon Air Ambulance and staff at Derriford Hospital in Plymouth for their assistance yesterday.
Media coverage
- Devon hunt saboteur injured in ‘attack’, 16 December 2018, BBC
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