‘Not many huntsmen were blessed by Desmond Tutu'

Old Surrey Burstow and West Kent master Richard Gurney’s hunting life has come full circle, as Catherine Austen finds out

- Catherine Austen

WHAT makes a 48-year-old decide that the one thing he really must do in life is hunt a pack of hounds?

On the face of it, it looks like lunacy. After all, it wasn’t as though Richard Gurney’s life had lacked interest and challenges – far from it. He had worked in high-goal polo, attempted to ride in the Grand National (and nearly pulled it off), run successful businesses, raised huge amounts of money for charity and written and produced a pop song. And, as an MFH of the Old Surrey Burstow and West Kent for a decade, he couldn’t plead ignorance – he knew just how hard it would be.

But people who love challenges continually seek them, undaunted, and in fact this wasn’t something completely new. It was the final, irresistible tug on a string that led all the way back to the beginning.

Richard explains: “When I was six months old, my mother [Anne] was poached by Uvedale Lambert, master of the Old Surrey and Burstow when Jack Champion was hunting the hounds, to be his groom. She went for a two-week trial and stayed for 26 years.”

Uvedale Lambert lived at South Park, near Bletchingley, a 2,000-acre estate that Richard describes as “like a playground”, covered in hunt jumps.