‘You need a skin like a rhino'

From peace rallies to being wedged in a tree, Countess Goess-Saurau has learnt that an MFH’s life is certainly varied, as she tells Tessa Waugh

- Tessa Waugh

THREE years into her second stint as master of the VWH, Countess (Susie) Goess-Saurau is one of the country’s senior masters of foxhounds.

“Are you writing about old dinosaurs?” she laughs when I ring her.

An elegant blonde in pastels and a big hat, Susie draws the eye at gatherings of the tribe throughout the summer. She looks like a Hitchcock heroine but in person she is fun, chatty and down-to-earth.

As the daughter of non-horsey parents, horses didn’t come to her, she explains.

“I spotted a pony, aged two, and screamed until I was put on it. My parents allowed me to have riding lessons and I became known as ‘the professor’ because all of my knowledge came from the Pony Club manual.”

She remembers her parents loyally dragging her pony around in a single Rice trailer, some junior eventing and a bit of hunting with the Albrighton and Woodland. She hunted in her 20s, too, but it wasn’t until she moved to Wiltshire with her second husband, Konrad Goess-Saurau, an Austrian count, that she got going in earnest.

“I looked at all the packs locally, but I chose the VWH because they were incredibly friendly,” she breezes. “All through my thirties, I hunted four days a week and I became a master at 40. We were on holiday with Ginny and Mikey Elliot in the Virgin Islands and Mikey said, ‘You’ll be invited to be a master soon.’ Not long after that, Mark Hill got in touch to ask me.”

Along with Mark Hill, Susie’s first joint-masters included Martin Wood and Chris Mason.