Ed

This hunt horse certainly wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, but from the moment Daniel Cherriman got on him, he has never let anyone else hunt him

- Octavia Pollock

RAGS to riches is a familiar tale. Less familiar is reject to king, but such is Ed's story. “He came over from Ireland as the ‘exchange’ in a sale or exchange from dealer Paul Kinane,” says Daniel Cherriman, then huntsman of the Pytchley and now master and huntsman of the Shropshire. “We used to get a lot of horses from him; some were exceptional, some useless, usually unseen and untried. One horse arrived at 3.30am and was so unsuitable, it was sent straight back. I don’t think I even saw it.”

Ed arrived as the replacement.

“This ginger and white coloured horse turned up, a slightly unusual shape, as if he’d been put together by a committee trying to please everybody,” says Daniel.

As they knew nothing about him, local hunting fanatic John Knowles, “known for buying horses for £1 and getting a tune out of them”, was commissioned to try Ed.

“We met at Althorp,” remembers Daniel. “We weren’t out long when we came back through the yard and found John sitting on the tailgate, horse on the lorry. He said he bolted blind and wasn’t safe: ‘Send it back.’

“Paul said, ‘That’s your exchange, like it or lump it’, so we were stuck with a horse that wasn’t suitable.”