I’VE always enjoyed visiting Curraghmore, whether for the Waterford Country Fair or various horse related events, but this visit was going to be special. My photographer and I were going to spend an afternoon with Lord Waterford at Curraghmore just outside the village of Portlaw near Carrick on Suir. The visit had been arranged in the convivial surroundings of the recent National Hound Show in Stradbally where the Waterford huntsman, Niall Dunne, had come away with an armful of red rosettes including the Robin Hunt Trophy for the best Brood Bitch.

Our host for the afternoon, Henry Nicholas de la Poer Beresford, 9th Marquess of Waterford, which is a bit of a mouthful, but he is better known in the hunting world as Tyronie. A man of few words, he is modest almost to a fault (with little to be modest about). He has been joint-master of the Waterford for the last four seasons, rebuilding a family tradition which had been dormant since the 1950s when the last member of his family filled a similar role. No less than 10 members of his family have preceded him in the mastership since 1843. His joint-masters are the brothers Raymond and Allan Morrissey, John Kiely and Ian Shanahan.