THE recent passing of PJ O’Driscoll (known as Pat to his family and close friends) marked the end of an era of horses and hounds that spanned over 90 years.

PJ began riding in his infancy and started hunting with the Carbery Hunt in 1938. There had been hunting in West Cork since the 1600s when a Captain O’Driscoll had hounds. From about 1865 to the late 1890s, the Beamish family maintained a pack of hounds that became known as the Carbery Hunt but it fell into abeyance until circa 1913 when the hunt was rejuvenated by a local solicitor, Patrick J. O’Driscoll of Bandon.

The hunt country, with the town of Bandon at its centre, comprises mainly banks and requires a good hardy hunter that can gallop. In their early days, the Carbery hunted Thursdays and Sundays and hounds were maintained at the Old Military Barracks in Bandon.

PJ’s elder brother, Edward, had assisted his father in the hunting field for many seasons and was appointed the Master and huntsman in 1950 with PJ as the Field Master. The two brothers complimented each other in their respective roles, as they did throughout their lives. They were supported in the hunting field by whippers-in Jack Bradfield and Tim Horgan.

In 1961, their younger brother Barry was also appointed a whipper-in. It was following their father’s death in 1952 that PJ joined his brother Edward in the mastership, a position that he held right up until his death. Barry, who hunted the hounds from 1975, joined the mastership in 1990. More recently the mastership was extended to include their nephew, the late PJ O’Driscoll (who died in 2017) and Michael McCarthy, who currently hunts these hounds.

The O’Driscolls have a unique family distinction in that all three brothers - Edward, PJ and Barry - are solicitors, their nephew the late PJ O’Driscoll was a solicitor, PJ’s daughter Elaine is a solicitor and his daughter Karen, a Senior Counsel. In his professional life, PJ was renowned for his humour, his patience and his wisdom. He had a great ability to give short, clear and good instruction and would regale his apprentice solicitors and colleagues with stories and anecdotes that were at once entertaining and yet insightful. His protégés, of which there are many, describe him as a gentleman and a great boss.

PJ was born on July 12th, 1930 in The Retreat, Bandon, once the home of Anne, Duchess of Westminster. From his earliest years he developed a lifelong love of horses starting with a pony named The Flight into Egypt before he moved on to The Grey Mare, Lilac and Homer.

Great instincts

PJ maintained throughout his life the family’s longstanding relationship with Irish-bred horses.

It is said that he had an instinct to read a horse and was known to instil cold courage in a young horse to cross-country. Many was the day he went out with a novice horse and returned home that evening with a hunter.

Attending horse shows at Bandon, Belgooly, Cork and Clonakilty were regular events for PJ with his home-bred hunters. In later life his home-bred thoroughbreds were shown by his old friends Paddy and Susan McCarthy (Meelin Stud), with their son Patrick and daughter Nicola, winning many of the younger classes. In the 1960s, he bought a thoroughbred mare named Rannock Princess. Trained by Robert Hawkins, Rannock Princess was ridden by his brother Barry in a number of point-to-points and while they had limited success, they had the best of fun.

This instilled in PJ a desire to breed thoroughbreds for point-to-pointing and he had some success, particularly with a gelding called Call The Captain, who was ridden by his great friend Peter Fischer and later Paddy McCarthy. But his greatest triumph was when a descendant of Rannock Princess, named Smokey Lonesome, won the Gain Four-Year-Old Geldings race at Farnanes in 1993. And from a modestly bred and unraced mare named Timerry, he produced the following winners: Bealaha Bridge, Karen Mag, Lizzie Fennell, Helen Mag, Merramax, Merramar, Vanguard, Murdo McKenzie and, perhaps most famous of them all, Oscar Delta.

At Cheltenham in March 2013, Oscar Delta, trained by Jimmy Mangan and ridden by his 19-year-old daughter, Jane, had an almost unassailable lead coming over the last fence and galloping up the hill, only to hang to his left towards the far rail, swerve, jink and deposit Jane on the floor. That evening as the post mortem on the race took place, PJ was heard to say: “Well the Queen is one person who will have sympathy with me tonight and I bet she is talking about me right now!”

To the end of his days, PJ loved horses, hunting and point-to-pointing. He had the unrivalled privilege of working with so many of the top handlers in the Cork and Waterford region including Robert Hawkins, Ray Hurley, Margaret O’Sullivan, Robert Tyner, Jimmy Mangan, Terence O’Brien and Michael G Kennedy. His commitment to the continued success of point-to-pointing is illustrated by the fact that the Carbery Hunt run their annual races over his beautiful lands in Woodlands near his hometown of Bandon, Co Cork.

PJ’s wife, Helen, predeceased him and he is survived by his daughters Elaine and Karen, his brothers, Edward and Barry, his sister Marie, his grandchildren and a very wide family circle.

May he rest in peace.