Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 9th Baronet of Killerton in Devon and Holnicote in Somerset, was a prominent landowner and member of the West Country gentry. He was especially noted for his passion for staghu
Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 9th Baronet (1752–1794). By British (English) School, Collection of National Trust, Killerton House
Acland as a boy, portrait by Richard Phelps
Stalls in stable block built by Acland at Holnicote. The thirty stag heads on the walls date from about 1787 to 1793 and were killed under his mastership of the Devon and Somerset Staghounds. A similar collection of stag heads amassed by his father the 7th Baronet, and much beloved by the latter, was destroyed during a fire at Holnicote in 1779
Loose boxes in stable block built by Acland at Holnicote, with his stag head trophies
The red deer of Exmoor have been hunted since Norman times, when Exmoor was declared a Royal Forest. Collyns stated the earliest record of a pack of Staghounds on Exmoor was 1598. In 1803, the "North
Edward II Dyke (d. 1746), portrait circa 1741 attributed to Thomas Hudson (1701–1779), National Trust, Collection of Dunster Castle
Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 7th Baronet (1723–1785) painted in 1767 by Sir Joshua Reynolds. The bloodline of the large staghound with its head on his knee was lost when the pack was sold to Germany in 1824, and later rebuilt from foxhounds. Two identical versions exist, both owned by the National Trust, one at Saltram House, the other at Killerton House, both in Devon