Grosvenor Merle-Smith was born in Winchester, Virginia, and grew up over the Blue Ridge Mountains in Middleburg, Virginia, the heart of fox hunting in America. After college he started actually whipping-in to a pack of hounds. From there, he whipped-in to Andrew Barclay at Greenspring Valley in Maryland before moving back to Virginia as Kennel Huntsman for the Keswick Hunt. The next move took his family to the Golden Vale Hunt in Ireland where he spent over a decade hunting in County Tipperary. He was asked to return to Virginia and, as Master, developed a superior pack, very successfully hunting the Bull Run country for six seasons. Grosvenor lives in Virginia on a lovely farm and on hunting days now follows three of the local packs in an electric Polaris. He has a wife, Rosie, and two children, all very capable riders, and enjoys his hunting in part vicariously through their tales of the day.