Charlotte Smith

Location: East Yorkshire

Affiliation: Hull Wildlife Protectors, Protect the Wild, Rehome the Hounds

Charlotte Smith, an active supporter of Protect the Wild and a notable figure in their campaign Rehome the Hounds, has been caught in quite a pickle. She was spotted at the LACS rally on 9 May outside Westminster handling a foxhound, posing with speakers and hunt sab supporters Peter Egan, Chris Packham and Megan McCubbin.

The hound, named Canvas, was later revealed in a Telegraph article to have been stolen from a pack in Somerset, recognised by its hunt for its distinctive markings and missing front toe. The Taunton Vale Hunt, from which Canvas was taken, has written to Protect the Wild to ask for their animal to be returned safely, asking for a written account explaining who supplied the hound and who brought it to the event. Protect the Wild has not responded.

Smith and the Stolen Dog

Questions are circulating about Smith’s precise involvement and how she came to be in possession of this stolen animal. According to The Telegraph article, the hound is alleged to have been stolen by a member of the public and then handed over to hunt saboteurs.

Whilst it has not been stated that Smith was involved in this operation, her social media history does raise questions about her connection.

In early May, BTM noticed that Smith’s Facebook included revealing photos of Canvas and her other dog on a walk. Strangely, neither of those posts can be found on her feed today. Why would she delete pictures of this animal now, if there was nothing to conceal?

A Sham Campaign?

Smith loudly advocates for Rehome the Hounds, a campaign that intends to demonstrate, through carefully selected case studies, just how effortless it supposedly is to rehome hounds.

We have, however, noticed something rather peculiar about this campaign. Its mascot is the very animal Smith was seen with at the LACS rally, its face emblazoned across banners, posters, and photographs. Yet for all its prominence as the face of Protect the Wild’s propaganda campaign, this hound has no case study on the website. ‘Canvas’ is nowhere to be seen.

We are sure readers would be very curious to learn about the rehoming history of Canvas – including how she came to be removed from her home with the Taunton Vale Hunt and placed in the ‘care’ of hunt sabs. According to huntsman Jack Harris, “Canvas had been part of the family for the last six years” before she had been stolen.

The Curious Incidents of the Dogs in the Hunt Pack

Our investigations continued. One of the hounds featured on the site, Alfred, is not what the campaign claims. Protect the Wild maintained he was an “unclaimed stray” from Lincolnshire, but the hound was recognised by its owners at the Belvoir Hunt as Genial, according to the Telegraph. Lincolnshire Police are now investigating its disappearance after a photograph surfaced from Protect the Wild last month.

So, what exactly is the system being constructed here? It appears to be a hound rehoming campaign sourcing its next pitiable story by the simplest means available: taking hounds from the very hunts it sabotages. The animals are destabilised and uprooted, and the hunts they were taken from are then cast as the abusers.

Set the deceit aside, and the campaign still does not make sense. Rehome the Hounds has appointed itself the improbable mission of rehoming all 12,000 hounds in the UK, on the premise that a ban on trail hunting would otherwise see every one of them euthanised.

While some households, like those featured on the website, may be able to accommodate these pack animals, this is unlikely to be the case for most UK homes. Animal shelters are already stretched beyond capacity, and the arrival of 12,000 hounds will scarcely alleviate the strain. As of May 2026, the RSPCA describes animal shelters as "full to bursting". 

A CV of Hypocrisy

Beyond misguided campaigning and maybe even keeping a hound in hiding, Smith is a bog-standard hunt saboteur with far too much time on her hands. She is well acquainted with several sab groups, among them North London Hunt Saboteurs, Manchester Hunt Saboteurs, Sheffield Hunt Saboteurs, York Anti-Hunt League, Ryedale Hunt Saboteurs, Cheshire Monitors, and Welsh Border Wildlife Protectors.

She has been reported to employ familiar hunt sab tactics, such as the spraying of citronella, a substance toxic to dogs, to lure the hounds off the laid trail. So while she rails against hound cruelty within the hunts, she is quietly poisoning them as she disrupts an entirely lawful pursuit. She’s also been reported to have committed aggravated trespass and to have harassed hunt supporters whilst out.

One might hope the coming generation of hunt sabs would embrace fresh methods and conduct themselves with rather more sophistication when disturbing our countryside, yet old habits evidently die hard. Smith's tendency to conflate animal-loving activism with disruption and deceit is a pattern we have witnessed many times before, and one that grows no more convincing with repetition.

The Hound Scheme

Whilst most graduates look to land a professional opportunity with a competitive salary and promising company benefits, Smith dampens her CV with Protect the Wild daubed all over it. And clearly, what terrible influence they are having on her, supporting the theft of registered animals and concealing it all as rescuing the endangered foxhounds.

Rehome The Hounds is yet another technique for sabs to criminalise hunts by feeding lies to their followers without ever thinking about the damning consequences of their thoughtless propaganda. Given the police are likely to investigate this story, it seems Smith will have to get her story straight and her facts in order.