The Bareve German Wirehaired Pointers are owned by Sharon Pinkerton and are based in rural North Lincs.
At an early age Sharon had seen a photo in a library book of an attractive, yet rugged, medium sized Gundog breed and on closer inspection found the breed to be “the German Wirehaired Pointer”. Having contacted the Kennel Club she was disappointed to find that there were none registered in the UK so rather reluctantly couldn’t make any progress with the breed. In one of the pre-Crufts publications was a small classified advert from the Wittekind Kennels advertising that the GWP breed had arrived in the UK with newly imported stock and Mienicke Mills De Hoog was also advertising young male Wirehairs plus a litter was being planned.
Wittekind Bennie joined Bareve in the autumn of 1977 which was the first Wirehair to be shown by Sharon. Unfortunately due to his age and lack of socialising Bennie didn’t take to the show ring and found strangers who approached him in an attempt to judge him too scary so with the greatest of disappointment he was returned to Mienicke. The perfect gentleman at home but just not happy around strangers he was then given to Major George Wilkinson (who added Andesheim onto his KC name) who taught him to work as both a Gundog, winning a FT award, and his devoted deer stalking dog.
In October 1978 the Pinkerton family travelled to the GSP Open show to meet Mienicke who had got a 6wk daughter from Bennie for us to collect as a replacement for Bennie. Little did we know that this little, confident bundle of energy would become such an important part of both the breed history in the UK and in establishing the Bareve line. She was utterly fearless as she trotted around the car park, meeting people, dogs and cars and both Barbara and Sharon trying to keep her safe – she really was just 6 wks old! So Wittekind Eva Braun at Bareve travelled home to Rutland and started the most amazing journey of record creating successes, happiness, fulfilment, sadness and moments of reflection that comes with living with the German Wirehaired Pointer.
The early days of showing the GWP wasn’t straightforward and as they were deemed to be a rare breed so many shows simply did not provide breed classes hence our initial show experience was in the AV Not Separately Classified classes. One of the first shows ever to classify the breed was the Hammersmith Gold Medal Open show held initially at The Alexander Palace in London and then at the Ardingly Showground. Imagine the journey from Rutland to Ardingly, for an open show, back in the day when there was no M25 just the trusted North Circular Road right through London !!
Along with the other early dedicated breed enthusiasts we took every opportunity to promote the breed at dog and horse shows, game fairs and any other countryside events. Interested parties came together to create “Founder members” who were signed up, committee formed and the German Wirehaired Pointer Club was founded to ensure that the breed was given the opportunity to be promoted as a proven working Gundog and to become recognised as such.
In 1986 the Kennel Club decided that the breed was to be given Championship Status and it is testament to the quality of the original dogs shown in the UK that the first ever Show Champion was Ruth & Doug Martin Sh Ch Wiggmansburg Leonardo of Sunhouse and the first ever Sh Ch bitch was Barbara & Sharon Pinkerton’s Sh Ch Wittekind Eva Braun at Bareve who gained her title just weeks short of her 8th birthday – both big winners in the breed in the early 1980’s.
Since then many years have passed and there have now been 64 Bareve owned/bred UK Champion GWP’s who have won over 530 CC’s. From the mid 1990’s Sharon’s partner was a shooting man who was part of several shoot syndicates around the Leicestershire area. Initially going as a guest Sharon soon started training one of the GWP’s so that she could stand with Ray and pick up his shot birds. One of the most helpful people to take time and teach Sharon the finer points of working the GWP was Peter Lomasney. Peter and his son Matthew were rough shooting people with a passion of falconry which was why they added a GWP to their family. Peter and Kath were the proud owners of the first ever Full Champion GWP bitch in the breed – Champion Bareve Frau Holle- another milestone in the breeds history.
Sharon’s first FT award was a COM with Ch Bareve Bramble back in 1993 and she has continued to train and work as many of her Wirehairs to ensure they kept their true “dual purpose” credentials. To this end there have been 13 Full Champion Bareve GWP’s, and other Bareve owned/bred dogs have won over 30 FT awards from Novice to Open FT level.
Sadly Barbara passed away in March 2014 and Alec in January 2017 but Sharon has continued with the plans they had talked about over the years incorporating existing lines with some “frozen” stud dogs and the success continues.
The Bareve Show wins and major successes have been record making and without doubt lead the way in the show ring. 64 UK Champions, winning over 530 CC’s in the UK, Breed Record holder both Male and Female, the only all breed Championship BIS winner, 21 different Bareve bred/owned GWP with 33 UK Championship show Group wins and numerous Championship show Group placings, first ever Show Champion Bitch, first ever Champion bitch, first JW both old and new style (versions upto and including 2000), first Championship Group winner etc
Most importantly is that the Bareve Wirehairs continue to prove themselves as being truly dual purpose, with the most excellent and trustworthy temperaments and health.