ANGRY villagers watched in horror as hounds tore through gardens and killed a fox while huntsmen struggled to catch up with their pack.

The Cattistock Hunt hounds ran free in Bradford Peverell for 20 minutes before a huntsman appeared on foot to try to call them away.

Deborah Carrington claimed that one hound ran into her house after her terrified cat and tried to follow it upstairs.

She said: "I was really frightened. This hound was frantic to get after my cat and kept running from room to room.

"I couldn't get it outside and in the end I had to hit it with a broom to make it go.

"Other hounds were scrabbling at my doors to get in - it was horrible.

"It was chaos and it all went on for 30 or 40 minutes."

Mrs Carrington added that the hound was muddy and was snarling at her.

Builders working at her home helped chase the hounds off.

But they were unable to save a fox that fled from Mrs Carrington's garden and was killed in the garden across the road.

Carpenter Dean Burt saw the hounds close in on the fox as it hid behind shrubs and emerge with blood on them afterwards.

He said: "I don't know what remained of the fox - not much, I expect.

"We'd looked out of an upstairs window when we heard all the noise of the dogs and saw the fox run through Mrs Carrington's garden, double back then run on across the road.

"It was exhausted."

Mrs Carrington looked outside when she heard the hounds barking and saw her ginger cat Leo running down the garden with up to 20 hounds following.

"I opened the door for him just in time - he had nowhere to go and if I hadn't been there he would have been killed. He was terrified."

She added that the dogs broke garden pots as they jumped down from a six-foot wall.

Neighbour Angie Hunter ran out of her house after seeing six hounds race across her garden.

"I'm an animal lover and I know it's not the hounds' fault but it was awful.

"My two cats had been outside and they disappeared for a couple of hours - I was worried that one might have been the animal that was killed."

Pat Burns also saw the incident.

She said: "The huntsman did not have any control. The hounds were just everywhere - in people's gardens, across the river bank, in the river, even in a field with sheep in it."

Lucy Pinney, joint master of the Cattistock Hunt, said she was laying a trail for the hounds when they came across a real fox.

She said: "I can understand people's distress but it was an unfortunate accident.

"The hounds switched and went after the fox."

Delly Everard, Wessex regional director for the Countryside Alliance, said: "It's awful that it happened but dogs do kill animals.

"Huntsmen go to great lengths to keep hounds together because it's difficult to control them once they split up.

"I'm very sorry that people got distressed by this."

Chief Inspector Nick Maton, Dorset Police's hunt liaison officer, appealed for witnesses to contact the police.

He especially wanted to see video footage.

He said: "The key thing we will be looking into is the action of the huntsmen so we want to hear from anyone who saw any part of it, not just the killing of the fox."