Comments on: Blackie, the Last Spitalfields Market Cat

By: Bill

Bill — Wed, 13 Oct 2021 00:40:06 +0000

“…so black she was like a dark hole in the world running round on legs…”

So right, Susan, that line has real distinction.

By: Sue Theobald

Sue Theobald — Sun, 17 May 2020 12:16:38 +0000

Loving this on cats…my cat, Molly, who is sitting on my lap in the garden, especially admires Blackie – would have love her as a tough friend…Molly is 18.

By: Karl Sheridan

Karl Sheridan — Sun, 15 Sep 2019 10:15:06 +0000

Interesting. I write feline adventures about a bunch of cats that live in Cornwall and get up to all sorts of things – foiling catnappers, helping a white witch, stopping a bank robbery and so on. Obviously they are only cats and have limited powers of course. The thing is one of my group of cats is called Blackie – a careworn all black alley cat that lives by his wits. He mixes with the others and is very rough and ready but streetwise.

By: Alexandra Marier

Alexandra Marier — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 14:41:28 +0000

Animals can certainly have very imposing, magnificent personalities. It’s very touching how everyone in the neighbourhood knew, loved and appreciated Blackie for what she was. What a splendid story! Thank you.

By: jeannette

jeannette — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 04:44:32 +0000

i missed this one first time around. wonderful to think of a working cat being so instrumental, and to think of the people of spitalfields each taking her in, in turn. as always, you persuade people to dig out and part with the pix, too. wonderful work.

By: kim

kim — Mon, 23 May 2011 05:18:13 +0000

I also have a black cat named blackie and they look very similar and have the same temperment too!

By: Susan

Susan — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 06:27:20 +0000

Sometimes you have to reread a line to fully savor it:

“…so black she was like a dark hole in the world running round on legs…”

If I were a market cat, I’d print that on my calling card!

By: angelladee

angelladee — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 13:01:47 +0000

Even though I have to accept that most of our cats and dogs will die before us I still had a little cry reading this wonderrfull story. I spent a lot of my teenage years working on my local farm where we had a feral colony of small Black Cats. Adel Mill farm(N’Leeds) was at least 400 yrs old and used to be a hub for all the other farms in the area as we had a river dam and a grinding wheel for wheat and barley.(years before my time and the invention of electricity). These feral cats lived all over the many hey lofts . At milking time, morning and evening we would put down a churn top of fresh milk and the felines would come running and get their fill. Sometimes there would be as many as thirteen girl cats drinking. Thats all we gave them as they lived off all the vermin that the farm provides. Rarely did we see males as they roam. Every 6 months males would return and serve the females. Imagine ten cats all having kittens at the same time. My job was to search out all the litters and box them up for the vet to humanely cull. This was neccessary to keep the colony healthy and strong. If too many kittens were kept then the colony would get too big and decease could spread through them as there would be more competition for the food! I hated doing this, but it is part of our job to manage the countryside and keep there numbers reasonable! These small, short haired black cats all had a little diamond of white on their necks so were distinguishable and you could often see some of their relatives that had been domesticated when delivering the milk around our village of Adel. Just before I left my job at the Mill farm I found a couple of kittens of a different colour in amongst all the other kittens. We decided to keep these little fawn ones as we thought it time for some new blood. You cant interbreed forever as the off~spring would get smaller and smaller and weaker and weaker. Now I live in Islington and I have 3 cats. Needless to say, one of them”Spitz” is a big black cat. He is the youngest of my 3 cats. My dog “Harley” died recently and he was the well known big black lurcher cross dog of Brick Lane on Sundays. We used to work at a coffee shop,(coffe@) slap bang in the middle of Brick Lane. Everyone knew him as he was so friendly and such fun. He is sorely missed by me and many others who had the privaledge to meet him. I still haven’t written about his life as I have found the memory of his death too emotional, but soon I must!
Thanx for bringing back such loverly memories, all my love Angella~Dee x x