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In these balmy days of sweltering heat, I think of my old cat Mr Pussy

While Londoners luxuriate in the warmth of early summer, I miss Mr Pussy who endured the hindrance of a fur coat, spending his languorous days stretched out upon the floor in a heat-induced stupor. As the sun reached its zenith, his activity declined and he sought the deep shadow, the cooling breeze and the bare wooden floor to stretch out and fall into a deep trance that could transport him far away to the loss of his physical being. Mr Pussy’s refined nature was such that even these testing conditions provided an opportunity for him to show grace, transcending dreamy resignation to explore an area of meditation of which he was the supreme proponent.

In the early morning and late afternoon, you would see him on the first floor window sill here in Spitalfields, taking advantage of the draught of air through the house. With his aristocratic attitude, Mr Pussy took amusement in watching the passersby from his high vantage point on the street frontage and enjoyed lapping water from his dish on the kitchen window sill at the back of the house, where in the evenings he also liked to look down upon the foxes gambolling in the yard.

Whereas in winter it was Mr Pussy’s custom to curl up in a ball to exclude drafts, in these balmy days he preferred to stretch out to maximize the air flow around his body. There was a familiar sequence to his actions, as particular as stages in yoga. Finding a sympathetic location with the advantage of cross currents and shade from direct light, at first Mr Pussy sat to consider the suitability of the circumstance before rolling onto his side and releasing the muscles in his limbs, revealing that he was irrevocably set upon the path of total relaxation.

Delighting in the sensuous moment, Mr Pussy stretched out to his maximum length of over three feet long, curling his spine and splaying his legs at angles, creating an impression of the frozen moment of a leap, just like those wooden horses on fairground rides. Extending every muscle and toe, his glinting claws unsheathed and his eyes widened gleaming gold, until the stretch reached it full extent and subsided in the manner of a wave upon the ocean, as Mr Pussy slackened his limbs to lie peacefully with heavy lids descending.

In this position that resembled a carcass on the floor, Mr Pussy could undertake his journey into dreams, apparent by his twitching eyelids and limbs as he ran through the dark forest of his feline unconscious where prey were to be found in abundance. Vulnerable as an infant, sometimes Mr Pussy cried to himself in his dream, an internal murmur of indeterminate emotion, evoking a mysterious fantasy that I could never be party to. It was somewhere beyond thought or language. I could only wonder if his arcadia was like that in Paolo Uccello’s “Hunt in the Forest” or whether Mr Pussy’s dreamscape resembled the watermeadows of the River Exe, the location of his youthful safaris.

There was another stage, beyond dreams, signalled when Mr Pussy rolled onto his back with his front paws distended like a child in the womb, almost in prayer. His back legs splayed to either side, his head tilted back, his jaw loosened and his mouth opened a little, just sufficient to release his shallow breath – and Mr Pussy was gone. Silent and inanimate, he looked like a baby and yet very old at the same time. The heat relaxed Mr Pussy’s connection to the world and he fell, he let himself go far away on a spiritual odyssey. It was somewhere deep and somewhere cool, he was out of his body, released from the fur coat at last.

Startled upon awakening from his trance, like a deep-sea diver ascending too quickly, Mr Pussy squinted at me as he recovered recognition, giving his brains a good shake, once the heat of the day had subsided. Lolloping down the stairs, still loose-limbed, he strolled out of the house into the garden and took a dust bath under a tree, spending the next hour washing it out and thereby cleansing the sticky perspiration from his fur.

Regrettably the climatic conditions that subdued Mr Pussy by day, also enlivened him by night. At first light, when the dawn chorus commenced, he stood on the floor at my bedside, scratched a little and called to me. I woke to discover two golden eyes filling my field of vision. I rolled over at my peril, because this provoked Mr Pussy to walk to the end of the bed and scratch my toes sticking out under the sheet, causing me to wake again with a cry of pain. I miss having no choice but to rise, accepting his forceful invitation to appreciate the manifold joys of early morning in summer in Spitalfields, because it was not an entirely unwelcome obligation.

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Mr Pussy, Water Creature

At Odds With Mr Pussy

Mr Pussy Gives his First Interview

The Ploys of Mr Pussy

Mr Pussy in the Dog Days

Mr Pussy is Ten

Mr Pussy in Winter

The Caprice of Mr Pussy

Mr Pussy in Spitalfields

Mr Pussy takes the Sun

Mr Pussy, Natural Born Killer

Mr Pussy takes a Nap

Mr Pussy’s Viewing Habits

The Life of Mr Pussy

Mr Pussy thinks he is a Dog

Mr Pussy in Spring

In the Company of Mr Pussy

Click here to order a signed copy for £15

Tessa Hunkin and the members of Hackney Mosaic Project never stop creating. Their latest masterpiece, Birds of Hoxton, was installed in the residents’ garden at Follingham Court this week, where it can be seen by passers-by walking south down Hoxton St.

Three years in the making, this ambitious diptych illustrates the ornithology of the neighbourhood with each species created by a different mosaic maker, imparting diverse personalities to each of the birds and vivid life to the completed mosaic.

Further up in Hoxton Market, decorative mosaic roundels have been installed outside Shoreditch Library, Hoxton Hall and Hoxton Garden, while just round the corner where Pitfield St meets Old St, you will find the Hoxton Varieties Mosaic from 2013. These new projects mark a return to their roots for the project, since this is where it all began with the Shepherdess Walk Mosaics back in 2012.

Tessa Hunkin is giving an illustrated talk, showing the mosaics and telling the story of the project, this Sunday 10th May at 4pm at Sutton House, Homerton High St, E9 6JQ, as part of Hackney History Festival.

Click here to buy a ticket for £3

Sutton House is the oldest house in Hackney and one of London’s few remaining Tudor mansions, built in 1535, so this is a great opportunity to pay a visit.

Roundel outside Hoxton Garden

Roundel outside Hoxton Hall

Roundel outside Shoreditch Library

Tessa Hunkin with two local councillors on the eve of the local election

The Hoxton Varieties mosaic was installed in Pitfield St in 2013

Click here to order a copy of Tessa Hunkin’s Hackney Mosaic Project

Click here to book your walk through the City of London

These are Cockney Cats by Warren Tute, with photographs by Felix Fonteyn from 1953, in the archive at Bishopsgate Institute

Micky is the centre of the Day family of Copley St in the parish of Stepney. The whole family pamper him and have a wonderful time

Bill on weekdays, William on Sundays, the cat at the Bricklayers Arms in Commercial Rd has a wonderful life since the Guv’nor Jim Meade was once a Dumb Animals’ Food Purveyor. At seventy-seven Jim looks back on a long and distinguished life in Stepney during his thirty-two years as Guv’nor.

Yeoman Warder Clark & Pickles on Tower Green

On duty at the Tower of London

The tail-less cat of the guardroom who came out to watch Pickles being photographed

Min, Port of London Authority cat has many friends among the dockers and very good ratting at night

Min of the magnificent whiskers has made her home in the office of K Warehouse in the Milwall Docks

Customs & Excise cat guards the Queen’s Warehouse and is paid a Treasury Allowance of sixpence a day

Mitzi has the run of her ship from the lifeboats to the Officers’ Mess

Old Bill the railway cat, his favourite position is the entrance to Blackfriars Station

Old Bill takes cover when necessary in the rush hour

Tibs the Great (1950-64), the official Post Office cat at Headquarters, does not normally live in this 1856 pillarbox

This cat’s curiosity unearthed a box of ancient stamps and seals, some dating back to Queen Anne

Minnie the Stock Exchange cat was a self-willed and determined kitten who adopted the dealing floor as her own preserve

Minnie enjoys the banter in the tea room

Tiger of The Times is the best office cat in Fleet St

Tiger of The Times is equally at ease whether in the Board Room …

… or doing his rounds in the Print Room

Sneaking back into Lloyds of London is difficult even for the resident cat

Cecil is the Front of House cat at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Cecil is very elusive in his many hiding places from which he has to be coaxed by the Royal Waiter before the performance can begin

When thirteen people sit down to dine at the Savoy and the thirteenth guest is Jimmy Edwards, almost anything can happen. The famous black cat is invited to occupy the fourteenth place so that everyone can enjoy the sparkling conversation.

Bill at the Tower of London (1935-47)

Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute

You may also like to take a look at

Schroedinger, Shoreditch Church Cat

Doorkins Magnificat, Southwark Cathedral Cat

East End Cats

The Cats of Spitalfields (Part One)

The Cats of Spitalfields (Part Two)

The Cats of Elder St

Blackie, the Last Spitalfields Market Cat

Today’s tour is sold out and those on Saturday 11th and Saturday 25th April only have a few tickets left, so I have added an extra Spitalfields tour on Saturday 18th April. Click here to book

Today music writer, Mat Smith, contemplates the pied wagtails of Bishopsgate. Please leave a message in the comments below if you have also observed these tenacious creatures

Bishopsgate

During the dark days of the recently-departed winter, I would see two pied wagtails fluttering and strutting their way playfully along Bishopsgate. They were usually to be found between the corner of Liverpool St Station and the entrance to Brushfield St.

Spotting them became an important part of my walk to the office each morning, just after 7am. Seeing them flying across the road or scurrying comedically along the pavement among the sleepy pedestrians was something I depended on to ensure my day started off on the right foot. They were as much a part of the street scene of my morning as Alleynaut’s poetry stickers placed mischievously on street furniture, or weary travellers being deposited from a bus bringing them in from Stansted, or the caffeine-fixated people waiting in line at Store St Espresso, or the construction workers attending to the remodelling of one of the Broadgate office buildings. These two birds were, during winter, part of my London.

Without them, London did not feel right. If I had not seen them by the time I reached the revolving doors of our office, I would begin to panic. I often worried about them flying across Bishopsgate into the path of a bus. Or getting squashed by an angry, over-tired traveller with a wonky trolley bag. Or becoming trapped inside the mechanism of the service lift clinging to the outside of the Broadgate building remodel. And yet, the next day, they were still there and I would breathe a quiet sigh of relief. All was right in my London and all was right in my world.

I noticed that people did not quite know what to make of these two plucky avian characters. One day, I passed a bus stop where a teenage girl in school uniform was idly watching noisy TikTok videos on her phone while sitting on the bench under the shelter. She had one eye on her phone screen and the other on the wagtail that was pecking occasionally at the strap of her rucksack, its long fan tail moving in concert with its inquisitive beak. It was as if the bird was trying to get her attention, and ever-so-slightly failing to do so. Another day, a guy in a suit stopped dead in his tracks as the two birds chased each other along the pavement in front of him. Another day, a street-sweeper in a yellow City of London high-visibility jacket was pushing his cart along when one of the birds landed on the edge of the cart furthest from him. The wagtail cocked its head to one side and allowed the street-sweeper to give it a breather from expending the energy it would have otherwise used tearing along the uneven paving stones outside the Bishopsgate Institute.

I have always loved pied wagtails. I think it is their tiny stature, their diminutive faces and short beaks, their ridiculously long legs and their monochrome colours. I attribute the latter to being a lover of minimalism but also because colour blindness has left me perpetually unsure of what colours I am seeing. Black and white things are, figuratively and literally, much more certain and solid for me. They inspire a sense of confidence that I can – occasionally – see the world in the same way that others are able to.

Whenever I saw this pair of pied wagtails, I would be reminded of two things. The first was a small book that my maternal grandmother gave me, a hardback volume from The Observer’s Pocket Series which surveyed the British avian population, devoting a page to each bird. I still have that book, and each page is often accompanied by sumptuous illustrations. Like most people, I have seen very few of the birds it describes. The wagtail, however, was one that I had seen. We had a regular visitor to our back garden where I grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon and it felt like a privilege to see it exploring the lawn. I do not remember seeing one anywhere else while I was growing up and that is why it felt special.

Much more than that book, seeing the Bishopsgate pied wagtails reminds me of my father, who passed away two years ago. As I come to terms with a world without him, I have begun to reflect on precisely what legacy he left me with. He never taught me how to hammer a nail into a wall, how to change a tyre, how to wire a plug, how to paint a skirting board, or how to wash a car. In fact, there are lots of things I wished he had taught me, but which he chose not to, for reasons I will now never understand.

He did, however, leave me with a solid work ethic, which explains why I can be found walking along Bishopsgate just after 7am each day to start my job, despite me living almost fifty miles away from London. The other thing he gave me was an ability to identify certain birds. He was born in a Warwickshire village after his mother had moved from her beloved East End during the Second World War. He had an undying love and passion for the East End – the area around Bell Lane, where she had gone to school in particular – and the kinetic hustle and bustle of London, all because of his mother.

But while his heart may have been forever yearning after the London he was never able to live or work in, his feet were very much planted on the ground of the Warwickshire countryside. He accumulated an enviable knowledge of wildlife, including birds, and this is undoubtedly one thing he left with me. It was my father who told me what the tiny black and white bird was when it landed in our Stratford-upon-Avon back garden. I am fairly certain I would not be able to name this species of bird today if it was not for him telling me.

And thus, whenever I would see this pair of pied wagtails on Bishopsgate, I felt a mix of emotions. I would feel joy and a lightness of spirit, the kind of uplifting, energising feeling that I needed in order to carry me through my day at work. It was like a shot of espresso carried to my lips on the monochrome wings of these funny little creatures.

For all that levity, the sighting of these two birds was also filled with a sense of enduring, poignant sadness at my father’s absence. They were a reminder that he will never again be able to excitedly identify a species of bird for me, that making my way in this complicated world is now all up to me, that I have reached the terminal limit of the knowledge he could impart to me.

As spring fought and then won its battle against the preceding season, I began to see the two birds less and less, until finally sporadic sightings gave way to a permanent absence. I assumed they were still there and still nesting nearby, and it was merely that the timing of my walk to the office from Liverpool St, and their morning routine, had become less synchronised. I did not want to think it was because of the myriad other fates that could have befallen them.

It occurred to me that their presence during the winter months, when the melancholy at my father’s absence was often at its heaviest, might indicate a sort of impending closure, that their disappearance might imply that the grieving process for my father was now complete. Maybe it is. Maybe it is not. I cannot tell. I will wait for the dark mornings on Bishopsgate to return when another autumn gives way to another winter and perhaps then I will know for certain.

From The Observer’s Book of Birds

James & Mathew Smith

Mat Smith is a music writer for Electronic Sound, Clash, Further. Pooleyville.city and Documentary Evidence. Mat has written sleeve notes for Mute, Cherry Red, BMG and Our Silent Canvas. Since 2019 he has overseen the collaborative arts project Mortality Tables

My beloved cat Schrodinger died suddenly on the night of Saturday 6th December. One moment he was happy and prancing, and the next he was gone. That evening he stretched out in front of the fire to warm himself, as was his custom, and then sat beside me on the sofa in companionship after dinner. When I went out for a walk around the neighbourhood before bed, Schrodinger followed me out of the house into the alley as he always did, settling there in the dark until my return.

When I came back, he was in the same place but slumped over and, as I approached, I could see his body was limp below the shoulders. He lifted his head and there was a brief moment of mutual recognition as I bent down, placing my hands upon him as I saw him choking and gasping for breath. Then his head twisted to one side and the life went out of him in a single exhalation. I ran my hand along his warm fur and supported the weight of his head, now that his neck was limp. The light was gone from his eyes. He was dead.

I wondered if I could had saved him if I had returned earlier, whether he had been holding out for my return. I was grateful that he did not die alone, that I did not return to discover him dead on the pavement.

I laid his head down gently and went into the house to fetch a blanket and carried him inside where I laid him on the carpet in disbelief at what had happened. I could detect no heartbeat or breath. His mouth leaked phlegm, although his body was uncorrupted, and I was expecting him to leap up into life again, but he did not. There was no curing him.

It should not have happened when he was so strong and full of life. Yet I recalled he had a seizure the day before when he threw up a large amount of phlegm. He recovered immediately, so I cleared it up and thought no more of it.

Last summer, the vet told me that Schrodinger had tooth decay and needed dental treatment but, since he had a weak heart, she would need to do further tests to see if it was possible for him to be anaesthetised and recover.

Yet there was never any diminution, Schrodinger was a bright spirit who always bounded at full strength. Maybe he slept more over the past year and there was a day recently when he slept from breakfast until dinner without awakening. I had assumed he had been out all night. But perhaps he grew old and got tired, and I had not noticed.

Schrodinger was a self-reliant creature who kept himself apart and carried the implacable mystery of his unknown origin. He was with me here in Spitalfields for seven years and lived two years before that at Shoreditch Church, where they had estimated he was two years old when he arrived from nowhere. By this reckoning he was eleven years old, though maybe he was older than anyone knew.

After making a phone call, I lifted his soft warm body into the large basket used to carry vegetables and cycled him over from Spitalfields to the veterinary surgery in Hoxton Square. It was late on Saturday night now and the streets were full with crowds celebrating loudly which jarred with Schrodinger’s final journey, gliding silently through the streets of Shoreditch and past the church where he came from.

When I told the duty vet about Schrodinger’s seizure the previous day and his weak heart, she explained that a build-up of phlegm on the lungs could be associated with a heart condition, so we concluded that he had died of heart failure. I left him there and cycled back to Spitalfields.

I thought of my father who fell asleep on the sofa after a day’s gardening at the age of seventy-nine, twenty-five years ago, and never woke up. I have known people suffer, dying slowly, and it has taught me that it is better to leave this life quickly as Schrodinger did.

But how I miss him. I miss him in the morning when I always gave him a dish of fresh water as the start to every day. I miss him waiting for me when I return to the house. I miss him jumping onto my lap whenever I sit down to write. I miss him in so many ways.

I missed him all through December. I missed him today and I shall miss him tomorrow. I shall miss him next year.

How I miss Schrodinger.

You may like to read my stories about Schrodinger

Schrodinger, Shoreditch Church Cat

A New Home for Schrodinger

The Loneliness of Schrodinger

Schrodinger Takes Charge

Schrodinger’s First Winter in Spitalfields

Schrodinger Pleases Himself

Schrodinger’s First Year in Spitalfields

The Consolation of Schrodinger

Schrodinger in Lockdown

Schrodinger Wants to Recruit Me

Schrodinger at Christmas

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This extract is from ‘Aunt Louisa’s Keepsake’ published by Frederick Warne which was given to me by Libby Hall. The copy is inscribed ‘Christmas 1896’ inside the front cover.

‘Twas Christmas-time, a dreary night,

The snow fell thick and fast,

And o’er the country swept the wind,

A keen and wintry blast.

The Robin early went to bed,

Puffed up just like a ball,

He slept all night on one small leg,

Yet managed not to fall.

No food had touched his beak,

And not a chance had he

Of ever touching food again,

As far as he could see.

The stove had not burnt very low,

But still was warm and bright,

And round the spot whereon it stood,

Threw forth a cheerful light.

Now Robin from a corner hopped,

Within the fire’s light.

Shivering and cold, it was to him

A most enchanting sight.

But he is almost starved, poor bird!

Food he must have, or die,

Unless it seems, alas! for that

Within these walls to try.

Perhaps ‘t is thought by those who read

To doubtful to be true,

That just when they were wanted so

Some hand should bread crumbs strew.

But this is how it came to pass,

An ancient dame had said,

Her legacy unto the poor

Should all be spent on bread.

Enough there was for quite a feast,

Robin was glad to find.

The hungry fellow ate them all,

Nor left one crumb behind.

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H W Petherick’s London Characters

These are the last remaining solar-powered houses made out of boxes from Whitechapel Market by Spitalfields artist Robson Cezar. If you would like one of these for £45, drop me a line to spitalfieldslife@gmail.com

Today I remember my old cat, Mr Pussy. This is an extract from the biography I wrote of him, THE LIFE & TIMES OF MR PUSSY.

On dark winter nights, Mr Pussy seldom stirred from the chimney corner. Warmed by a fire of burning pallets, he had no need of whisky to bring him solace through the dark hours, instead he frazzled his brain in a heat-induced trance. Outside in the streets, Spitalfields might have lain under snow, the paths might have been coated in sheet ice and icicles might be hanging from the gutters, but this spectacle held no interest for Mr Pussy. Like the cavemen of ancient times, his sole fascination was with the mesmerising dance of flames in the grate. And as the season descended towards its nadir in the plunging temperatures of the frozen byways, at home Mr Pussy fell into his own warm darkness of stupefaction.

When Mr Pussy grew old and the world was no longer new to him, his curiosity was ameliorated by his love of sleeping. Once he was a brat in jet black, yet he became a gentleman in a chenille velvet suit, as tufts of white hair increasingly flecked his glossy pelt. One summer, I noticed he was getting skinny and then I discovered that his teeth had gone which meant he could no longer crunch the hard biscuits that were always his delight. Extraordinarily, he made little protest at this starvation diet, even as he lost weight through lack of food. I learnt to fill his dish with biscuits and top it up with water, so that he might satisfy his hunger by supping the resulting slush. And through this simple accommodation – plus a supplement of raw meat – his weight was restored to normal and he purred in gratification while eating again.

Once Mr Pussy was a wild rover, ranging over the fields in Devon, disappearing for days on end and returning proudly with a dead rabbit in his mouth. Yet in the end, he did not step beyond the end of the alley in Spitalfields and, in sub-zero temperatures, he only ventured outside to do his necessary business. Sprinting up the stairs and calling impatiently outside the door of the living room, he was ever eager to return to the fireside and warm his cold toes afterwards, sore from scraping at the frost in the vain attempt to dig a hole in the frozen earth. Like a visionary poet, Mr Pussy acquired a vivid internal life to insulate himself against the rigours of the world and, in the absence of sunlight, the fire provided his imaginative refuge, engendering a sublime reverie of peace and physical ease.

Yet Mr Pussy still loved to fight. If he heard cats screeching in the yard, he would race from the house to join the fray unless I could shut the door first and prevent him. Even when he had been injured and came back leaking blood from huge wounds, he appeared quite unconcerned. Only two small notches in his ears persisted as permanent evidence of this violent tendency, although I regularly checked his brow for tell-tale scratches and the occasional deep bloody furrows that sometimes caused swelling around his eyes. But I could stop him going out, even though it was a matter of concern to me that – as he aged and his reflexes lessened – he might get blinded in a fight one day, losing one of his soulful golden eyes. Since he was blissfully unaware of this possibility, I had no choice but to take consolation from his response when he could not eat, revealing that Mr Pussy had no expectations of life and consequently no fear of loss. His nature was to make his best accommodation to any exigency with grace.

Be assured, Mr Pussy could still leap up onto the kitchen counter in a single bound. He could still bring in a live mouse from the garden when he pleased and delightedly crunch its skull between his jaws on the bedroom floor. If I worked late into the night, he would still cry and tug on the bed sheets to waken me in the early morning to see the falling snow. When the fancy seized him, he could be as a sprightly as a kitten. Come the spring, he would be running up trees again, even if  – in the darkest depth of winter – he only wanted to sleep by the fire.

When I was alone here in the old house in Spitalfields at night, Mr Pussy became my sole companion, the perfect accomplice for a writer. When I took to my bed to keep warm while writing my stories, he was always there as the silent assistant, curled into a ball upon the sheepskin coverlet. As the years passed and Mr Pussy strayed less from the house, I grew accustomed to his constant presence. He taught me that, rather than fear for his well-being, I needed to embrace all the circumstances and seasons that life sends, just as he did.

You may also like to read

So Long, Mr Pussy

Click here to buy a copy and have it inscribed by The Gentle Author

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This is an extract selected by Hilda Kean from her book The Great Cat & Dog Massacre – The Real Story of the Second World War’s Unknown Tragedy published by University of Chicago Press

Blue Cross rescue of a cat (Courtesy of State Library of Victoria)

Frequently we hear the Second World War described as  “The People’s War” and this phrase has become set in the public imagination, but – too often – the experiences of our own (or our relatives’) cats and dogs at the time are forgotten. Of the start of the war in September 1939, much is remembered. Certainly we remember that at the time school children were evacuated to the countryside, blackout curtains were made and even flower beds were starting to be dug up to create vegetable patches. Yet such positive action was rather different to what happened to cats and dogs at the start of the war.

In September 1939, many animals were killed by their owners. Politician Sir Robert Gower, who was also the president of the Royal Society for the Prevention of  Cruelty to Animals, argued that at the decisions of ordinary people themselves nearly 750,000 pet animals were killed. Later the RSPCA and Brigadier Clabby, the author of the official history of the Royal Army Veterinary Corps, declared that 400,000, representing around 26% of cats and dogs in London alone, pet animals were killed. And this killing happened in the first week of the war in September 1939.

These acts of killing were not imposed by the government, but were undertaken by people taking their pet animals to vets and animal charities. Yet these were not the explicit decisions of the charitable organisations. Prior to the war, the RSPCA organised a conference on horse welfare involving many organisations and – in partnership with the National Air Raid Precautions Committee and with Home Office support – set up a body “to advise on all problems affecting animals in wartime.” Vets were annoyed and, with too little involvement from the government, they issued their own literature arguing that it was their responsibility to persuade people from having their pets killed.

But at the start of the war thousands of animals were killed. The RSPCA, the oldest animal charity in the world, reported the number of dogs and cats being brought in to be destroyed had doubled at its London clinics, and wrote “the work of destroying animals was continued, day and night, during the first week of the war.” The People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals, well known for its work in East London, noted that destructors were overwhelmed by thousands of animals brought for death to its clinics. Then the National Canine Defence League, set up in the eighteen-nineties to protect dogs at a time of rabies hysteria, reported that, so extensive was the slaughter of dogs, its supplies of choloroform had been exhausted. The Battersea Dogs’ Home killed fewer than other charities, having argued in the Bow and Battersea branches that people should take their animals home. Even at London Zoo there was an initial killing of poisonous snakes, and some birds including kestrels, herons and kites that were observed flying over Regent’s Park. Yet after a few months, many zoo animals were financially sponsored and continuing their lives there at the zoo  – even including a dormouse paid for at the cost of a shilling per week !

During the war the government did much to ensure the status of dogs and cats including through BBC broadcasts. By Spring 1942, it was widely publicised that cats were doing work of “national importance.” Again the BBC would praise the NARPAC for offering  free identification discs with the animal’s own collar. Less than half-way through the war, over three and a half million animals became registered and wore large blue and white discs.

Internally, civil servants were also working busily explaining to their ministers that “dogs are not to be interfered with” and ensuring the dogs “must be fed.” As a result, dogs could eat thousands of tons of food and cats could drink gallons of milk. If the civil service was to restrict materials for the manufacturing of dog biscuits then, they concluded, people would probably substitute for them other forms of human food! Given that so many people were in favour of their pets, the civil servants allowed genuine breeding to continue. For some months, civil servants thought about increasing dog tax but recognising such a topic was unpopular, they proposed psychological factors should be taken into account. They also rejected going along with the Nazi policy for conscription of the dog population for their war effort!

Vulnerable dogs as well as cats were looked after by the sanctuary organised by the Animal Defence House near Salisbury, which drove them to the countryside from Central London. Some of the dogs were taken to the home of Nina Duchess of Hamilton where they, together with moggies and pedigree cats, found countryside premises away from the London bombing. In their diaries and even in their mass observation interviews, many men and women talked about their own animals. Thus the writer, Fryniwyd Tennyson, took in two new cats-  sharing their own food but also supporting their owner’s belief “they know nothing about war.”-

Sometimes the war situation was tragic. Thus Lilian Margaret Hart, living in Bethnal Green Rd with her husband George in the Air Raid Precautions, looked everywhere for Gyp the dog and Timmy the cat but sadly both had died in the bombing. On similar occasions others survived. Thus a parrot from Samuda St on the Isle of Dogs was kept alive in his squashed-up cage by being fed with bacon rind and crusty bread, only to give a wonderful recital of obscene language. Other animals, such as the canaries in the photograph below were rescued from a  public house in southeast London. Thus the local community in West Hampstead searched for the mother of a local cat who was found by demolition workers in the debris of a nearby shop who carried her home in a sack. She was thin but was none the worse for her ordeal! In the Poplar air raids, Rip the dog helped find victims with Mr King the local air raid warden and stayed with him next to his small allotment. Together, they regularly visited an air raid shelter comforting those sheltering. As a result of his positive actions, Rip received a Dickin medal for his bravery.

Many animals were looked after and their stories passed on to children of all ages to give them emotional support. As one respondent argued, her father had given her The Photo Book of Pretty Pets for Christmas in 1940 and she recalls “The quality of my life has been enhanced by animals.”

On some occasions, children questioned why people were carrying their pets to a vet for their destruction. As a result of one particular boy becoming upset, his family returned home with the rescued ginger cat who had been about to be killed. Others, such as the late Brian Sewell, art critic, noted the seaside killing of his own dog as a “cold, hard, vengeful aversion lodged” in his long memory.

In diaries and in the records of Mass Observation during the war many adults told their stories. As one young man said to Mass Observation, “Probably dogs do more to uphold morale among their owners than anything else.” In many diaries, animals were witnessed and encouraged. Thus, the well-known Nella Last was an enthusiast about her dog Sol and cat Mr Murphy, explaining that, “To me he is more than an animal: he has kindness, understanding and intelligence and not only knows all that is said but often reads my mind to an uncanny degree.”

Even Winston Churchill publically celebrated his black cat Nelson at 10 Downing St and his ginger cat at his Chartwell home. When Rab Butler, pioneer of the 1944 Education Act, came to his room one night while Nelson was curled up at Churchill’s feet, Winston started the conversation by expressing that, “This cat does more for the war effort than you do!”

For some years the experience of wartime animals, especially in London, had stuck in my head as I rarely found them to be included when I was reading any conventional histories of the war. In my earlier book on Animal Rights: Political and Social Change in Britain since 1800, I wrote no more than a few pages about the treatment of the animals in war. This was not through ignorance but because of the paucity of animal material. Although Angus Calder’s The People’s War had talked very briefly of the destruction of animals, his common phrase “people’s war” ignored the effect on animals in the main.

Thinking about animals and researching the diary writers, family stories, animal charities and state archives, from that time highlighted the specific plight of animals in London and the East End for me. It also demonstrated the long established (if sometimes erased ) presence of animals, as well as those only thinking themselves and their ancestors as participating in ‘the people’s war.’ Rather than forgetting about this time of varying treatment, perhaps we should choose to think in different ways, remembering cats and dogs as much as humans.

Disc of the National Air Raids Precaution Animals’ Committee

Canaries rescued from a pub in southeast London, September 1940

Joint canine and human fatigue at Southwark Rest Centre c. 1940

Dog at an East End rest centre, September 1940

Families, including children and a dog, at an emergency feeding unit in Chingford, January 1945

A hen is a victim of the bombing in Hackney

Images courtesy Bishopsgate Institute

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So Long, Mr Pussy

Libby Hall, Collector of Dog Photography

The Dogs of Old London

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Sometimes in London, I think I hear a lone dog barking in the distance and I wonder if it is an echo from another street or a yard. Sometimes in London, I wake late in the night and hear a dog calling out to me on the wind, in the dark silent city of my dreaming. What is this yelp I believe I hear in London, dis-embodied and far away? Is it the sound of the dogs of old London – the guard dogs, the lap dogs, the stray dogs, the police dogs, the performing dogs, the dogs of the blind, the dogs of the ratcatchers, the dogs of the watermen, the cadaver dogs, the mutts, the mongrels, the curs, the hounds and the puppies?

Libby Hall (1941-2023), who gathered possibly the largest collection of dog photography ever made by any single individual, helped me select the dogs of old London from her personal archive. We pulled out those from London photographic studios and those labelled as London. Then, Libby also picked out those that she believed are London. And here you see the photographs we chose. How eager and yet how soulful are these metropolitan dogs of yesteryear. They were not camera shy.

The complete social range is present in this selection, from the dogs of the workplace to the dogs of the boudoir, although inevitably the majority are those whose owners had the disposable income for studio portraits. These pictures reveal that while human fashions change according to the era and the class, dogs exist in an eternal present tense. Even if they are the dogs of old London and even if in our own age we pay more attention to breeds, any of these dogs could have been photographed yesterday. And the quality of emotion these creatures drew from their owners is such that the people in the pictures are brought closer to us. They might otherwise withhold their feelings or retreat behind studio poses but, because of their relationships with their dogs, we can can recognise our common humanity more readily.

These pictures were once cherished by the owners after their dogs had died but now all the owners have died too, long ago. For the most part, we do not know the names of the subjects, either canine or human. All we are left with are these poignant records of tender emotion, intimate lost moments in the history of our city.

The dogs of old London no longer cock their legs at the trees, lamps and street corners of our ancient capital, no longer pull their owners along the pavement, no longer stretch out in front of the fire, no longer keep the neighbours awake barking all night, no longer doze in the sun, no longer sit up and beg, no longer bury bones, no longer fetch sticks, no longer gobble their dinners, no longer piss in the clean laundry, no longer play dead or jump for a treats. The dogs of old London are silent now.

Arthur Lee, Muswell Hill, inscribed “To Ruby with love from Crystal.”

Ellen Terry was renowned for her love of dogs as much as for her acting.

W.Pearce, 422 Lewisham High St.

This girl and her dog were photographed many times for cards and are believed to be the photographer’s daughter and her pet.

Emberson – Wimbledon, Surbiton & Tooting.

Edward VII’s dog Caesar that followed the funeral procession and became a national hero.

A prizewinner, surrounded by trophies and dripping with awards.

The Vicar of Leyton and his dog.

The first dog to be buried here was run over outside the gatekeeper’s lodge, setting a fashionable precedent, and within twenty-five years the gatekeeper’s garden was filled with over three hundred upper class pets.

Libby Hall, collector of dog photographs.

Photographs copyright © The Libby Hall Collection at the Bishopsgate Institute

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Libby Hall, Collector of Dog Photography

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No-one knows where Schrodinger came from. He wandered in from the street one day and made his home in Shoreditch Church, where he lived for two years before he came to me in Spitalfields. In his vulnerability, Schrodinger learned to be lonely as a means of survival. Loneliness became his friend and his self-sufficiency protected him when life was uncertain.

On the street, Schrodinger experienced the capricious nature of humanity. He discovered their indifference to a stray cat. When the church offered Schrodinger a refuge, he spent long nights patrolling the empty building in the dark. Whenever he drew unwanted attention from dogs in the churchyard, he could escape through a metal grille into the crypt and sleep among the dusty coffins. Thus Schrodinger discovered an affinity with solitude.

When Schrodinger arrived in Spitalfields, he hid behind the old wing chair when anyone entered the room and looked over his shoulder warily while eating. If I approached him sitting on the floor, he frequently sprang up to run away – but keeping as much space around him as he did in Shoreditch Church proved a challenge in my house. He was a creature of hauteur who would not tolerate being stroked or petted and he never sought the opportunity to sit upon my lap as you might expect a cat to do.

Yet his caution was punctuated by sudden expressions of affection, especially when I presented him with plates of fresh food – as if he could not control his gratitude at such unexpected kindness. By the standards of domestic cats, Schrodinger’s expectations were low and he did not presume any privilege. Only in his sleep was he no longer vigilant. At night I came upon him taking his ease, stretched out and defenceless, even if by day he was circumspect.

These signs gave me hope that Schrodinger might overcome his loneliness and accept that he now has a permanent home where he will always be safe. I often saw him looking at me suspiciously, sizing me up. I wondered if he was questioning how long this episode of good fortune might last and whether it was only a matter of time before he was abandoned on the street again. If loneliness is his custom and source of security, Schrodinger cannot sacrifice it as long as he has uncertainty over his circumstance.

One day while I was writing at my desk, Schrodinger climbed up silently and slipped into the gap between me and the back of the chair. A round face appeared beneath my right armpit and a black tail curled round beneath my left armpit as he rubbed himself against my back and purred affectionately. Schrodinger had found a space where he fitted perfectly. Even if he still remained wary when I encountered him face to face, it was unquestionable progress.

To my delight, this new behaviour evolved quickly. So that he waited each day for me to sit at my desk and then ran to leap up, settling down there, snug between me and the back of the chair. As I sit writing now, I can feel his warmth against the small of my back. I wish I could say that he dictated stories to me but the fact is we inhabit separate reveries. We are peaceful in our mutual companionship that requires no eye contact, and I keep this private intimacy in mind when Schrodinger displays his habitual self-possession in other circumstances.

These days when I walk towards him sitting on the carpet, Schrodinger does not move out of the way in skittish discontent. He sits still, holding his ground and knowing that I will step over him or walk round. He spreads his shoulders and stretches out his front legs in the manner of the Sphinx, expressing a certain assurance in his territory and his right to be there.

As the summer has passed, Schrodinger’s confidence has grown. He will approach visitors to greet them and if I reach out a hand to him, he lifts his head up to meet it now. He knows I am not indifferent to him but I do not require him to become a cuddly domesticated subordinate either.We can exchange glances, even if he is more comfortable inhabiting his implacable vigil.

I observe Schrodinger’s internal isolation ebbing away as he becomes accustomed to his new life with me in Spitalfields, yet I respect his dignified self-possession, his remote sufficiency and his introspection. Loneliness shaped Schrodinger’s personality and it has endowed him with courage and strength of character. Loneliness is an essential part of Schrodinger’s nature. Schrodinger’s loneliness is his wisdom.

You may like to read my earlier story about Schrodinger

A New Home for Schrodinger

Order this handsome collection of stories of my old cat THE LIFE & TIMES OF MR PUSSY, A Memoir Of A Favourite Cat