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Military Cats, Part 1: Spies and Mascots · Ridiculous History

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
0:27
Speaker 1: back to the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always
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Speaker 1: so much for tuning in. That's our one and only
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Speaker 1: super producer, Max Williams. They call me Ben. My voice
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Speaker 1: maybe a bit dark night today because Nolan I have
0:43
Speaker 1: returned from an adventure. It's true. We talked a lot
0:47
Speaker 1: to a lot of people for a lot of time.
0:50
Speaker 1: I had a conference called Podcast Movement. It was a
0:52
Speaker 1: lot of fun. Hear me, I sound like the kid
0:55
Speaker 1: of the Taco Bell drive through. Um No, no shade
0:58
Speaker 1: on that kid. Ums. He's going to grow into himself.
1:02
Speaker 1: His voice will change eventually. But I'm not supposed to
1:04
Speaker 1: tell it that I'm thirty eight years old. I also
1:06
Speaker 1: had a birthday, so I'm officially an old old man.
1:10
Speaker 1: And if you're hearing this the day it comes out,
1:13
Speaker 1: then my birthday is tomorrow, so I'm going to be
1:16
Speaker 1: a little bit older if you're listening to this later.
1:20
Speaker 1: But yes, happy New Year, Noel, Happy New Year to
1:23
Speaker 1: all our fellow Leo's in the crowd. Uh. Today's episode
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Speaker 1: is not about podcast Movement. It's not really about birthdays.
1:32
Speaker 1: It's about one of humanities. Two of humanity's earliest inventions,
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Speaker 1: domestication and war. I thought you were gonna say cats
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Speaker 1: were one of humanity's earliest inventions, and that would have
1:44
Speaker 1: been cool, because I was not aware that cats were automatons,
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Speaker 1: although it doesn't really surprise me. Well, you know, there's
1:49
Speaker 1: an interesting thing about domestication. A very few animals have
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Speaker 1: actually been domesticated by humans, and there's this really great
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Speaker 1: argument that cats actually domesticated themselves. They just started hanging
2:03
Speaker 1: out chasing vermin and they were Um, they're in a
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Speaker 1: little bit less of a symbiotic relationship, you might say,
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Speaker 1: than one where it doesn't really hurt people to have
2:15
Speaker 1: them around toxoplasmosis aside, but it really helps the cats. However,
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Speaker 1: as as you know, a long time ridiculous historians, Max
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Speaker 1: Noel and I are all ourselves friends of the feline.
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Speaker 1: We have cats that live with us. Nol. I believe
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Speaker 1: you just got a new cat. Is that correct? Well,
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Speaker 1: it's a kitten. Her name is Vanessa Williams Carlton Jr.
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Speaker 1: The Third, a k little skips and she's a bit
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Speaker 1: of a terror, but a lovely terror. You know how
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Speaker 1: kittens are They You can't really teach them anything. I
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Speaker 1: don't think I could domesticate this thing to save my life.
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Speaker 1: I pretty much feel like that's accurate what you said.
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Speaker 1: Better Day kind of domesticated themselves, and they're in a
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Speaker 1: little bit more of a parasitic relationship with us as
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Speaker 1: humans than a symbiotic. We basically provide them food and water,
3:02
Speaker 1: and they daigned to kind of hang around us when
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Speaker 1: they feel like it. Yeah, yeah, sometimes. So in a
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Speaker 1: previous episode, we had talked about our cats as well, Uh,
3:14
Speaker 1: you know, shout out to uh my cats. One with
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Speaker 1: dozens of names. His original was, we are shadow people
3:21
Speaker 1: that didn't fly with a lot of folks. And then
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Speaker 1: the other cat, dr Bankman, uh and Max, what's your
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Speaker 1: cat's name? Let's go ahead and give him shout up.
3:28
Speaker 1: Oh my cat's name. Her name is Sylvia. Sylvia. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: she's amazing, all right. So just that I shouted out
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Speaker 1: our cats, let's talk about some other cats. As we
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Speaker 1: were saying in a in a previous episode, we talked
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Speaker 1: about the bizarre and fascinating history of animals in the
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Speaker 1: world's militaries. And you think of when you think of this,
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Speaker 1: you probably think of like an old black and white
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Speaker 1: picture of you know, something like Colonel's scooter boots and
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Speaker 1: it's like a you know, an otter or something with
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Speaker 1: a hat. Stuff like that does happen. And usually when
4:07
Speaker 1: we think of animals in warfare, we're thinking of things
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Speaker 1: like horses. In the days before the internal combustion engine,
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Speaker 1: we're thinking about dogs who have always been hanging out
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Speaker 1: with humanity during uh some of the best things we've
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Speaker 1: ever done and some of the worst. But we might
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Speaker 1: not always think of cats. And as it turns out,
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Speaker 1: cats have been involved in war since the days of
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Speaker 1: ancient Egypt all the way up to the days of Iraq,
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Speaker 1: and they will probably be somehow involved in war in
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Speaker 1: the future. Unbelievable. But when we say they're used in
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Speaker 1: war or they hang with humans during times of war,
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Speaker 1: which might be more accurate, what does that really mean? Noal,
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Speaker 1: are they like radio operators? Are they you know, work
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Speaker 1: in the mess hole? Yeah, it's a good question. But
4:55
Speaker 1: and I just want to have a quick nerd aside.
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Speaker 1: I've been playing this the cool game on the Switch
5:01
Speaker 1: called Monster Hunter Rise, and in it you have two
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Speaker 1: animal companions. They're called buddies, and one of them as
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Speaker 1: a cat um I think they call them palcos or
5:11
Speaker 1: maybe that's the dog. But anyway, the cat actually like
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Speaker 1: does stuff for you on the regular, like gathers supplies
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Speaker 1: for you, like you know, different elements that are out
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Speaker 1: in the battlefield while you're finding these monsters. And it
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Speaker 1: also like grows these like trees that like bear this
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Speaker 1: fruit that gives you, uh, you know, energy back if
5:28
Speaker 1: you're getting a beating. Um. So, you know, I wonder
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Speaker 1: if it's based on the history of cats in battle.
5:35
Speaker 1: It has little kitty armor and everything that you can customize.
5:37
Speaker 1: It is quite adorable. But cats, as we likely all know,
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Speaker 1: we're hugely revered in ancient Egypt. Uh. Scientists in fact
5:47
Speaker 1: have uncovered more than three hundred thousand mummified cat remains,
5:52
Speaker 1: and much like you know the sacred cows of India,
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Speaker 1: killing cats in ancient Egypt was a absolute high crime
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Speaker 1: that could get you executed. The Egyptians loved cats so much,
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Speaker 1: in fact, that the Persians turned against them because they
6:14
Speaker 1: were somewhat distrustful of this relationship that the Egyptians had
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Speaker 1: with cats. Um. So one of the earliest examples of
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Speaker 1: cats being used in war came from the Persians. UH.
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Speaker 1: The king of Persia at the time, King Canvassess. The
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Speaker 1: second Um used the Egyptian god of cats, bass Set
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Speaker 1: as almost like a psy ops technique against the Egyptians
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Speaker 1: who feared and revered this god or this goddess. Yeah, yeah,
6:43
Speaker 1: that's right. The what they did is they took a
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Speaker 1: symbol representing Bastet and painted it on their shields, and
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Speaker 1: they also let cats run amuck and loose in the battlefield.
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Speaker 1: There was a law in Egypt during this time that
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Speaker 1: said Egyptians could not hurt nor kill cats, so left
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Speaker 1: at a loss, they just surrendered. According to the story
7:08
Speaker 1: and this um, going back to the original question, I posed,
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Speaker 1: what we're cats doing? Uh, this is a great example
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Speaker 1: of weaponizing feelnes. But for a long time, across the
7:19
Speaker 1: span of human civilizations, cats also worked unofficially as pest control.
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Speaker 1: Think about it. You know, food is one of the
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Speaker 1: big determining constraints of armies in ancient days and in
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Speaker 1: modern days, and so if you have a cat that
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Speaker 1: can keep the population of rats and vermin down, then
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Speaker 1: you will be able to have a more effective army.
7:44
Speaker 1: They'll also help prevent the spread of disease. So that's
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Speaker 1: that's one of the things cats could do. They were
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Speaker 1: often you know, adopted as like mascots. Uh. And then
7:54
Speaker 1: you know what's interesting about the Egyptian example is that
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Speaker 1: this really is, as he's said, psychological warfare. This leads
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Speaker 1: us to some other examples. What what we'd like to
8:07
Speaker 1: do in part one of this two part episode is
8:09
Speaker 1: to explore other instances of heroic cats who really made
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Speaker 1: the difference for human militaries. Uh. And we'll we'll list
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Speaker 1: off several different little buddies throughout throughout this episode. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: let's let's start with Unfortunately we don't know the names
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Speaker 1: of all the cats and that ancient war between the
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Speaker 1: Persians and the Egyptians at the Battle of Pellusium, but
8:37
Speaker 1: we do know some of these cats that came along
8:40
Speaker 1: later by name. One that I particularly love just as
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Speaker 1: a name. We love nicknames on this show Crime and
8:47
Speaker 1: Tom Crime and Tom was as you might imagine a
8:52
Speaker 1: Tom cat. And he really comes onto the scene in
8:56
Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds when he helped the French and British
9:00
Speaker 1: who were almost starving actually find some food during the
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Speaker 1: Crimean War. That's right, And if you go to this
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Speaker 1: amazing list on mental flaw six heroic military cats by
9:12
Speaker 1: Jackie mean you can actually see an image of Crime
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Speaker 1: and Tom's very surprised looking taxidermied remains. Uh So that's
9:21
Speaker 1: how much love there was for Crime and Tom come
9:25
Speaker 1: a long way. It really has. It's it's a very
9:27
Speaker 1: unsettling uh post. Let's just say our expression. So there
9:31
Speaker 1: was this year long siege of Sevastopol by British and
9:36
Speaker 1: French troops and when the city finally fell to those forces, Uh,
9:41
Speaker 1: there was mass starvation. It was a really bad scene. Um.
9:45
Speaker 1: And Lieutenant William Gare of the British side was looking
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Speaker 1: for food in a Russian cellar when he saw this
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Speaker 1: cat Tom sitting on a pile of debris and absolutely
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Speaker 1: just everard and grime and dust and you know, all
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Speaker 1: of the nasty stuff that goes along with sacking a city.
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Speaker 1: And this military man named him Tom, and he brought
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Speaker 1: him to his camp and he was you know, taken
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Speaker 1: care of and fed and all of that good stuff.
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Speaker 1: And then the British followed Tom into the city to
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Speaker 1: see where he might be getting all of these mice
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Speaker 1: that he seemed so well fed on, and he actually
10:30
Speaker 1: led them to a storehouse where they found a lot
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Speaker 1: of food where they found, you know, like these kind
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Speaker 1: of surplus supplies of rations and that's when Tom kind
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Speaker 1: of became the symbol in this hero and Lieutenant Gare
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Speaker 1: brought Tom back to England with him after the war.
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Speaker 1: And as I said before, when Tom passed away in
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Speaker 1: eighteen fifty six, he had the cat's remains Taxi German
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Speaker 1: and donated to the Royal United Services Instant Tuition, where
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Speaker 1: the cat was then dubbed crimean Tom. Yeah, this is
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Speaker 1: where we may have an explanation for the surprise on
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Speaker 1: this cat's face, because you see, if you look at
11:12
Speaker 1: the picture of Crime and Tom, as Noel mentioned there
11:17
Speaker 1: on cat war heroes over mental flaws, you will see
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Speaker 1: the cat looks surprised. And that's because this tax German cat,
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Speaker 1: the one that's in the National Army Museum's collection, was
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Speaker 1: purchased at a flea market almost a hundred years later
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Speaker 1: in the nineteen fifties. So we don't know whether or
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Speaker 1: not it's the actual facts Crime and Tom, So it
11:39
Speaker 1: might have just been a very surprised cat who just
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Speaker 1: posthumously became a war hero. But Crime and Tom, as
11:53
Speaker 1: we said, is exceptional in that he has a name
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Speaker 1: and has been specifically identified, whether or not that's his
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Speaker 1: actual body. When we go forward just a little bit
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Speaker 1: further in World War One, we see that cats are
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Speaker 1: everywhere in a time of war. Cats are used often
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Speaker 1: just like a way to decompress, a way to combat
12:17
Speaker 1: the PTSD of surviving trench warfare. Uh. And of course
12:21
Speaker 1: they're catching mice and rats, and then they're kind of
12:25
Speaker 1: morale boosters, you know, like in the US we have this, uh,
12:29
Speaker 1: this thing called the U s O or we have
12:31
Speaker 1: this thing called the U s O. And that's where
12:33
Speaker 1: they would fly out entertainers and dancers to try to
12:36
Speaker 1: raise people's morale during conflicts, and cats are like a
12:40
Speaker 1: smaller version of that. There's uh, there's some great articles
12:44
Speaker 1: on r d dot com which lists out military cats.
12:48
Speaker 1: And they talked to a guy named Dorin Cart who
12:52
Speaker 1: is the senior curator the National World War One Museum
12:56
Speaker 1: and Memorial over in Missouri in Kansas City, and Court
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Speaker 1: says that there was one medical officer in the British Forces,
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Speaker 1: a guy named Lieutenant Philip Gross, who wrote about his
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Speaker 1: pet cat in nineteen fifteen and said she was quote
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Speaker 1: very intelligent and affectionate the most confidential cat I ever knew,
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Speaker 1: and was forever whispering something in my ear which I
13:19
Speaker 1: could never quite catch. While I was writing. She would
13:22
Speaker 1: come and sit very close beside me and read what
13:25
Speaker 1: I wrote and per loudly. You can, Yeah, you can
13:29
Speaker 1: also see like a multiple pictures of people from World
13:33
Speaker 1: War One, like whole groups of soldiers proudly posing with
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Speaker 1: their cat, which is like, you know, that's a nice
13:41
Speaker 1: break from the horrors of conflict. I would say, no question.
13:45
Speaker 1: It reminds me of not to get back to podcast movement.
13:47
Speaker 1: Every year I've been I don't know who does this,
13:50
Speaker 1: some podcast adjacent company, but there's like a puppy snuggling station,
13:56
Speaker 1: very popular attraction. But again, it's weird that all I
13:59
Speaker 1: remember is that it's a puppy snuggling station and nothing
14:03
Speaker 1: about what it's advertising. So maybe not as effective in
14:06
Speaker 1: that department, but it kind of reminds me of that
14:08
Speaker 1: type of deal. Yeah, same dude, same We know that.
14:13
Speaker 1: I think we mentioned little earlier. Cats can be kind
14:16
Speaker 1: of like mascots. A lot of animals can, and according
14:20
Speaker 1: to cart the most famous mascots during World War One
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Speaker 1: were a pair of not house cats, but lion cubs
14:29
Speaker 1: for the Lafayette Eska Drill, which is a French flying
14:33
Speaker 1: unit that was oddly enough made up of American volunteers.
14:36
Speaker 1: They were named I love this whiskey and soda. That's adorable. Man.
14:42
Speaker 1: People drank a lot back then. Um. Do you think
14:44
Speaker 1: if you got if you became friends with lions when
14:46
Speaker 1: their cubs and just kind of hung out with them
14:48
Speaker 1: throughout their life, they'd be cool to you when they
14:49
Speaker 1: were adults, or they still want to eat you alive.
14:52
Speaker 1: It's a hundred percent, but usually um, depending on how
14:57
Speaker 1: they are reared. It is such a bummer. But I
15:00
Speaker 1: have to say this, Uh, I expect my fun police
15:03
Speaker 1: badge in the mail. Responsible zoologists. Lions are wild animals.
15:09
Speaker 1: They are not domesticated. Wild animals can be tamed in
15:13
Speaker 1: specific instances, but it is important to note that on
15:18
Speaker 1: a one on one unarmed p VP situation, a lion
15:22
Speaker 1: will absolutely mop the floor with you. It will not
15:25
Speaker 1: take long. You can be on good terms with them,
15:28
Speaker 1: but always be aware. You know what I mean, don't
15:30
Speaker 1: turn your back what I'm saying. Let's not forget too
15:33
Speaker 1: that you know cats. Given Let's say you live alone
15:37
Speaker 1: and you you know sadly pass and no one finds
15:41
Speaker 1: you for a while. The cats will eat you when
15:43
Speaker 1: your smell changes, because cats, like dogs, are very smell oriented.
15:49
Speaker 1: So we we said, there are a lot of pictures.
15:51
Speaker 1: We we can also see photos of German soldiers, you know,
15:56
Speaker 1: on the other side of the war, they're in the trenches.
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Speaker 1: You can see pictures of them with their kitty mascots.
16:02
Speaker 1: And then we also know that cats were so common
16:05
Speaker 1: animals in general were so common during World War One.
16:08
Speaker 1: Let's remember that some intelligence agencies decided to use them
16:14
Speaker 1: as spies. So on the British side, at least twice
16:19
Speaker 1: officers accused cats of being German spies. But as as
16:24
Speaker 1: r d dot com points out, historians nowadays largely believed
16:29
Speaker 1: the cats were not spies. They were just probably trying
16:31
Speaker 1: to get some scritches, trying to get some mice. But
16:35
Speaker 1: this continues right Noll into World War Two, where we
16:38
Speaker 1: have a few incredibly heroic cats in the historical record.
16:43
Speaker 1: That you have a hero cat, it makes me think
16:45
Speaker 1: of that episode of Nathan for You where he uh
16:48
Speaker 1: does the whole viral YouTube stunt with the hero pig
16:51
Speaker 1: who rescues the drowning baby goat maybe I think anyway,
16:56
Speaker 1: check that up said if you haven't seen it, but
16:58
Speaker 1: it's true, and a lot of this that where we've
16:59
Speaker 1: got a couple of we've already sided with mental flaws.
17:01
Speaker 1: There's a really cool list of heroic cats who served
17:04
Speaker 1: in the military by Melissa Mills on Reader's Digest. But
17:08
Speaker 1: it wasn't just cats that the military was fond of
17:11
Speaker 1: using in warfare. It actually used dogs as well as pigeons,
17:17
Speaker 1: horses a little more obvious, and mules. And this comes
17:20
Speaker 1: from Tony M. Kaiser, who's the assistant director for Collections
17:24
Speaker 1: and Management at the National World War Two Museum in
17:28
Speaker 1: New Orleans, and he says the following. He says, cats
17:32
Speaker 1: were definitely one of the more common animals, along with dogs,
17:35
Speaker 1: used as mascots and adopted as pets, but they often
17:38
Speaker 1: played a useful role as well. Cats were often kept
17:41
Speaker 1: to keep down rodent populations and even some insects populations
17:46
Speaker 1: on posts around mess or dining halls, and often aboard ships. Um.
17:51
Speaker 1: So yeah, not only that they could be trained to
17:56
Speaker 1: help warn of bombs that were on the way. Uh.
18:00
Speaker 1: If we go to that Reader's Digest article, we see
18:04
Speaker 1: a cat by the name of CoDIAK Cat who was
18:08
Speaker 1: the mascot for the seventy three bomb wing. And then
18:12
Speaker 1: our historian Mr. Kaiser goes on to say that, you know,
18:15
Speaker 1: while cats were used to warn of impending bombing attacks,
18:20
Speaker 1: which apparently had to do with their ability to detect
18:23
Speaker 1: changes in atmospheric pressure, Is that right then? Yeah, that's correct.
18:28
Speaker 1: Without knowing the specifics of how the situations go down,
18:33
Speaker 1: we know that, for instance, uh, the same way dogs
18:36
Speaker 1: are able to sniff out bombs, cats are very sensitive
18:41
Speaker 1: to changes in atmospheric pressure, so that is probably how
18:46
Speaker 1: they were able to uh notice something obviously. Also, cats
18:50
Speaker 1: have better hearing than humans, right, Also, um, this sounds
18:54
Speaker 1: sort of weird, but cats do have a better sense
18:58
Speaker 1: of smells, so they could probably I would I would
19:01
Speaker 1: say they could probably not poisonous gas encroaching. But they
19:05
Speaker 1: were also used, this kind of sad uh to spread
19:09
Speaker 1: poisonous gas or there was a plan to turn them
19:11
Speaker 1: into gas bombs, which we may have talked about in
19:15
Speaker 1: a previous episode of our our pure podcast stuff they
19:19
Speaker 1: don't want you to know. But yeah, I got ugly.
19:22
Speaker 1: It digged ugly, and as I was beating around the
19:24
Speaker 1: bush at uh. In addition to being used to the
19:26
Speaker 1: tech bombs, cats were actually used to test bombs uh.
19:30
Speaker 1: Much like you know, shooting a monkey into space, only
19:33
Speaker 1: with much more predictable and devastating results. Yeah. Yeah, it
19:39
Speaker 1: seemed that in those tests, from what I recall, the
19:43
Speaker 1: original cats who got the who drew the unfortunate short
19:46
Speaker 1: straw passed out too quickly for their bombs to be successful.
19:52
Speaker 1: So there were there were negative sides to this. There
19:55
Speaker 1: were there was a dark side to animals in the military,
19:58
Speaker 1: cats in the military. If we want to talk about
20:02
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the human interest stories, some
20:05
Speaker 1: of the real morale boosters. We got to talk about
20:08
Speaker 1: cats like Faith. This is from another Mental Fluss article
20:13
Speaker 1: five Fantastic Feelines by ms Celania Uh. And this this story,
20:20
Speaker 1: the story of Faith is interesting. Faith was a stray
20:23
Speaker 1: cat who wandered into a church in London in ninety
20:28
Speaker 1: six St. Augustine's and St. Faith's, so you can see
20:31
Speaker 1: where the name comes from. She got adopted by the
20:34
Speaker 1: rector and the parishioners and she would like literally hang
20:37
Speaker 1: out at the pulpit while uh the guy preached. Father
20:41
Speaker 1: Henry Ross in nineteen forty, she gave birth. She had
20:44
Speaker 1: one kitten. The kitten was named Panda by the parishioners.
20:49
Speaker 1: And on September six, she got into the church basement
20:53
Speaker 1: and she carried her cat down into the cellar. Father
20:57
Speaker 1: Ross tries to get the kitten out of the seller twice.
21:00
Speaker 1: Each time Faith carries him back downstairs. And then the
21:04
Speaker 1: very next day nol air raids begin in the Battle
21:07
Speaker 1: of London, and somehow, uh, at least you know, to
21:13
Speaker 1: the true believers, somehow Father Ross seemed to know what
21:16
Speaker 1: was happening there, and we're we're talking like massive destruction
21:22
Speaker 1: the Battle of London. By September nine, hundreds of people
21:25
Speaker 1: have been killed. Eight churches have been just ruined by bombs.
21:30
Speaker 1: His church. Father Ross's church was no exception. But he
21:35
Speaker 1: found that Faith in Panda had survived. And just for this,
21:39
Speaker 1: this is not really a military story, right, but just
21:42
Speaker 1: for this, Faith is nominated for something called a dick
21:45
Speaker 1: In Medal. What's the dick In Medal? No, a dick
21:48
Speaker 1: In Medal uh is an award The p D s
21:53
Speaker 1: a dick In Medal that was created in nineteen forty
21:56
Speaker 1: three in the U K by Maria Dicken who was
22:00
Speaker 1: a push for social change, was also a huge proponent
22:03
Speaker 1: of animal welfare and founded the People's Dispensary for Sick
22:07
Speaker 1: Animals or p ds A and nineteen seventeen UM. But
22:12
Speaker 1: she pushed for the creation of a metal specifically for
22:16
Speaker 1: animals that presented heroic behavior in the line of duty.
22:21
Speaker 1: I guess right, yeah, exactly. And this is a morale function,
22:26
Speaker 1: right people, the people of England and London reading about
22:30
Speaker 1: this during this terrible time, and it's just the kind
22:33
Speaker 1: of human interest story you need to feel a little
22:37
Speaker 1: bit less terrible. Uh. Specifically, by the way, the words
22:41
Speaker 1: that she used are the words and establishing this metal
22:44
Speaker 1: where that this this was for animals who quote displayed
22:47
Speaker 1: conspicuous gallantry or devotion to duty while serving or associated
22:52
Speaker 1: with any branch of the armed forces or civil defense units.
22:57
Speaker 1: So that's you know, I really like that for as.
23:00
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna bring that back, conspicuous gallantry. I
23:03
Speaker 1: love specific compliments, So unspicuous gallantry. Uh, that's that's gonna
23:08
Speaker 1: be one of the one of the highest compliments I
23:12
Speaker 1: given comments. That's when you really flaunt your gallantry. It's
23:15
Speaker 1: not you know, low key gallantry. That modest gallantry. This
23:19
Speaker 1: is gallantry out there for all to see. Yeah, yeah,
23:23
Speaker 1: maybe it's a little problematic. This true gallantry doesn't need
23:26
Speaker 1: to be conspicuous. Get what she's saying. But let's let's
23:37
Speaker 1: let's talk about just a few more cats. So here's
23:41
Speaker 1: one guy that should be a Pixar movie. Unsinkable Sam.
23:46
Speaker 1: Is it the name of an old sea salt or
23:49
Speaker 1: is it the name of like a wildly rambunctious bar fly. Well,
23:54
Speaker 1: kind of the former. Unsinkable Sam is awesome guy. We
23:59
Speaker 1: learned about, think to Ruslan book Nick, who was writing
24:02
Speaker 1: for war History Online. So Second World War we've got
24:07
Speaker 1: a lot of maritime conflict and many cats. As a result, became,
24:14
Speaker 1: you know, famous for living on some of these warships.
24:18
Speaker 1: Unsinkable Sam, whose street name with his friends, his oscar,
24:24
Speaker 1: This little guy, this black and white cat, is famous
24:28
Speaker 1: for surviving the sinking of not one, not two, but
24:32
Speaker 1: three different warships. And he was also uh he kind
24:36
Speaker 1: of played both sides. Did you say that part? He
24:38
Speaker 1: sure did. Uh. He ended up being a member of
24:42
Speaker 1: both German and British fleets during the war where he
24:46
Speaker 1: survived these three different sinkings. Who's This reminds me, who's
24:50
Speaker 1: that woman that survived the sinking of the Titanic who
24:53
Speaker 1: also was in like another very high profile ship wreck,
24:56
Speaker 1: And I think she was called Unsinkable something I believe
24:59
Speaker 1: in movie she was played by Kathy Bates. Well, there's
25:02
Speaker 1: Violet Jessup, also known as Miss Unsinkable. She survived three shipwrecks,
25:08
Speaker 1: including the Titanic. That's the one I was thinking of.
25:11
Speaker 1: But also this funny that the Kathy Bates character in
25:14
Speaker 1: the Titanic was known as the Unsinkable Molly Brown. She
25:18
Speaker 1: was a socialite who only survived the Titanic, and that's
25:20
Speaker 1: actually got that nickname. So I think Jessup's got her beat,
25:23
Speaker 1: as does our hero cat Here. Yeah, Unsinkable Sam. He
25:28
Speaker 1: wasn't named Unsinkable Sam at first, it was just called Oscar.
25:32
Speaker 1: A sailor on a German battleship called the Bismarck brought
25:36
Speaker 1: him aboard, and on eight the Bismarck sailed from an
25:42
Speaker 1: occupied Polish city during something that translates to the exercise Ryan.
25:47
Speaker 1: They were tasked with tying down British escort ships and
25:51
Speaker 1: then there was another heavy cruiser on the German side,
25:54
Speaker 1: the Prince Eugene that was supposed to attack merchant ships
25:59
Speaker 1: and sink able Sam was along for the ride. Spoiler
26:03
Speaker 1: alert on mats when he's seven. The third day of fighting,
26:08
Speaker 1: British forces sink the Bismarck and it's brutal. Only a
26:13
Speaker 1: hundred and fifteen sailors out of the two thousand, two
26:17
Speaker 1: hundred aboard actually survive, as does Sam. So that's his
26:22
Speaker 1: first crash and he doesn't sink. Well, you know, all
26:24
Speaker 1: of this stuff really does track with I think what
26:26
Speaker 1: both you and I and any cat people out there
26:28
Speaker 1: or even just casual you know, cat fanciers know about
26:32
Speaker 1: our feline friends is that they they're pretty resilient. They
26:35
Speaker 1: are survivors. I mean, there are so many neighborhood cats
26:40
Speaker 1: uh where I live that just kind of like hang
26:43
Speaker 1: around and they somehow managed to take care of themselves
26:46
Speaker 1: that they're finding and killing little rodents or just you know,
26:49
Speaker 1: depending on the kindness of strangers or neighbors giving them
26:52
Speaker 1: food outside. But I definitely have always been impressed with
26:55
Speaker 1: how cats always kind of managed to come out ahead.
26:58
Speaker 1: The idea they always land on all four of their
27:01
Speaker 1: feet when they fall, and the fact that you can
27:03
Speaker 1: basically like chuck a cat, you know, with all your might,
27:06
Speaker 1: and it's just gonna like land on his feet and
27:09
Speaker 1: just trot away. The very impressive creatures. I've never tried
27:12
Speaker 1: that person. It's just a thing, you see. So they
27:17
Speaker 1: do have an excellent sense of balance. I agree. This
27:20
Speaker 1: is such a movie moment. So hours later after the
27:24
Speaker 1: Bismarck sinks, sailors on a British destroyer find Sam literally
27:30
Speaker 1: just chilling floating on some wreckage. They take him aboard
27:34
Speaker 1: and uh, let me step back and correct myself. This
27:37
Speaker 1: is where he gets the name Oscar. The British sailors
27:40
Speaker 1: don't know what to call him, so they go with
27:44
Speaker 1: the name Oscar, and it's somewhat inspired. This is interesting.
27:48
Speaker 1: If you look at a book called the International Code
27:51
Speaker 1: of Signals, there is a signal known as Oscar. It's
27:56
Speaker 1: a square, it's diagonally red and yellow, and this flag,
28:01
Speaker 1: this signal means there is a man overboard. So that's
28:05
Speaker 1: why they called him Oscar. Interesting. You know, it's also like, uh,
28:08
Speaker 1: I feel like I've heard it used where, you know,
28:12
Speaker 1: when we say things like A as an alpha, B
28:15
Speaker 1: as in beda or whatever. I sometimes feel like I've
28:18
Speaker 1: heard oh as an oscar in terms of a military,
28:22
Speaker 1: you know, way of making sure people know what letters
28:24
Speaker 1: you're you're spelling. You're correct, that's the NATO alphabet Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, etcetera.
28:30
Speaker 1: And Oscar is the accepted one. Got it? Hey cool?
28:34
Speaker 1: The old brain's UH firing on mainly all cylinders this
28:37
Speaker 1: morning and then UH. In October of ninety one October,
28:42
Speaker 1: to be precise, the h MS Cossack took off from
28:45
Speaker 1: Gibraltar from the Port and Gibraltar on the way to
28:49
Speaker 1: Liverpool as part of a convoy that was escorting the
28:52
Speaker 1: h G seventy five, and then out of the clear
28:56
Speaker 1: blue sea UH, the German U boat the U five
29:00
Speaker 1: six three, shot a torpedo UM at the flagship there
29:05
Speaker 1: and seriously damaged the ship. UM. A hundred and fifty
29:09
Speaker 1: nine sailors lost their lives and the rest of the
29:12
Speaker 1: crew had to abandon ship and board the h M
29:16
Speaker 1: s Legion and they then tried to tow UH the
29:20
Speaker 1: crippled HMS Cossack back to Gibraltar, but they had a
29:24
Speaker 1: really hard time because the weather was getting rough and
29:27
Speaker 1: the tiny ship was definitely tossed. It wasn't a tiny one,
29:30
Speaker 1: that was a big one. But Gilligan's Island was a
29:32
Speaker 1: great show. And then on October, a couple of days later,
29:36
Speaker 1: the Cossack sank completely just west of Gibraltar. They hadn't
29:41
Speaker 1: quite made it. They were close, but no cigar. And
29:44
Speaker 1: that's when that cat survived once again. Um and it
29:51
Speaker 1: was taken by the officers to Gibraltar, and they then
29:56
Speaker 1: gifted it with the nickname Unsinkable Sam because at this
29:59
Speaker 1: point this cat is a legend and it represents kind
30:02
Speaker 1: of the you know, resilience in the face of adversity
30:06
Speaker 1: and all of that. Right, it's a symbol, yeah, exactly.
30:09
Speaker 1: And they had no idea that Sam was going to
30:14
Speaker 1: go for a three time streak. In November one, he's
30:18
Speaker 1: transferred to an aircraft carrier, the HMS arc Royal. At
30:23
Speaker 1: this this ship had also assisted in sinking the Bismarck
30:27
Speaker 1: way back when the carrier was torpedoed riddled with torpedoes.
30:33
Speaker 1: Just three weeks later, another ship called the HMS Lightning
30:36
Speaker 1: comes to search for survivors and then they find Sam, who,
30:41
Speaker 1: after surviving his third shipwrecked, was according to contemporaneous descriptions, angry,
30:47
Speaker 1: but quite unharmed. Because you know, cat or person, you
30:52
Speaker 1: can imagine by the time it's your third shipwreck, you're
30:55
Speaker 1: you're getting to a Larry David moment. Right, how much
30:57
Speaker 1: more this can we take? And I love to picture
31:00
Speaker 1: the curb your enthusiasm music picking up right as they
31:03
Speaker 1: find Sam. Cut to commercial Uh. This this is the
31:07
Speaker 1: end of Sam's naval career, and so he stays on
31:11
Speaker 1: shore uh, and he's cared for by the Governor General
31:14
Speaker 1: of Gibraltar. He lives there for a while. Later he's
31:18
Speaker 1: taken to the United Kingdom and he lives in a
31:22
Speaker 1: home for sailors in Belfast. And then later in nineteen
31:28
Speaker 1: he passes away on the beach. People are aware of him,
31:32
Speaker 1: they love him. Uh. An artist Georgina shaw Baker even
31:36
Speaker 1: makes a pastel drawing of him, which you can see today.
31:39
Speaker 1: Should you visit the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, And
31:44
Speaker 1: you should because it seems great and you should. Yeah,
31:47
Speaker 1: I love I love naval museums. But there's another cat
31:51
Speaker 1: that we want to mention who was also at sea.
31:55
Speaker 1: This cat had uh in a way well, I don't
31:58
Speaker 1: know if you say much better luck, but a different
32:00
Speaker 1: kind of good luck in comparison to Sam Tittles. Tittles
32:05
Speaker 1: My think that's my favorite name of all of these
32:07
Speaker 1: cat names. Yeah, Tittles was a cat. Was a ship cat.
32:11
Speaker 1: That that was its life. That was the life that
32:13
Speaker 1: it knew. It hung around on a few Royal Navy
32:17
Speaker 1: aircraft carriers, but it was its career. If you can
32:21
Speaker 1: call it that. On the you can, I guess it's
32:24
Speaker 1: a career if you if you get a medal for it,
32:25
Speaker 1: you gotta call it a career on the h M
32:28
Speaker 1: S Victorious, And that was in the early ninties, and
32:32
Speaker 1: it was the captain's cat, So I mean it's likely
32:36
Speaker 1: you know, the all the ratting and all that stuff
32:38
Speaker 1: that we discussed earlier, but a companion to the ship's captain.
32:42
Speaker 1: He logged more than thirty thousand miles during his time
32:46
Speaker 1: in the in the Navy um and also potentially is
32:51
Speaker 1: one of the reasons, at least in Great Britain or
32:54
Speaker 1: some parts of Great Britain, completely opposite of how it
32:56
Speaker 1: is here in the States, a black cat is actually
32:59
Speaker 1: considered lucky. I am quite fond of black cats. The kitten,
33:03
Speaker 1: the aforementioned kitten that I recently adopted is pure black.
33:06
Speaker 1: And I've had black cats in the past, and that's
33:08
Speaker 1: because a lot of times here in the States, black
33:11
Speaker 1: cats get mistreated and are harder to adopt because people
33:16
Speaker 1: think they're you know, witchy or like they represent bad
33:18
Speaker 1: luck in some way. So it's good to hear that
33:20
Speaker 1: they've got a little bit of a better life in
33:23
Speaker 1: Great Britain because of tittles. Yeah yeah, white, possibly because
33:27
Speaker 1: the tittles. Uh No, we did mention earlier that British
33:31
Speaker 1: intelligence accused some cats, at least two, of being spies.
33:36
Speaker 1: We can't walk away from part one of our War
33:40
Speaker 1: Cats episode without mentioning a genuine cat spy. I don't know.
33:45
Speaker 1: I don't know what the sound cue is for that, Max,
33:47
Speaker 1: but can we try one cats by? Here we go,
33:52
Speaker 1: There we go. Excellent work is always Mr Williams. Uh
33:56
Speaker 1: there is. Here's one example of a genuine cats by
34:00
Speaker 1: Marca of Stalingrad. Now you may remember the Battle of Stalingrad,
34:05
Speaker 1: fellow ridiculous historians. It is one of the most brutal,
34:09
Speaker 1: bloodiest battles in modern history, and during this battle in
34:15
Speaker 1: World War Two, it was often way way too dangerous
34:19
Speaker 1: for human soldiers to get across the city of stalin
34:23
Speaker 1: Grod even when they needed to with vital wartime messages.
34:26
Speaker 1: So there's this commander on the Russian side and he
34:29
Speaker 1: notices that there's a cat who lives at the army
34:32
Speaker 1: h Q that always seems to find a way back
34:36
Speaker 1: to his food, no matter what evil stuff the humans
34:40
Speaker 1: are doing to each other at this time. And this cat, Morka,
34:44
Speaker 1: looks like an opportunity to this Russian commander. So he
34:48
Speaker 1: has Marka a company scouts on missions in the city,
34:52
Speaker 1: and wild Mark is walking around with these humans. He's
34:57
Speaker 1: got messages hidden in his collar, and their messages that
35:01
Speaker 1: contain information about the locations of German troops. And so
35:07
Speaker 1: they would send him out on the scouting missions and
35:10
Speaker 1: then he would cross the city looking for the headquarters.
35:14
Speaker 1: And every time you found when he got food, treats, attention,
35:17
Speaker 1: and he also conveyed these crucial messages. He made a
35:22
Speaker 1: real difference in the outcome of the conflict. Unfortunately, after
35:27
Speaker 1: several successful missions, Marca went missing in action, which you know,
35:32
Speaker 1: if you want to be more optimistic, uh, then please
35:36
Speaker 1: feel free to do what I did and assume that
35:39
Speaker 1: Marca just found a cool place and decided to live
35:42
Speaker 1: at that house. I am with you with that silver
35:45
Speaker 1: lining version of the story. I hope that's the case.
35:48
Speaker 1: Our final war cat for today's episode is Pouli the Cat.
35:53
Speaker 1: And this is the one and only cat that was
35:56
Speaker 1: inducted into something that we definitely need to discuss a
35:59
Speaker 1: little further at some point, but an organization called the
36:03
Speaker 1: Solemn Mysteries of the Ancient Order of the Deep. Yeah, yeah, this,
36:10
Speaker 1: this is This is a fascinating thing and a really
36:13
Speaker 1: cool name. So Princess Papul was her full name. She's
36:18
Speaker 1: striped tabby. She's born on July four, Independence Day at
36:22
Speaker 1: Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, and all the sailors just called
36:26
Speaker 1: her Pooley. She was brought aboard the U s. S. Fremont,
36:30
Speaker 1: which is an attack transport by a crewman named James Lynch.
36:34
Speaker 1: This ship fought in the Pacific theater of World War
36:37
Speaker 1: two and it was evolved in numerous invasions and during
36:41
Speaker 1: these evasions places like Saipan, Iwa Jima, you name it,
36:45
Speaker 1: poolly Uh slept in the mail room like specifically during battles.
36:50
Speaker 1: This strikes me his very cat like. She went and
36:52
Speaker 1: found a quieter place the mail room and then she
36:55
Speaker 1: just kicked it there. She also participated in a ceremony
37:02
Speaker 1: to promote inexperienced sailors and acknowledge that they have become veterans,
37:08
Speaker 1: which they called shellbacks. She got her own uniform, she
37:13
Speaker 1: got three service ribbons, she got four battle stars, again
37:17
Speaker 1: for mainly sleeping in the mail room. And there was
37:21
Speaker 1: even a story about her in the l A Times
37:24
Speaker 1: because she survived the war celebrating her fifteen birthday. So
37:29
Speaker 1: things worked out for Princess POOLI with her mail room strategy,
37:33
Speaker 1: which is what I think naval historians call that. Now,
37:36
Speaker 1: uh and this no, this is this is a this
37:39
Speaker 1: is a cool ride. We've looked at a lot of
37:43
Speaker 1: amazing wartime cats, but as we said, this is the
37:47
Speaker 1: first part of a two part episode because there is
37:51
Speaker 1: one cat also naval, one cat we found that deserves
37:56
Speaker 1: an episode all his own. That's right, Simon the Cat,
38:01
Speaker 1: the most heroic of all the war cats again, because
38:04
Speaker 1: he really does get his own episode, which you will
38:07
Speaker 1: hear later this week. In the meantime, thank you all
38:11
Speaker 1: for tuning into this episode. Ridiculous history, Part one of
38:14
Speaker 1: hero cats, war cats, whatever you want to call them.
38:17
Speaker 1: Huge thanks to you, Ben Bolan, my feline loving brother
38:21
Speaker 1: from another mother, and we're both leos, so I mean
38:24
Speaker 1: we're levels on this one. Yeah, big big thanks to
38:29
Speaker 1: my writer die Noel Brown, big thing and happy birthday, Noel,
38:33
Speaker 1: Happy birthday to me as well. It's conne It's coming,
38:36
Speaker 1: It's coming. Uh and uh big big thanks to Casey Pegrun,
38:40
Speaker 1: big big thanks to Max Williams as well as Alex Williams,
38:45
Speaker 1: who composed this slapping track. Well, I was thinking just
38:49
Speaker 1: for a second of reaching out to Alex and saying like,
38:51
Speaker 1: hey man, can you make a cat version of this?
38:54
Speaker 1: But he's he's got stuff to do. You know, he's
38:57
Speaker 1: got stuff to do, So imagine me Al's when hear that,
39:00
Speaker 1: or imagine that you know, well maybe you don't have
39:03
Speaker 1: to imagine. Maybe your cat like mine, is me owing
39:06
Speaker 1: right now. You could do it real quick. Let's say, huh,
39:11
Speaker 1: how's this has the theme go yeah, I'm yeah Yo.
39:22
Speaker 1: Really should have laid off on that meatloaf on karaoke.
39:26
Speaker 1: I did Paradise by the dashboard lights and shredded my voice,
39:29
Speaker 1: but this was the best of my How's that you
39:30
Speaker 1: can get out of me? We'll see you next time, folks.
39:40
Speaker 1: For more podcasts for My Heart Radio, visit the I
39:42
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to
39:45
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.