The 1900s
In September 1939, within days of war being declared, British families queued outside animal clinics to have their pets put to sleep. About 400,000 cats and dogs went in the first week, and perhaps 750,000 in all. No law told anyone to do it: a government leaflet had simply said it would be kindest, and fear did the rest. Four years later the same country invented a medal for brave animals, and started pinning it on dogs.
The 1939 Pet Panic
Britain went to war in September 1939. In the first days, hundreds of thousands of families took their pets to be put to sleep. No law told them to.
A government committee prints a leaflet for pet owners. Send your animals to the countryside, it says. And if you cannot, it really is kindest to have them destroyed.
Not everyone joined in. The National Canine Defence League, today’s Dogs Trust, spoke out against it, and vets, charities and ordinary owners argued to keep animals alive. Within four years Britain would be giving dogs medals.
What a week’s food looked like
Rationing started on 8 January 1940, four months after the panic, with bacon and ham, butter and sugar. Meat followed in March, tea in July, then cheese, milk and eggs in 1941. By 1942 almost everything except bread and vegetables was on the ration, and everyone had a ration book with their name on it.
- Bacon and ham
- 4oz a week, about four rashers
- Other meat
- 1s 2d worth, about two chops
- Butter
- 2oz a week
- Margarine
- 4oz a week
- Cooking fat
- 4oz a week
- Cheese
- 2oz a week
- Milk
- 3 pints a week
- Eggs
- 1 fresh egg a week
- Sugar
- 8oz a week
- Tea
- 2oz a week
- Jam
- 1lb every two months
- Sweets
- 12oz every four weeks
No ration book was ever issued for a dog or a cat. Pets lived on scraps, leftovers and whatever their owners could spare, which is exactly what people had been afraid of in 1939.
Figures are estimates from later histories. The leaflet never ordered anything: it was fear, and a single sentence, that did it.
The Animals’ Victoria Cross
In 1943 Maria Dickin founded a medal for animals: the animals’ Victoria Cross. Four years after the panic, Britain was pinning bronze on dogs. Tap a marker.
Rip
A stray taken in by an air raid warden, and the first search and rescue dog of the Air Raid Patrol. He is believed to have found more than 100 people buried in the Blitz.
Off the map:Judy, a pointer, was ship’s dog on HMS Gnat and HMS Grasshopper and ended up in a prisoner of war camp in Sumatra, where she kept the prisoners going. She got her medal in 1946.
The medal has gone to 75 animals so far, 38 of them dogs, along with pigeons, horses and one cat. Markers show roughly where each dog served.
Did you know?
One sentence, one panic
The 1939 leaflet was mostly about moving pets to the countryside. One line at the end said that if you could not, it really was kindest to have them destroyed.
That single sentence is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths. Nobody was ever ordered to do anything.
The stray who saved 100 people
Rip was a stray until an air raid warden fed him during the Blitz. He became the Air Raid Patrol's first search dog, without a day of training.
He is believed to have found more than 100 people buried under bombed buildings, and search dogs have worked that way ever since.
A medal for animals
In 1943 Maria Dickin, who founded the PDSA, created a medal for animal bravery. It is known as the animals' Victoria Cross.
It has gone to 75 animals: 38 dogs, 32 pigeons, four horses and one very good cat.
In the first week of September 1939 Britain destroyed around 400,000 pets, and 750,000 in total, on the strength of one government pamphlet. Four years later the same country created the Dickin Medal and gave it to dogs for bravery under fire. The century that nearly ended pet keeping in Britain ended with dogs firmly in the family.