Kitten-heaven

This is our 9 or 10 week old kitten, that we fetched from Battersea Dogs Home. My daughter has named her Boe, the other choice being Sunshine! Boe is energetic, curious, a little reckless, and feisty.  When our three year old tabby met Boe, she spat and hissed. The kitten stood her ground, until big Kitty ran away. Boe was born to a stray cat, who gave birth in someone's garden and perhaps that has given her an edge. It was slightly harrowing to see her mother in the enclosure next to her, miaowing as we took her away - her litter of four all gone now, and she's still there, waiting to be neutered.

Battersea Dogs and Cats Home was founded as "The Temporary Home for Lost and Starving Dogs" in 1860 by Mrs Mary Tealby. Mary Tealby had separated from her husband and moved to London in 1860 and decided to open a "canine asylum" after the death of a starving dog she had tried to nurse back to health.  She established the Temporary Home for Lost and Starving Dogs in a stable in an Islington mews. The Times ridiculed the home on the 18 October 1860. "From the sublime to the ridiculous – from the reasonable inspirations of humanity to the fantastic exhibitions of ridiculous sentimentalism – there is but a single step... When we hear of a 'Home for Dogs', we venture to doubt if the originators and supporters of such an institution have not taken leave of their sober senses."

However, Charles Dickens gave support and  published a piece in the magazine All the Year Round in 1862 about the home, calling it an "extraordinary monument of the remarkable affection with which the English people regard the race of dog. It is the kind of institution which a very sensitive person who has suffered acutely from witnessing the misery of a starving animal would wish for, without imagining for a moment that it would ever seriously exist. It does seriously exist, though."

The home moved to Battersea in 1871 and they care for over 9,000 dogs and cats every year. It costs £14 million (Yes 14 million!) a year to run Battersea and their funds come entirely from the public. 

If you want to help them or adopt a dog or cat ring 0207 622 3626