Mail Coach Attacked by Lioness

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://postalheritage.wordpress.com/200 ... y-lioness/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The BPMA Museum collection consists of a wide range of objects and ephemera including a number of prints and engravings. This small collection of around 200 works is currently being documented and will be added to the online catalogue in the not too distant future.

The prints and engravings are in a number of styles and were produced using a variety of techniques, but all show some aspect of postal history, be it images of Royal Mail coaches unloading at the GPO at St. Martin’s le Grand, portraits of Postmaster Generals, interior scenes of letter sorting offices or motifs of postmen and postmistresses at work. Through this collection one can learn about the workings and development of the British postal service, and the interesting incidents that happened along the way.

One of the more dramatic stories told through the prints and engravings appears in two separate prints Lioness Attacking the Exeter Mail, At Winterslow Hut near Salisbury, on the Night of Sunday 20th October, 1816 and The Lioness Attacking the Horse of the Exeter Mail Coach. Their subject is, as the titles might reveal, an event that took place in 1816 where the ‘Quicksilver’ Royal Mail coach, on its way from Exeter to London, was attacked by a lioness outside the Pheasant Inn.

A lioness is not what one might expect to see in the English countryside, but not far from the Inn a travelling menagerie had stopped for the night and it was from here the lioness had managed to escape from its keepers. As the coach stopped to deliver the mail bags the lioness attacked the lead horse of the ‘Quicksilver’, setting its talons in the horse’s neck and chest. The two passengers of the coach fled into the Pheasant Inn and locked themselves inside, blocking the door for anyone else, while the mail guard attempted to shoot at the animal with his blunderbuss. A large mastiff dog from the menagerie set on the lioness “with such pluck and fierceness” and grabbed one of its hind legs, which made the lioness release the horse and attack the dog, chasing and finally killing the dog some 40 yards from the coach. During this time the keepers where alerted to the situation and managed to trap the lioness under the straddle of a granary. The menagerie proprietor and his men then crawled in after the lioness, tied her legs and mouth, and then lifted her out and back to her den in the menagerie caravan, while the locals of Winterslow Hut watched on.

This incident became known all over the country, and at a time without telephones, telegraphs or railways it is amazing to find that a mention of the Sunday night attack was made the very next day in the London Courier, and in further publications in the following days. It also became the subject of artistic work, among them paintings by A. Sauerweid and James Pollard, which the prints in the BPMA’s collection are based on.

Another noteworthy fact about the incident, and a testimony to the efficiency of the postal service at the time, is that the attack only delayed the mail coach 45 minutes before it obtained a new post horse and continued on its route to London.

[Thunderthighs]

Sort of related: When I was kid, my parents took me and my brother to the Isle of Wight zoo in the late 60's. There was this big Tarzan type guy, who put his head inside the mouth of a Lion, Simba, the largest in captivity. He also used to walk cubs along the seafront in the evenings. Couldn't do it now, H+S regs!
Anyway, recently I was staying with a friend, who is a Postmaster, and he suggested going to an antiques place as we were looking for some bits.

We saw nothing nice, or in our price range, so had a cuppa in the centres cafe. As we sat there, I noticed a huge glass case behind the Mrs shoulder.
Curious, I wandered to have a look. I wish I hadn't !
Inside - yes, you've guessed it, was poor old Simba!!!! Stuffed, mounted and threadbare. He was going for around £1,000. There was also a photo of the Tarzan guy as well.

Boy, all my childhood memories came flooding back of that holiday: Sunburnt back and legs, the lion, my dad clipping a car parking at our digs in a torrential rain storm, thinking there was a cat snoring in the lounge when it was the landladies good-for-nothing son sleeping on the couch. My grandmother...
The Good Old Day? Bloody right they were!

[Jack Mehoff]

Sort of related: When I was kid, my parents took me and my brother to the Isle of Wight zoo in the late 60's. There was this big Tarzan type guy, who put his head inside the mouth of a Lion, Simba, the largest in captivity. He also used to walk cubs along the seafront in the evenings. Couldn't do it now, H+S regs!
Anyway, recently I was staying with a friend, who is a Postmaster, and he suggested going to an antiques place as we were looking for some bits.

We saw nothing nice, or in our price range, so had a cuppa in the centres cafe. As we sat there, I noticed a huge glass case behind the Mrs shoulder.
Curious, I wandered to have a look. I wish I hadn't !
Inside - yes, you've guessed it, was poor old Simba!!!! Stuffed, mounted and threadbare. He was going for around £1,000. There was also a photo of the Tarzan guy as well.

Boy, all my childhood memories came flooding back of that holiday: Sunburnt back and legs, the lion, my dad clipping a car parking at our digs in a torrential rain storm, thinking there was a cat snoring in the lounge when it was the landladies good-for-nothing son sleeping on the couch. My grandmother...
The Good Old Day? Bloody right they were!

In Swahili, Simba means Lion.