Sea Control - Sea Control 403 - Cats in the Navy with Scot Christenson

Episode Date: January 12, 2023

Links1. Cats in the Navy by Scot Christenson, U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2022.2. "Cats in the Sea Services," by Scot Christenson, Naval History Magazine, Vol 35, Number 1, February 2021. 

Hey, folks, it's Jared. Today I'm joined by author Scott Christensen. We'll be discussing his book, Cats in the Navy. This episode was edited and produced by Jim Jarvie. SimSec, we believe victory in the maritime domain starts with great ideas communicated compellingly. Write, fight, win. Please help us continue to fulfill our mission by donating and making SimSec your preferred nonprofit on Amazon Smile. I'd like to pause here to highlight our local chapters.

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Aloha, Shoemates, and welcome back aboard Sea Control. My guest today is author Scott Christensen, and he's here to discuss his book, Cats in the Navy. So, Scott, welcome. Can you tell us a little bit about your background, please? Sure. Well, I'm the Director of Communications for the United States Naval Institute. The United States Naval Institute has been around since 1873. It was founded by a group of Civil War veterans who wanted an independent forum where they could discuss naval issues.

150 years later, it's still going strong, promoting an understanding of naval sea power and global maritime security. Naval Sea also has a publishing division, the Naval Sea Press, publishes about 80 books a year, mostly current affairs, histories, biographies, and the occasional novel. Several years ago, an unknown insurance agent walked in with a manuscript about a submarine that Naval Sea thought was interesting and decided to take a chance on it. That book was The Hunt for Red October and launched the career of Tom Clancy. Now, the NLC Press published my book, Captain of the Navy. Well, thank you again for coming on. As a reminder to the listeners, all opinions are our own and not reflective of any institutions with which we might be otherwise associated. So, Scott, what can you tell us about the research process for identifying both the information you discovered and then all the pictures and illustrations featured in the book?

because it is very picture-heavy, and that is not a critique in any way. It's like when you see a book called Cats in the Navy, you know what I want to see? I want to see pictures of cats on ships, and it definitely delivered. But how did you find all this stuff? Well, I'm glad I met your expectations. It started when I was actually doing research on goats. I was curious as to why the goat was the mascot of the U.S. Naval Academy. I thought they would have wanted something fierce like a shark, but no, it's built a goat.

As it turns out, it's because goats were once very common on U.S. Navy ships because they provided dairy products, they provided fiber, leather, meat, and they are a good substitute for cows because goats are small, compact, very short-footed, so they don't get thrown around too much on a rocking ship. Whereas cows are very large, require special feed, and if they get thrown around, they're like a loose can, they'll smash up the interior and cause a lot of damage. So while I was like looking into this, I started noticing a lot of photos of cats along with the goats. And in some cases, the cats were wearing uniforms or they're in hammocks. And I thought it was kind of funny. And there's kind of a rule that if you find a photo of a funny cat, you have to post it online somewhere. And so that's what I did. I created a page called Cats of the Sea Services, and it became very popular. I think much to the chagrin of some Naval Institute traditionalists, because Naval Institutes had a lot of really great leader thinkers write for it, including Chester Nimitz and Ernest King and Albert T. Bohan, and yet this goofy page about cats was getting a lot of attention. But because it became so popular, I started looking for more photos and going through ship logs and cruise books and memoirs, diaries, old newspaper accounts.

and discovered that there was a lot more history and heritage attached to cats than I initially realized. So I saw a bunch more photos, had some fascinating information, and thought, hey, this would make a great book, which brings us here today. All right, well, we're going to upset the traditionalists more because I'm going to include a link to that Cats in the Sea Services page in the show notes. So in going into the history of it, how long have cats been going to sea, and what purpose or purposes did they serve aboard ship initially? Well, cats have been going to sea for almost as long as man has been going to sea. Cats originated in the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa, and there are ancient Egyptian tomb paintings showing boats going down the Nile

with cats being used to hunt for birds in the reeds. but early sailors noticed right away that they are very good at catching rats and mice and those rodents are real problem on boats because they eat the food they chew through materials they spread disease so it really cast the bottom board boats as pest control and soon sailors learned they had a lot of other benefits such as predicting the weather because cats become visibly agitated when they're the drop in air pressure, which indicates an incoming storm. So sailors started to watch these cats and use them as furry little barometers. And over the centuries, they've discovered more and more uses.

Really, they're great for also companionship. And there's a lot of superstition attached to cats. Of course, they bring good luck and their omens. And sailors know that if a cat walked on their ship, it usually brought them good luck. They were going to have a good voyage. But if they had a cat that walked off a ship just before they left, they thought they were heading into trouble. Even worse is if they saw two cats fighting just before a ship left, because that meant they were surely doomed, because the cats were representing an angel and a devil who had already begun to fight for the souls for the crew.

But sailors of the century saw many more uses for cats. And cats were initially picked up by the Phoenicians and spread throughout the Mediterranean. And then the Vikings picked them up and spread them throughout Europe. And during the great colonial period, the British, French, Spanish, Portuguese brought them to America, into the Pacific. And some of the early British explorers noted that they brought a lot of merchandise with them, such as textiles and jewelry, to trade with the local islanders. But the islanders became so fixated with the cats, that's all they wanted. They were saying, hey, you keep that junk, but you want your cats. Captain Cook's crew said they had a problem going into some of these islands because

the locals would speak on the ships at night and try to steal the cats. And the captain was not willing to give up any of them because they were needed to control the giraffe population. And it'd be like today if a captain's asked to give up a a boatswain's mate or a safety officer, they would not be willing to do that either. So they really prized these cats. Later on, whalers went to use cats to trade because Because they said with these cats by certain islands, the locals would paddle off furiously just to see if they had any cats to trade. And as new breeds emerged around the world, sailors would pick up these cats, introduce them to their homelands. So it's really sailors that spread cats throughout the world.

How well were the cats suited to the life of the sailors? I think the stereotypical image of the cat is that they hate water. So spending all your time at sea does not seem like a suitable environment. Surprisingly, cats are better suited for vitamin C than humans are because cats make their own vitamin C and require very little fresh water. They can actually drink salt water in very small quantities, but cats get most of the hydration they need from the food that they eat. Whereas humans need vitamin C through vitamin C-rich foods, a lot of fresh water. And, of course, the historic story that's been told many times is that they're willing to let their sailors drink lime juice to get vitamin C and combat scurvy, which is why British are now called limeys. But for the most part, cats were fine at sea.

They were very good at catching fish. In fact, a lot of cats learned how to swim and dive into the water. Some sailors noted that, with a great pride of, I add, that their ship's cat always came back with a very good-sized catch. Other cats that still never learned to love to swim became very good at knocking down flying fish or pouncing on anything that washed up on the deck. And sometimes they became a little bit too efficient. During the scientific expedition, HMS Terror, one of the crew noted that they had the good fortune of an unknown species washing up on the deck, but before they could document it,

the cat pounced, ran off, and ate it. So cats will find a way to live at sea. And many of them spent their entire lives on ships. So why were cats the preferred pet compared to, say, dogs, monkeys, or parrots? Well, cats, of course, first and foremost, had a practical role. They were there for rodent control. And dogs were also very popular, but they weren't very useful. They were a bit from around, but it was not until they went to shore that they had any purpose.

When a landing party went to shore, dogs could be used to hunt or detect potential dangers hiding in the bushes. But dogs were also not loyal to a ship. They're usually loyal to an individual. So if a sailor left, the dog usually went with them. Whereas cats are territorial. So the cat kind of belongs to the ship, or the ship belongs to the cat, depending on which way you want to look at it. So cats remained probably the most popular because of that property. The first thing is monkeys were popular for a while.

Because it's so entertaining with all their antics, which is also a problem because they're a distraction. And captains noticed that there was a lot of time being wasted as monkeys would snatch the hats off sailors and scamper up the mast and wouldn't come down. So in most cases, captains were okay with dogs and cats, not so much monkeys. Interesting enough, there is a bar in Amsterdam. I'm not going to try to pronounce its Dutch name, but in English it means in the monkeys. and it's a place where shadows could go and pay off the bar tab with monkeys and at one point the place became so overwhelmed with monkeys they felt overwhelmed with fleas that the owner decided he had to do something with it so he found somebody nearby that took the monkeys and built

a habitat in his backyard which grew and grew and they started adding more animals and that grew into the Amsterdam Zoo so today you can still go to that zoo and you can still get the bark in the monkeys mind you there are no more monkeys left uh there's a lot of artwork depicting uh monkeys such as paintings carvings uh sculptures that reflects uh maritime monkey heritage tropical birds were also very popular especially those that mimic human speech but they were banned by the u.s navy in the 1930s because essentially of a virus that was going around but some people suspect is because sailors were teaching the birds to curse and insult officers. So they're banned either because of the virus or because they're calling officers stupid and ugly. Pick the story

you like best. But really, more than anything, cats were the most popular because of their practical role, they hunted rats. Over the years, US Navy ships have had mascots of all types, including kangaroos and donkeys and bears uh jeffrey ship even had a tiger at one point until they got loose mauled a bunch of the crew and then took over a deck there was even a u.s navy submarine that had a skunk and i don't know who thought that was a good idea because these submarines would go out for a month at a time a bunch of men a small compact area uh and the The smell was supposed to be absolutely ghastly, and then to throw a skunk at that mix, it just seems that there's a better idea, there's a better mascot than that out there.

So cats remained the most popular because they had a practical role. They basically took care of themselves and didn't pose a danger to the crew. Now, you identified a number of cats that were combat veterans, the battles that include Jutland and Dogger Bank. Did you find anything about the way that cats reacted to their ship having been in combat? have. Yeah, and cats were actually used to predict combat. Real Navy used cats to detect gas attacks. There was a fear of gas attacks at sea, and cats usually have a strong reaction to bad odors, and they thought that would give a fair warning to the crew that something was coming.

Also, cats could detect high-pitched whines, so if the crew noticed that the cat was getting skittish and running for cover, they knew to start looking in the sky for incoming aircraft. Cats would also be able to recognize the activity going on on a ship and know that combat was coming and there was gonna be a couple of big bangs. So they often ran to someplace where they felt safe. If they did not, someone in the crew was sure to scoop up the cat, take him someplace

such as a laundry room, someplace where the cat would be okay and perhaps be a bit muffled from the sound. And remember, cats are really valued by the crew. So they always made sure the cat was safe when going into combat. So after a long history of service, when and why did cats disappear from Navy ships? Well, animals were first banned by the U.S. Navy just prior to World War I when it was an Admiral Doyle who was conducting an inspection of a battleship. And the ship's goat got loose.

It butted him in the rear and knocked him over. He got up and the goat butted him again. He got up a third time, started running, and the crew tried to grab hold of the goat. I don't know how hard they were trying because the goat got away, knocked down the animal one more time. And so the very next day, all animals were banned. But that was quickly rescinded by Victor of the Navy because he recognized the importance of having animals on shifts for morale. So after World War II, when fumigation methods started to improve, cats began to lose their practical role, and that was for pest control. And then it became a political and legal liability.

After the war, there was a great downsizing of the military. There were a lot of budget cuts. The Navy felt they were being cut to the bone to the point where they could not defend the nation against the growing communist threat. So they started to push back. And they were ridiculed by members of Congress who were advocating budget cuts. And during hearings, congressmen would say that the Navy's claimed they had no money, yet they have enough money to spend on 100,000 oyster forks. And there's a ship that has a three-man committee to play in birthday parties for a cat. And this is very embarrassing to the Navy.

And in truth, this is not really affecting the budget too much because most cats were paid for out of the crew's own pocket. But the Navy was concerned about public perception, that the Navy was asking for money and yet spending it frivolously. But more than anything, the end of cats and ships came because of stricter quarantine laws after World War II. Cats were not allowed off ships anymore. The problem is cats don't follow rules. You know, as Stephen King wrote, that they are the gangsters of the animal world. They think they're above the law. If a ship pulled into a foreign port, a cat is going to cat.

They've got to sneak off that ship, find another cat, and get into trouble. The problem is if that's spotted by local authorities, it's a big penalty for the ship's captain. Several years ago, there was a Russian ship that pulled to Great Britain, and the cat got off just for about two minutes. The crew member ran out, skipped the cat back out, but it was too late. Someone saw it, reported to the authorities, and they came out. They find the captain the equivalent of about six months' wages, which the captain refused to pay. So they're going to throw him in jail for 30 days. And while this was going on, they noted that the ship had violated civil safety regulations, so they detained it.

This led to a diplomatic dust-up between Great Britain and Russia. Eventually, the Russians paid the fine for the cat and got the ship up to code. But all these problems started because of the cat getting off the ship. Now, U.S. Navy captains have a tremendous amount of responsibility. And the Navy, perhaps in its infinite wisdom, thought that worrying about a cat violating quarantine laws was not something that needed to be added to the list of concerns. So they, for all intents and purposes, banned animals, which was quickly followed by the Royal Navy, most other countries. The Russians apparently still have captain their ships. They just don't learn.

yeah i would say as a ship's captain you probably have enough to worry about with regular liberty incidents versus that that humans are doing uh versus uh what your cat is up to um but you had a whole section on famous cats did you have a favorite story that you uncovered uh i did i think that was probably mishap uh frank prayer was marine in korea in the early 1950s and he was the front line and came across two kittens that had been orphaned they were just a few days old he gave one of the kittens to another marine and he took one that he named mishap because she was born the wrong place the wrong time and he nursed her using a medicine dropper and somebody captured this with a camera and at that time he was actually facing a court

marshal because he was a photographer and he had taken a photo of a wounded marine and entered it into a photography contest and won first prize. Fortunately, he did not go through military censors. And at that time, they were not allowing any pictures of American wounded to be published. So he was gonna be brought up in charges. But just as the process was about to start, that photo of him feeding that kitten

was picked by newspapers, appearing in about 50,000 papers around the world. And he became famous overnight. And there's this photo, of course, a handsome Marine feeding this cute kitten. It's a moment of humanity and the chaos of war. It really resonated with people. And he started doing marriage proposals. And the Marines realized, hey, we cannot court-martial kitten guy. So he always said that mishap saved him from being thrown in the brig. He later gave mishap to the headquarters where she became the mascot.

Another Marine adopted her, took her back to Chicago, where she grew to be an old and happy cat so it's a great photo with a really sweet story well unfortunately that's all the time that we have for today i'd like to thank my guest scott christianson scott i think i know where the uh where the answer to this next question is going to go but where where can we find you online and then what is your next project uh if you have any stories about mascots or any photos please reach out to me at the usdable institute that's media at us9.org and of course since i just did the cow book. I'm finishing the dog book. It's going to be sea dogs coming soon. Oh, twist. I thought you were going to talk about the goats.

Is the goat book not in production or is it just further down the line? That was an article that you could find on US9 News that was published a few years ago. Okay. I will go back and look that one up. I don't know if you closed any part of that article with the USS Lake Erie story of my old ship having an unauthorized goat on board. I'm going to say 2008 time frame.

I've heard about that story, but it's not in the article. You need to tell me more about that one day. Yeah, I wasn't there for the story, thankfully, because a bunch of people caught some discipline for that one. But yeah, I will send you the link as soon as we're done here. But thank

you again for joining us, the listeners. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you next time. © BF-WATCH TV 2021 Water, wine, both white and red, oh boy, I'm in for now. Oh, help me, oh, I'm putting me out of it. Why, I'm putting me out of it. Help me, oh, I'm putting me out of it. Boy, I'm in for now.