The tiger that stunned a seaside town

A tiger brought to the UK in the 19th Century caused a stir before becoming a well-known resident of a military barracks, according to a local historian.

Phil Eyden has shared the story of a Bengal tiger cub called Plassey, which was brought to Dover by British soldiers.

Eyden said troops adopted the cub after shooting its mother during a hunting expedition. The adult tiger had been protecting two six-week-old cubs in the Terai foothills of India, an area now known for its wildlife and tiger reserves.

The soldiers from the 5th Lancers gave one of the cubs to the 102nd Royal Madras Fusiliers, which brought the animal to England, where it became a regimental pet at Dover's Western Heights.

Reflecting on how Plassey's mother was killed, Eyden said: "I think guilt didn't really enter into the world of a Victorian officer."

He said soldiers at the time saw the animal as a symbol of prestige.

The soldiers named the tiger after the 1757 Battle of Plassey between troops from the British East India Company led by Robert Clive and the last ruler of Bengal.

Eyden, a volunteer with the Western Heights Preservation Society, said when the tiger first arrived in Dover, it was marched from the docks up to the citadel and about 3,000 people gathered to watch.

One woman "flew into a panic", he told Secret Kent.

"She fled home and wrote to the colonel saying 'I can't leave home because of this, I'm too frightened it's going to come and attack me'."

Eyden said seeing a tiger at that time would have been like seeing a "mythological beast or a dinosaur, something you only read about… so to her it was like seeing a monster from the abyss".

At one stage, the mayor got involved and asked for the tiger to be removed from Dover because people were shopping in Folkestone, Eyden said.

Plassey lived with Paymaster Sergeant George Hartopp, who exercised the animal on a chain each day and walked it around the table at regimental dinners and guest nights.

Eyden said Hartopp later died of tuberculosis.

The historian believes that after Plassey's owner died, no-one else wanted to take on a Bengal tiger that was three-quarters grown by then.

Plassey spent seven years with other tigers in a cage at London Zoo and died in 1877, Eyden said.

Plassey's skull remains on display at the National Army Museum in London.

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