Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
I have always found the stories of animals at war an intriguing subject . Often forgotten about, there does not seem to be much in the way of reference material in relation to animal equipment used by the military so I thought I'd start a thread and see what everybody has out there.
My main interest (as most on this site) is WW2, however, I think that this is such an overlooked area anything 'military animal' related should be posted to act as a reference to others.
What have you got? A German horse shoe, saddle, harness.... A dog 'dog' tag, collar, lead.... A pigeon drop canister, parachute....A ships cat! Exploding rat!
I have shown the few items I have in various other threads but to get this one started I will show them again.
First up is Montgomery in a repro WW2 British dog harness. This was copied from an original although artistic licence was applied to the lead as it was not known what the original looked like.
(P.S. I'm pretty sure Bassets weren't used in WW2)
Re: Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
He's a lovely hound! Although he does remind me more of Churchill than Montgomery, but that one's already been done on those annoying insurance ad's hasn't it?
'I do not think we can hope for any better thing now.
We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker of course, and the end cannot be far.
It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more. R. SCOTT.
Last Entry - For God's sake look after our people.'
In memory of Capt. Robert Falcon Scott, Edward Wilson, Henry Bowers, Lawrence Oates and Edgar Evans. South Pole Expedition, 30th March 1912.
Re: Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
A WW2 US carrier pigeon capsule shown with an unused message.
- - Updated - -
by big ned
He's a lovely hound! Although he does remind me more of Churchill than Montgomery, but that one's already been done on those annoying insurance ad's hasn't it?
I went for Montgomery as he's not very tall! We are thinking of getting another one, I've already got names in mind - Clementine (Churchill's wife) for a girl or Rommel for a boy!
Re: Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
Ha Ha!! The return of 'Speckled Jim'.....!!
'I do not think we can hope for any better thing now.
We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker of course, and the end cannot be far.
It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more. R. SCOTT.
Last Entry - For God's sake look after our people.'
In memory of Capt. Robert Falcon Scott, Edward Wilson, Henry Bowers, Lawrence Oates and Edgar Evans. South Pole Expedition, 30th March 1912.
Re: Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
A US carrier pigeon vest. Used by paratroopers to keep the bird safe when they jumped. The bird was strapped to the top of their reserve chute
As Ned rightly pointed out this is Speckled Jim - unfortunately I manged to delete all of the images I had ever downloaded on to war relics which makes the old 'Carrier pigeon' thread pretty useless!
Re: Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
There you have it! The very few animal related items I have (at the moment)
I'm sure there must be more out there, especially from the 'German' boys and girls - wasn't the Wehrmacht one of the biggest users of horses?
These images show a page from 'The War Illustrated' and a copy of an original German photo, it is interesting to note that the dogs all appear to have similar collars although one has a piece of rope as a lead.
Animals at War - Carrier Pigeons, War dogs, Cavalry, etc - Reference thread - What have you got?
)
.
Although he does remind me more of Churchill than Montgomery, but that one's already been done on those annoying insurance ad's hasn't it?
by big ned
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