Today I want to plug someone else’s book – a marvelous little book that’s about 225 years old. I stumbled on it by chance, I don’t even know how anymore. It’s my favourite read of 2024 so far, and I’m overwhelmed by the story and the charm of it all.
Matthew Flinders was a Royal Navy captain and cartographer. He should be famous for how well he wrote. Instead, he’s famous as the captain, explorer and mapmaker who first circumnavigated and charted the entire Australia coastline.
If you had asked me to guess when that happened, I would have hazarded 1600s or 1700s. But no, Flinders charted Australia and defined it as a continent in its own right in the years 1801 to 1803. We forget how comparatively recent some of these explorations were.
Flinders, of course, wasn’t alone during his voyages. He had a crew, including the unforgettable Trim. He writes of Trim, who was born on board ship in the Indian Ocean:
“… The signs of superior intelligence which marked his infancy procured for an education beyond what is usually bestowed on individuals of his tribe …”
“…In playing with his little brothers and sisters upon deck by moon-light … the energy of his movements sometimes carried him so far beyond his mark, that he fell overboard, but this was far from being a misfortune; he learned to swim and to have no dread of the water; and when a rope was thrown to him, he took hold of it …and ran up by it …”
“… he was endowed with an unusual degree of confidence and courage, and having never received anything but good from men, he believed all to be his friends, and he was friends to all …”
A crew of ragtag sailors in the 1800s included all types of good and evil – especially in the Royal Navy, which pressed every category of man from farms, bars, brothels and prisons. Trim, if you haven’t guessed it yet, was a cat. And the fact that he charmed all the crew- the bullies and the bullied alike- into treating him well is an astounding testament to his supra-ordinary charm and popularity aboard.
He seems to have been born to shipboard life:
“He knew what good discipline required, and on taking a reef, never presumed to go aloft until the order was issued; but so soon as the officer had given the word – ‘Away up aloft!’; up he jumped along with the seamen; and so active and zealous was he, that none could reach the top [of the mast] before, or so soon as he did … This …created no jealously for he always found some good friend ready to caress him after the business was done, and to take him down in arms [since climbing downwards was more difficult for him]”
Trim – whose official duty was to guard the ship’s bread-room against mice – accompanied Flinders during the circumnavigation of Australia, during a temporary sojourn in England, during a circumnavigation of the world, during shipwreck on the Great Barrier Reef, and imprisonment with Flinders on Mauritius, where Trim died.
Flinders, while still imprisoned on Mauritius, wrote the following epitaph:
“To the memory of Trim, the best and most illustrious of his Race, – the most affectionate of friends, – faithful of servants, and best of creatures. He made the Tour of the Globe, and a voyage to Australia, which he circumnavigated; and was ever the delight and pleasure of his fellow voyagers. Returning to Europe in 1803, he was shipwrecked in the Great Equinoxial Ocean; This danger escaped, he sought refuge and assistance at the Isle of France, where he was made prisoner, contrary to the laws of Justice, of Humanity, and of French National Faith; and where, alas! he terminated his useful career, by an untimely death, being devoured by the Catophagi of that island. Many a time have I beheld his little merriments with delight, and his superior intelligence with surprise: Never will his like be seen again!
Trim was born in the Southern Indian Ocean, in the year 1799, and perished as above at the Isle of France in 1804.
Peace be to his shade, and Honour to his memory.”
If you want to read it all, Flinders’ memoir about Trim has been republished as
Trim, The Cartographer’s Cat – by Matthew Flinders, with additional commentary/padding by modern day editors/writers Philippa Sandall and Gillian Dooley.
It’s a story I can’t get out of my head.
PS Here are some photos I took of Trim and Flinders outside the New South Wales State Library in Sydney.
Update April 2025:
I found today, to my great surprise, that there was another expedition cat that was famous enough to have a statue. In the pictures below you’ll see Mrs. Chippy (she’s a he). He accompanied Shackelton’s famous Antarctic expedition on the ship Endurance. In the first picture, he’s shown on the shoulder of Perce Blackborrow, the stowaway member of the Endurance’s crew.
I stumbled on Mrs. Chippy while reading “Finding Endurance” by Darrel Bristow-Bovey. Darrel gives a bad character reference to Mrs. Chippy, which I distrust because of the happy first photo below, but here goes Darrel’s quote about Mrs. Chippy:
““She was the worst ship’s cat in expedition history. She habitually walked across the top of the dog kennels, driving them into a frenzy. No one had ever seen her catch a rat. On the voyage out she had jumped overboard through a porthole, and the navigator Huberht Hudson, whose parents didn’t know how to spell Hubert, had the ship heeled round so she could be fished from the sea. She wasn’t even a female cat, she was male. She didn’t much like people, but she loved Chippy McNish (the ship’s carpenter), who didn’t much like people either, but loved her back.”
Wikipedia gives a more neutral view: “After the loss of the Endurance four of the sled dogs and Mrs Chippy, the cat McNish had brought on board, were shot on Shackleton’s order due to his belief that keeping them alive in such harsh conditions would be an unnecessary drain on the crew’s scarce resources, they would suffer from being underfed, and the crew could utilize the dog meat. McNish never forgave Shackleton for having his cat killed.”
Photo by Expedition Photographer Frank Hurley, from Wikipedia.
Bronze sculpture of Mrs Chippy on the grave of Harry McNish (sometimes spelled McNeish) in Karori Cemetery which was added by the New Zealand Antarctic Society; from Wikipedia.
Absolutely delightful!
Thought this would be up your alley!