Pet Monkey - Ship's Monkeys

Ship's Monkeys

When the British first began to explore Africa, young monkeys were often captured and taken back on board the ship to entertain sailors. For example, a Senegal monkey was kept as a pet by a ship's cook in the 19th century and entertained passengers with its antics. Some were later kept in zoos; many modern captive monkeys in the UK are descended from such Victorian-era monkeys. The same practice is thought to have occurred during the Napoleonic wars; it is rumoured that such practices led to a monkey being washed ashore and hanged in Hartlepool, causing the people of Hartlepool to be nicknamed the Monkey Hangers.

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