Tarvin History Revealed – Jenny the Monkey

Items for our "Tarvin History Revealed" series are mainly drawn for press reports that have been collected and archived by the Tarvin History Group. A much less common source of material is oral history collected from the memories of individuals. Our monkey story belongs to the latter category and comes from a Tarvin resident who wished to remain anonymous.

"In 1945, my father, was licensee of "The Engine House Tavern" in Boughton. We had served servicemen regularly during the war and a sailor came to the pub with a young monkey which he had acquired on his travels and we presume his wife had refused to house it. It ended up at the pub and we named her Jenny. I, as an eleven year old lad, had the job of caring for her before and after school. I fed her on raw vegetables and took her across to the Meadows on the ferry for a run.

Jenny groomed our dog for fleas which Mick loved. However, the owner of a car with a damaged canvas roof and the neighbours whose flower boxes she ate were not too happy. My mother had to run to St. Paul's school to get me from my class when Jenny escaped as she only responded to me.
These events, and with winter approaching, the family decided she should go to the zoo. An appointment was made and it was arranged for my aunt to come with me. I walked Jenny on a rope through Boughton and up to the Town Hall to meet her at the Upton bus stop. The conductor wasn't going to allow a monkey on his bus but my aunt, a formidable lady, insisted. Mr Mottershead met us and accepted Jenny.

I visited a few times and was once told off for giving Jenny a drink of cider. On a later visit she was not there and I was told she had died of pneumonia.

Another memory from the same year was when we took American soldiers to visit the zoo. They were stationed at Vicar's Cross, where the Rugby club is now. One of the soldiers was a pig-farmer from Maine and he was fascinated to see a lion and a dog sharing the same space."