Poor Fluffy

The authoress Ursula Bloom had her first book, Tiger, printed when she was 7. She later went on to write some 500 novels and other books. In 1906, when she was 13, she visited her great uncle’s farm, Heath Farm, Bernards Heath, St Albans. She was so distressed with one aspect of how the farm animals were treated that she wrote a poem about it.

The villain was the farmer, Jacob Reynolds. He was much amused by the attitude of this sentimental young lady to his policy of controlling the farm cats. He copied her poem into his scrap book and added a verse of his own.

In those days it was the practice on farms in the area to encourage a number of cats to make their home in the farm yard to keep down the vermin. However they were not allowed to stray into the fields to hunt the rabbits. After all, farmers used to shot and sell the rabbits at the market, and cats that took up poaching did not last long. My father Gerald Reynolds, was brought up on nearby Hammonds Farm, Sandridge in the 1920s and 30s and the practice was to shoot any cat seen hunting more than two fields from the farm.