203rd anniversary of Engels birth. His cat Tidlums was the ‘terror’ of Regents Park Rd
Friedrich Engels was born on 28th November 1820 and died in North London (where else)on 5th August 1895.
After taking early retirement from the family firm in Manchester he moved to London and lived in Regents Park Rd until his death.
Writing to Karl Kautsky on 27th December 1891 Engels reported on the activities of his cat Tidlums:
Tidlums has grown into a large, majestic tomcat, the sultan of all the female cats in Regent’s Park Road and the terror of all competitors and rivals.
Unfortunately there is no other mention of Tidlums and Tristram Hunt’s biography of Engels, The Frock Coated Communist, unaccountably doesn’t mention cats.
Tidlums sounds like a rather worrying cat though not quite as bad as Rosa Luxemburg’s cat Mimi who she reported had ‘whacked Lenin with her paw’ on one occasion:
We need to hear more these revolutionary felines. Clearly they can hold their own in local community action.