Italian artist Walter Molino captured the moment a Narrandera girl met an escaped tiger in 1953. Photo: La Domenica del Corriere.
In the wee hours of a Tuesday morning in November 1953, seven-year-old Mavis Hallcroft was asleep on the unenclosed veranda of the family’s Narrandera home on Chantilly Street.
Her three brothers slept at the other end of the veranda and her three-year-old sister Fay was curled up beside her.
At around 1:30 am, Mavis was awakened by an unusual sensation as something coarse and wet was dragged across her cheek.
As the bleary-eyed child battled her way out of a deep sleep, she realised that a strange creature was sitting beside her on the bed.
“Daddy, quick. Daddy, help me,” she cried.
“There’s a big dog licking my face. He’s on my bed.”
A groggy Claude Hallcroft peered into the sleep-out through the window and was horrified to see – not a dog – but a tiger perched beside the girls!
As he told the Goulburn Evening Post, his “wife almost fainted when she saw the tiger’s eyes glowing in the darkened room”.
Mrs Hallcroft later described the horrifying scene.
“When I looked through the window, I could not believe what I saw,” the Morning Bulletin reported.
“I thought I must have been dreaming, but I did not panic and I knew I should not anger the tiger. My daughter, Fay, was sleeping beside Mavis.”
A now very wide awake Mr Hallcroft rushed to his car to grab his .22 rifle and returned to take aim at the striped intruder that was still sitting casually on the bed beside a motionless Mavis and her still-sleeping sister.
“I stood at a window about 12 ft from the bed and aimed at the tiger while my wife held a torch,” he said.
“I knew I could not afford to miss. Luckily, Mavis lay quite still. I fired, and the bullet went through the tiger’s nose and jaw. It ran through the door and into the street in a flash.”
Accompanied by the police, Claude Hallcroft and a group of local men located the wounded tiger several hundred metres away and it was soon collected by members of the visiting Bullen Bros. Circus.
They explained that the animal appeared to have been deliberately released as several of the circus’ horses had also been turned out on the streets.
The tiger appeared much smaller in the daylight and was revealed to be a six-month-old cub named Queenie who had been bottle fed and would often curl up in bed with the performers at night.
Lilian Bullen told the media that “Queenie was not savage and would not bite anyone. A two-year-old child could play with her!”
“We are sure someone broke open her cage and probably carried her away.
“Whoever took her must have got the wind up and let her go again.”
Fortunately, the tiny .22 bullet had passed through Queenie’s jaw without doing too much damage and she was dosed with penicillin and soon on the mend.
A police investigation revealed that the tiger’s cage had indeed been tampered with. Three former employees with a grudge were identified as the likely suspects and officers in Sydney were warned that at least two of the men were armed.
By Thursday, the men had been arrested on vagrancy charges and the circus had moved on to Junee where the curious tiger cub was said to be recovering very well.
Unsurprisingly, the story became a global sensation as it was repeated in publications in the US and Europe.
Renowned Italian comic artist and illustrator Walter Molino beautifully captured the moment for the December 1953 edition of the magazine La Domenica del Corriere.
The translated caption reads “Papa send this dog away!”
