Free Republic

With his vicious fangs on display and weight firmly on his back legs, this tabby looks set to pounce on its unsuspecting prey. But it is not mice, birds or any other small animals he is after. It is not even the other pet cats he has already savaged in his neighbourhood. They were deemed too 'small' a target to terrify, so he decided to turn his attention to a much larger prey - humans. The pet cat, who has been named Grumpy because of his exploits, started entering all the cat flaps on one street in the search for...

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. Was there a black cat aboard the Civil War ironclad USS Monitor, placed inside a cannon by a superstitious but desperate sailor as the vessel was sinking? Conservators had hoped to verify the legend as they worked this month to extract concrete-like sediment from two cast iron, smooth-bore cannons salvaged from the ship's turret. A crewman who had survived the sinking off the North Carolina coast more than 140 years ago maintained that he stuffed the feline into one of the 11-inch-wide, 17,000-pound barrels. And did he stuff his new wool coat and boots into the carriage...