ESCAPE FROM A ZOO

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 53, Issue 286, 14 September 1933, Page 8

ESCAPE FROM A ZOO

LION'S 40 HOURS' LIBERTY. All Bognor, the popular Sussex watering-place, was busily engaged on July 6 in discussing 'the mystery of an escaped zoo lion, which, it was announced had been recaptured at 2 a.m. after 40 hours' liberty. The lion—a two year old African animal named Rex—was reported to have escaped from his cage during transit from Littlehampton to Bognor on the night of July 4. He was tracked by bis spoor to a field at Pagham, not far from that in which the body of a badly mauled sheep was found on July 5. The beast put up no resistance. A net was thrown over him. He was put in a box and taken back to his cage, where he went to sleep. Mr W. Butlin, owner of the zoo, said: "The door of Bex's cage was found open when the lorry arrived at Bognor. The door had been fastened with nuts and bolts. All I can think of is that the nuts must have rattled loose."

But Mr C. Joss, Mr Butlin's Bognor manager, said: "Three bars of the cage were broken when it arrived here. I saw them myself. Of course, Bex must have broken them. The door was not open." "A report reached us that Rex had been seen and we tracked him in half an hour," said Mr Butlin. "He was too exhausted to put irp a fight, and it was fairly easy to get a large net oyer him. We brought him back to Bognor in a lorry." A local veterinary surgeon who was called in stated that Rex was suffering from exhaustion and shock and prescribed a tonic with his meat.