C.H.A.T, Celia Hammond Animal Trust (Lewisham)

Celia Hammond was one of the top models in the 60's, appearing on countless Vogue covers and travelling all over the world on photographic assignments. Although she became a vegetarian in her teens, she ironically became one of the country's top fur models - until she saw some footage on television of the Canadian seal cull and told of her horror in a press interview. Contacted by Lady Dowding of the charity Beauty Without Cruelty, Celia agreed to fly to the Gulf of St Lawrence, as an observer of the seal cull for BWC. Having witnessed the appalling cruelty of the seal hunt, she immediately vowed never to model fur again and persuaded all the top models of the day to give up promoting fur. This resulted in a lot of publicity and Celia realised that her modelling career gave her an ideal platform from which to campaign against the fur trade, factory farming, vivisection, and other animal abuses including, much later, the live export of sheep, calves and pigs across Europe from the UK.

In the mid 60's, Celia also became involved in rescuing, neutering and rehoming stray and unwanted animals. She learned how to trap feral cats, developing her own equipment, and started to trap, neuter and return to suitable sites many thousands of feral cats at a time when euthanasia of feral cats was considered the only option. She fought many battles with local authorities, hospitals, environmental health departments and succeeded over several years in elevating the status of feral cats from near vermin to animals worthy of humane treatment and showing that control could be achieved by neutering and not killing. She opened a sanctuary in the country for the many cats that could not, because of building or demolition, be returned to their own environment and rehomed many thousands of neutered, vaccinated ferals on smallholdings, farms and stables.

Address: 233-235 Lewisham Way Lewisham

Call Us: 0208 694 6545 - RESCUE AND REHOMING ENQUIRIES ONLY