3-017-163 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Landing foreign cattle at the British and Foreign Wharf, near the London Docks, 1865. Illustration of '...the process of unloading a mixed cargo of sheep and cattle from the Magnet, a regular cattle-ship, at the British and Foreign Wharf. There were 1600 sheep on the upper deck, crowded into several pens; in the lower hold were a number of cattle standing on the sheep's ballast. These poor beasts, which were sadly dirty, but did not show any signs of suffering, were made, one by one, to scramble up the shoots connecting the upper with the lower decks of the vessel; each was led by a rope from the horns, and only in one case, where an ox slipped down on the shoot leading up from the lower hold, was there any difficulty in getting the animals out...the greater portion of the cattle imported for the London market are disembarked at three London wharves...During the summer months nearly 4000 head of cattle are disembarked every week at these three landing-places, where we also receive, per week, pork, veal, and mutton to the extent of 1800 pigs, 750 calves, and 10,500 sheep. These herds and flocks are brought over in about thirty steamers'. From "Illustrated London News", 1865.