Sports Presenter Owen Shipton’s blog: How a kitten’s Wembley adventure created the Black Cats

BLACK_CATS
Sunderland's Black Cats logo at the Stadium of Light. (Photo: Colstonrj)

In the third of a series on the origins of the nicknames of football clubs from around the UK, Notts TV Sport Presenter Owen Shipton examines one of Nottingham Forest’s relegated Premier League opponents next season – Sunderland.


In 1937, twelve-year-old Sunderland fan Billy Morris travelled hundreds of miles to Wembley with a kitten in his pocket.

It was just the second time Sunderland had reached the FA Cup final. And, as the half-time whistle blew, they were losing one-nil to Preston North End.

But over the next 45 minutes, Billy – and the tiny, black cat sprouting its head out of his overcoat pocket – watched a miraculous comeback. Sunderland scored three to claim the FA Cup for the first time.

Billy’s kitten was seen as a good luck charm. The Sunday Dispatch even reported that the little cat was “adorned with scarlet and white”, Sunderland’s colours.

“Perhaps Preston”, the paper remarked, “had no lucky black kitten among their supporters!”

The Sunday Dispatch zoned in on Billy’s kitten in the crowdThe Sunday Dispatch zoned in on Billy’s kitten in the crowd.

But Sunderland’s feline connections stretch back much further. And Billy’s kitten was not the first black cat to bring Sunderland luck.

The North East city has had military defences since 1742. And, as Napoleon’s forces threatened the British shoreline in the early 19th century, more and more men and cannons guarded the Sunderland coast.

Stumbling home from the George Inn one night in 1805, a lonely watchman heard a loud yowl. Lurking in the darkness was a black cat so large he mistook it for the devil. From that point, defences nearby were dubbed the Black Cat battery.

A Sunderland battery in the 19th century

A century later, a gaggle of dejected Sunderland players loped into a Roker Park dressing room. The Mackems hadn’t won the league in seven years and a 4-1 defeat to Liverpool on New Year’s Day had thrust them into the bottom half of the first division.

They found a stray, black cat sheltering from the winter inside. That day, despite missing a penalty, Sunderland beat Bury 3-1. Contrary to popular superstition, the legend of a lucky, black cat was born.

And the cat made himself at home. Photos from the time show him posing in a red and white bow tie, cuddling with players at Roker Park and sitting on a table in front of star goalscorer, Billy Hogg.

Sunderland fans have called themselves the Black Cats ever since; the club’s supporters’ association has used a black cat as its emblem since it was founded in the 1960’s.

billy-hogg-black-cat
Billy Hogg holds the black cat that made Roker Park home.

But the club only made the nickname official in 2000 when they put it to a vote. More than half of the 11,000 voters chose the “Black Cats”.

The club moved from Roker Park to the Stadium of Light in 1997. But fans still remember the black cats who brought them such great luck.