THE SLAUGHTER OF
ANIMALS FOR FOOD.
BY
JOHN GALSWORTHY,
Author of "Strife," "Justice," "The Man of Property," etc.
Reprinted by Special Permission of
the Author, and of the Editor, of
THE •* DAILY MAIL."
ISSUED BY THE
ROYAL SOCIETY FOR THE
PREVENTION OF CRUELTY
TO ANIMALS.
105, JERMYN STREET, LONDON, S.W.
AND THE
COUNCIL OF JUSTICE
TO ANIMALS,
12, OLD BURLINGTON STREET. LONDON, W.
PRICE ONE PENNY.
INTRODUCTION.
HUMANER METHODS IN
THE ABATTOIR.
[HE admirable and restrained articles by
Mr. John Galsworthy deal with a subject
from which men, by predilection, avert their
thoughts. Yet there can be no doubt
that Mr. Galsworthy makes out an unanswerable case
for stricter regulation and humaner methods of animal
slaughter. There is no ground for suggesting
intentional cruelty on the part of the men concerned
in a disagreeable task. The question is whether the
methods which they employ, and which the law
sanctions, are the most merciful and the best. Nor is
there any practical difficulty in the way of a humaner
system. In Sweden all the higher animals must be
rendered insensible before they are killed in the abattoir.
The Swedish law would meet Mr. Galsworthy's
criticisms, and could readily be enforced. The issue is
not a trifling one. " He prayeth best who loveth
best All things both great and small," wrote Coleridge
in one of his moments of inspiration. The public
should not rest till the dumb animals which perish
in man's service and for man's food are slain with a
minimum of pain.
From a leading Article, " The Daily Mail,"
December lyih, igi2.
192999
THE SLAUGHTER OF ANIMALS
FOR FOOD.
By JOHN GALSWORTHY.
THE thing is horrible, but it is necessary. Why drag
it out into the hght ? Why make our thoughts
miserable with contemplation of horrors which must
exist ?
If it were true that the present methods of slaugh-
tering animals for food in this country were necessary,
if all the sufifering they involve was inevitable, I should
be the first to say : Let us shut our eyes ! For un-
necessary suffering — even to ourselves — is anathema.
It is just because this particular suffering is avoidable,
and easily avoidable, that I feel we must face the
matter if we want to call ourselves a decent people.
I am a meat-eater — we are nearly all meat-eaters.
Well ! We cannot sit down at present to a single meal
without complicity in methods that produce a vast
amount of preventible suffering to creatures for whom
the least sensitive among us has at heart a certain
friendly feeling. For, to those who say that they do
not care for animals, that animals, even domestic ones,
have no rights except such as for our own advantage
we accord them, let me at once reply : I do not agree,
but for the sake of argument, granted ; and then con-
ceive, if you can, a world without cattle, sheep, and
pigs, and tell me honestly whether you do not miss
something friendly. No I the fact is, we, who are the
descendants of countless generations to whom these
animals have been literally the breath of life, can-
not — even now that we have become such highly
civilised townsmen — disclaim sensibility in their
regard.
Consider the magnitude of this matter. The
calculations of an expert give the following approxi-
mate numbers of animals annually killed for food in
England and Wales: 1,850,000 beasts, 8,500,000 sheep,
and 3,200,000 pigs. These figures are hard to come
at, and may be a million or so out, one way or the
other, but even if they be, is there any feature of
the national life which can touch this for possi-
bilities of preventible physical suffering? And is
there any department so utterly neglected by public
opinion and the law?
Save the eating of bread, have we any practice
in our lives so consistent as that of eating meat, or
any from which we consider that we derive more
benefit, or any about whose conditions, sanitary or
humane, we are so careless?
If a donkey is badly beaten, a dog stoned, or a
cat killed with a riding-whip, the chances are that
a prosecution will ensue or a question be asked in
Parliament ; for public opinion and the law lay it
down that the infliction of unnecessary suffering on
animals is cruelty, an offence punishable by fine
or imprisonment. But if in the dark and sacred
precincts of our slaughterhouses some 8,000,000 sheep
are killed yearly, without first being stunned, by a
method which, even in the hands of an expert,
produces some seconds of acute suffering (Report
of the Admiralty Committee on Humane Slaughtering
of Animals, 1904) ; if thousands of cattle, stunned
by inexperienced young slaughtermen, require two
or more blows of that primitive instrument, the
pole-axe ; if pigs are driven in gangs into a small
space and there killed, one by one, while the others
squeal in terror round their dead bodies; if all this
preventible suffering is inflicted daily in our slaughter-
houses, what does public opinion know of it, and
what does the law care?
One of the quaintest things in life is the inability
of the human mind to see that what is sauce for
the goose is sauce for the gander. There was a
time in this country when men beat their donkeys
set cocks fighting, baited bears and badgers, tied
tin pots to dogs' tails, with the Hghtest of light
hearts and no consciousness at all that they were
outside tlie pale of decency in doing so. Their
descendants, butchers, slaughterers, what-not (as good
and decent fellows as members of other trades) now
look on the unnecessary suffering involved in such
doings with the same aversion as the rest of us; but
they still kill their sheep without stunning, still drive
their pigs in gangs into the slaughtering chamber,
still prefer to use the uncertain pole-axe — all without
a qualm.
Why should this enormous field, wherein does
occur such an amount of easily preventible suffering,
be left so utterly unpatrolled by the law, which has
interested itself in warding off all needless suffering
from cats and dogs and horses? Well! The law
stands idle partly because the animals we kill for
food are not so near and dear to us as those others.
We should never stand the horses and dogs and cats
we make such pets of killed when their time comes
in the manner in which we kill our sheep and pigs.
And partly the law stands idle because in the case
of horses and dogs and cats there is no large leagued
interest, such as that of the meat trades, setting its
face against interference.
I am told that the meat trades constitutes the
strongest body in the kingdom. And well they may,
considering the vast proportions of their business.
But presumably the meat trades are controlled by
men very like ourselves; no more cruel, no more
desirous of inflicting unnecessai^y suffering and if
I am told that these men are going to oppose, just
for the sake of prejudice, such simple, elementary
safeguards against unnecessary suffering as I shall
outline, I can only say I do not believe it. There
will be nothing prejudicial to their interest in these
suggestions. Nothing startling, extravagant, or experi-
mental. The case has been proved up to the hilt.
What on earth is the good of appointing a Govern-
mental Committee of first-rate men* to examine into
* The Admiralty Committee on Humane Slaughtering, 1904, Chairman Mr. Arthur Lee, M.P
facts if their Report is to be paid about as much
attention to as one would pay to the suggestions of
seven lunatics ? It is ridiculous to pretend that
humane methods are not effective, in the face of uni-
versal evidence from abroad ; in the face of numerous
testimonials from butchers in this country; in the
face of the fact that Mr. Christopher Cash in the
year 19 lo had 4,000 animals (the property of thirty
butchers) killed by humane methods, and though
he was in every case willing to pay full compensa-
tion for any injury to a carcase had not one single
claim made on him. (From a pamphlet entitled "The
Humane Slaughtering of Animals for Food," by
Christopher Cash. Issued by the Royal Society for
the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.)
Butchers and slaughtermen perform a necessary
task from which most of us would shrink, and it is
both unbecoming and nonsensical to suggest inten-
tional cruelty on their part. I do not for a moment.
But I do say that it is the business of the law so
to control the methods of slaughter as to obviate,
as far as possible, needless suffering, however uninten-
tionally it may be inflicted.
In the following brief summary of our want of
system, I am not dealing at all with the Jewish
method of killing, for not being a Jew and having
merely seen the method at work, I cannot pretend
to be qualified to discuss a custom which, it is true,
nearly turned me sick, but which appears to be
necessary to the peace of the Jewish mind. This
would seem to be a matter for the non-*'religious"
conscience of a people in many respects more humane
than ourselves. Neither am I speaking as to Scot-
land, which is, of course, far ahead of us, having
provided by the Burgh Police Act of 1892 that
where there are public there shall be no private
slaughter-houses ; and where — at all events in Edin-
burgh — tliey have abattoirs that compare, I am told,
with the best on the Continent.
The following is a rough outline of what at present
seems good to a nation which prides itself on being at
once the most practical and the most humane in the
whole world : —
A mixed system of private and public slaughter-
houses — thousands of private slaughter-houses
(some of them highly insanitary) alongside of a few
municipally controlled abattoirs.
No regulation that where there are public
abattoirs there shall be no private ones ; hence
great difficulty in making these public slaughter-
houses pay their way.
Inspection of private slaughter-houses, in spite
of all the good intentions of local authorities and
medical officers, admitted to be very inefficient in
so far as condition of meat and method of slaughter
are concerned.
Supervision of public slaughter-houses much
hampered by the present widespread custom of
allowing butchers to send in their beasts with their
own slaughtermen.
No general statutory regulations as to method
of slaughter. Model by-laws have been drawn up
by the Local Government Board and recommended
to local authorities — but they are not compulsory
and have been but sparsely adopted.
Slaughtermen not licensed ; nor — except m
slaughter-houses directly controlled by a Govern-
ment Department (such as the Admiralty) — required
by law to be proficient before they commence
slaughtering. They learn in the great majority of
cases on the live animal.
"^^F^
METHODS OF SLAUGHTER.
CATTLE are almost universally stunned before their
throats are cut. So far — good 1 But they are still, for
the most part, stunned with the pole-axe. This weapon
produces complete unconsciousness at the first blow, if
well wielded. If not well wielded ! I have been
assured that the cases of misfire amount to a very small
percentage. But on the first two beasts slaughtered
before my eyes the first blow of the pole-axe — wielded
in each case by an experienced slaughterer — descended
without effect. The animals moaned, and waited
perhaps a minute for the second and successful blow.
Thanks to the efforts of the Royal Society for Preven-
tion of Cruelty to Animals, the Council of Justice to
Animals, the Humanitarian League, of Mr. Christopher
Cash, and others, there are now a considerable number
of improved instruments for stunning cattle in use —
the Greener and Behr pistols ; the Royal Society for
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals humane killer, and
large captive-bolt pistol ; the apparently perfect
Ransom pneumatic killer (recently tested at Islington
Cattle Market and awarded the Council of Justice to
Animals ;^ioo prize), and others. But the number of
these improved instruments in use at present is only a
fringe to the mass of the time-hallowed and uncertain
pole-axes.
CALVES : " The usual practice in this country
appears to be to run the animal up first (by a tackle
fastened to its hind legs) and then to stun it, previous
to bleeding." (Report of the Admiralty Committee.)
On this method the Committee thus commented :
" This order of procedure is not so humane, and
appears to be unnecessary." ..." Calves should
first be stunned by a blow on the head with a club" —
i.e., before being run up. It must be remembered that
when this Committee conducted its investigation, in 1904,
the best instruments for stunning had not been invented.
SHEEP, with few exceptions, are not stunned
before they are bled The method of killing them, and
the amount of suffering they undergo, are thus summed
up in the report of the Admiralty Committee : " The
usual method in this country is to lay the sheep on a
wooden ' crutch ' and then to thrust a knife through
the neck below the ears, and with a second motion to
insert the point from within, between the joints of the
vertebrae, thus severing the spinal cord. In the hands
of an expert this method is fairly rapid but somewhat
uncertain, the time which elapses between the first thrust
of the knife and complete loss of sensibility varying,
according to Professor Starling's obsetvations, from 5 to
30 seconds. In the hands of an inexpert operator it may
be some time before death supetvenes, and there can be
little doubt that this method must be very painful to the
sheep as long as consciousness remains.
"At the best it is a somewhat difficult operation,
and yet in practice is often entrusted to the younger
and less experienced hands in the slaughter-house, the
probable reason being that sheep are easy to handle,
and do not struggle or give trouble when stuck. . ."
In other words, the more helpless the creature the less
need for humanity ! " In Denmark and many parts of
Germany and Switzerland the law requires that sheep
shall always be stunned previous to being stuck, and
the Committee have satisfied themselves, by practical
experiments and observation, that this can be done
expeditiously and without difficulty. A small club with
a heavy head should be used, and the sheep should be
struck on the top of the head between the ears. This
point is important, as it is almost impossible to stun a
sheep by striking it on the forehead. . . It was also
clearly demonstrated that the stunning caused no injury
to the sheep's head or to the ' scrag of mutton ' which
could in any way depreciate their market value."
Notwithstanding this recommendation, the Local
Government Board have omitted from their model by-
laws (which, as before said, are not obligatory) a
regulation requiring the stunning of sheep. For this
omission they give the following ground : " In relation
to this question the Board have been advised by the
Board of Agriculture and Fisheries that they would see
no objection to a by-law requiring the stunning of pigs
or calves, but that the stunning of sheep is a difficult
operation, in the carrying out of which cruelty might
easily occur." Acting on this advice the Local
Government Board says : " While the practice of
stunning sheep may be a proper one to adopt in
public abattoirs, where it will be carried out by skilled
slaughtermen, the Board doubt whether it is advisable
to require its adoption in private establishments unless
there is reasonable ground for believing that it will be
properly performed."
Now in regard to this : First, why should there be
universal suffering to save cases of possible suffering ?
Secondly, the use of the Royal Society for Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals' captive-bolt or spring-bolt pistol
or the Ransom pneumatic killer entirely vemoves
difficulty, if indeed there be any even in stunning sheep
with a mallet, if only the sheep is struck on the top of the
head between the ears. This myth of difficulty is in
direct opposition to the assurance of the Admiralty
Committee and to the evidence of foreign countries.
The objection of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries
would appear to be based on the assumption that sheep
must be struck in the wrong place.
PIGS : " The Committee ascertained that it is the
usual practice in large establishments in England to stun
pigs by a blow on the forehead previous to sticking
them, and there is no difficulty m carrying this out, as
the pig's head is soft as compared with that of the
sheep. The Committee are of opinion that the pre-
liminary stunning should be enforced in all cases, the
evidence tending to show that this operation is often
limited to pigs which are so large or strong as to give
trouble, or to cases where, owing to the location of the
slaughter-house, the squeals of the stuck pigs cause
annoyance to the neighbourhood. The Committee feel
that considerations of humanity are at least as important
as those above mentioned." A sentiment with which
those of us who are not cads will presumably agree.
Note, however, that the Admiralty Committee refer
above only to large establishments. It is notorious that
numbers of pigs are still killed all over the country in
ways that the following quotation describes : " I, with
another witness, saw five pigs killed last Thursday
afternoon— three small ones and two large ones. The
pigs were * knifed ' one at a time and allowed to
wander round the slaughter-house bleeding and in a
drunken, reeling, rolling state, and at the same time
uttering most plaintive cries." (From a letter to a
daily journal.) The late eminent physiologist Sir
Benjamin Ward Richardson, in a paper read before the
Medical Society of London some years ago, says :
" Pigs, I have said, suffer a mental terror of death, and
to them commonly is also given a severe degree of
physical pain. . . . When they are killed by the
knife alone they die by a haemorrhage that may
extend with persistent consciousness over tliree or four
minutes of time."
In relation to the pig's mental horror of death, I
myself, the other day, saw the following sight : —
Fifteen or so pigs in a slaughtering chamber just large
enough to hold them and the slaughterer. Of these
pigs three or four had already been stunned and knifed
and lay dead and bleeding among their living
brethren, who with manifest terror were squealing and
straining here and there against the walls, while the
slaughterer moved about among them selecting the
next victim. A blow, a cut, and there was another
dead pig ; and this would go on, no doubt, till the
whole fifteen were despatched and their bodies shot
down the slide. Terror of death ! Yes ! At all this,
by the way, a boy of about thirteen was looking on —
and this in a public slaughter-house with a good
superintendent and under municipal control.
SEGREGATION OF ANIMALS about to be
slaughtered, from slaughtering operations : " It appears
to be tlie common practice, even in modern and well-
regulated slaughter-houses, to keep the animals, which
are immediately awaiting slaughter, in pens which are
mere annexes to the slaughter chamber itself, and in
ID
many cases in full view of all that goes on inside. . .
There is no point which the Committee have more
carefully investigated than the question as to whether
animals do or do not suffer fear from this contact, and
the evidence of those best qualified to judge is so
conflicting that no absolute verdict can be given.
The animal should be given tlie full benefit of the
doubt." (Report of the Admiralty Committee.)
But the animal is not given the benefit of the
doubt. Whatever the degree of consciousness of
animals awaiting slaughter (sometimes for a whole
hour) just divided by a door which, all regulations to
the contrary, is far from always shut, whether they
know or not that it is death which awaits them, any
spectator accustomed to animals in their normal stale
has only to look at their eyes, as they stand waiting, to
feel sure that they are in fear and trouble.
Such then, in brief and in rough, are the conditions
and methods of slaughter which still seem good to
us. When the Admiralty Committee issued their
report eight years ago they made the following
recommendations : —
{a) All animals (cattle, calves, sheep, lambs, and
pigs) without exception must be stunned or other-
wise rendered unconscious before blood is drawn.
(b) Animals awaiting slaughter must be so
placed that they cannot see into the slaughter
house, and the doors of the latter must be kept
closed while slaughtering is going on.
(c) The drainage of the slaughter-house must
be so arranged that no blood or other refuse can
flow out within the sight or smell* of animals await-
ing slaughter, and no such refuse shall be deposited
in proximity to the waiting pens.
{d) If more animals than one are being slaught-
ered in one slaughter-house at one lime they must
not be in view of each other.
(e) None but licensed men shall be employed
in or about slaughter-houses.
I belitTc it ie the biiicll uf blood, rather than the sight wbwb ativcts aulnwls.
II
What has been done to carry out these recom-
mendations, the fruit of most thorough and laborious
investigations carried out at a considerable expenditure
of public money, and presumably with some object, by
men well qualified for their task ?
Just this much has been done. The recommend-
ations have been adopted and are worked successfully
by the Admiralty themselves, and they form the basis of
certain clauses in a set of model by-laws so amiably
un obligatory that hardly anyone pays any attention to
them.
Seeing that the condition of affairs is such as I
have detailed ; seeing that the Admiralty Committee
made the following wise remarks : — " However humane
and scientific in theory may be the methods of
slaughter, it is inevitable that abuses and cruelty may
result in practice, unless there is a proper system of
official inspection " ; and : " In the interests not only of
humanity, but of sanitation, order, and ultimate
economy, it is highly desirable that, where circum-
stances permit, private slaughter-houses should be
replaced by public abattoirs, and that no killing should
be permitted except in the latter under official super-
vision " ; seeing the enormous dimensions of this
matter, and that our methods are behind those of
nearly every Continental country and vastly behind
those of Denmark, Switzerland and Germany, it would
occur to the simple mind that here was eminently a
case for broad and sweeping action on the part of the
Legislature.
I have not even thought it worth while to dwell on
the insanitary aspect of the present system, because
the Royal Commission on Food from Tuberculous
Animals (again at a considerable expenditure of public
money) reported thus : "The actual amount of Tuber-
culous disease among certain classes of food animals
is so large as to afford to man frequent occasions for
contracting tuberculous disease through his food. We
think it probable that an appreciable part of the tuber-
culosis that affects man is obtained through his food ;"
practically without effect ! If the public likes to spend
12
its money on ascertaining a risk to itself and likes to
disregard that risk to itself when ascertained, far be it
from me to gainsay the public. But if anyone be
interested in the sanitary side of our want of system,
let him go to the superintendent of some large public
slaughter-house and ask what percentage of meat is
condemned daily ; then let him ask some medical
officer of health how far it is possible to inspect the
condition of carcases in private slaughter-houses — and
then let him go home and think ! There I leave the
matter. For, frankly, it is not this, but the disregard
by the public of needless suffering inflicted on helpless
creatures, bred and killed for its own advantage, that
moves me, and I venture to think will move anyone
who is not so delicate and tender-hearted (?) that he
would rather not know- thank you — what went before
his beef and mutton and crisp breakfast bacon.
Before we can hold up our heads in relation to
this question which so directly affects nearly all of
us there must be an irreducible minimum of reform,
a very A B C of decency :
A^o animal to be bled before being stunned (or
othenvise rendered instantaneously insensible).
No animal to be slaughtered in sight of another
animal.
No slaughter-refuse and blood to be allowed within
sight or smell of an animal awaiting slaughter.
No stunning or slaughtering implement to be used
that has not been approved by the Local Government