What was the name given to a controversy about vivisection in England from 1903 to 1910 that involved the infiltration of University of London medical lectures by Swedish women activists, street battles between medical students and suffragettes, trade unionists and the police, police protection for the statue of a dog in Battersea Park, its removal by the authorities in 1910 (and its replacement in 1985), a libel trial and the establishment of a Royal Commission?
Brown Dog affair Brown Dog affair The Brown Dog affair was a political controversy about vivisection which raged in England from 1903 until 1910. It involved the infiltration of University of London medical lectures by Swedish feminists, pitched battles between medical students and the police, police protection for the statue of a dog, a libel trial at the Royal Courts of Justice, and the establishment of a Royal Commission to investigate the use of animals in experiments. The affair became a "cause célèbre" which divided the country. The controversy was triggered by allegations that William Bayliss of the Department of Physiology at University
National Anti-Vivisection Society reported to have been illegally dissected during a demonstration to medical students at the University of London. The inscription on the statue reads: The statue became the target of animal researchers and London University medical students; students rioted at the site; anti-vivisectionists defended their statue; the elderly Frances Power Cobbe was attacked in her office. After years of conflict, the statue mysteriously disappeared in 1910. The NAVS and others erected a new statue with the same inscription in 1985, again in Battersea Park, where it remains to this day. In 1906 the Government appointed the Second Royal Commission on Vivisection.