Unsinkable Sam

Unsinkable Sam — originally named Oscar — is one of the most remarkable cats in naval history. He began his career as the ship's cat aboard the German battleship Bismarck. When the Bismarck was sunk by the Royal Navy on 27 May 1941 with the loss of over 2,000 men, Oscar was found floating on a board amid the wreckage, described by a British sailor as "apparently quite unharmed and not a little disdainful of the whole incident." He was taken aboard HMS Cossack, which struck a mine five months later, killing 159 men. Oscar survived again. He was then transferred to HMS Ark Royal, which was torpedoed by a German submarine the following month. Oscar was found floating on a floating cushion and brought aboard HMS Legion, whose crew reportedly gave him the name Unsinkable Sam. After his third shipwreck, the Royal Navy quietly transferred Sam to land duties — first at the Governor of Gibraltar's residence, then at the Home for Sailors in Belfast, where he lived peacefully until 1955. A watercolour portrait of him hangs in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich.