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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores a strange episode in medical care after World War I: the establishment of a hospital for “veteran” war horses in Cairo. The paper builds on literature on veterans and post-war imperial recovery to ask how animals crossed borders and moved knowledge in the British Empire.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores a strange and largely forgotten episode in medical care after World War I: the establishment of a hospital for “veteran” war horses in Cairo. Left in Egypt after being used by the British forces in the Middle East, dozens of horses and donkeys were found in Cairo, many of them repurposed for civilian transportation. British charities mobilized the public image of the human veteran to recruit donations and resources to “save” the horses, healing the wounds of the war through the animal body. Lobbyists and animal activists presented this hospital as a form of caring for the non-human soldiers who won the war while also establishing Western animal care as part of Britain’s “civilizing mission” for the Middle East. But the scientific practice itself crossed boundaries and moved knowledge in both ways: veterinarians at the hospital were primarily local, Egyptian men, even though the director of the hospital and the donors were British. This paper builds on literature on veterans and post-war imperial recovery to ask how animals crossed borders and moved knowledge in the context of British colonialism. What does it mean for animals to be considered soldiers, patriots, and veterans? How was animal-care colonialized yet localized in this institution? Moreover, what can we learn about classic issues of the inter-war era – displacement, veteran care, rehabilitation – when we look at animals rather than humans?