What happened to the Pandora's cat?
The day after the wrecking, George Passmore, the Pandora's master, was sent back to the wreck in one of the boats to see if anything useful could be salvaged. He returned with several pieces of the masts, some lightning chain, and the ship's cat-found perched in the main masthead.
The cat isn't mentioned again, so her fate can only be guessed at. But no doubt, cat lovers would hope she didn't end up in a stew made by the hungry survivors during their gruelling open-boat voyage from Escape Cay to Timor. Perhaps a more acceptable alternative for cat lovers would be that puss ran away a few days later-when the survivors landed at Freshwater Bay on Cape York to look for water. (Perhaps she became the first feral cat in North Queensland!)
Detail from a painting attributed to William Tobin, possibly based on sketches by Pandora's midshipman George Reynolds. The cat is perched in the main topmast cap. Escape Cay can be seen in the distance.