In 1943, Australia tried to win Winston Churchill's favor with a unique wartime gift: a live platypus, named Winston, shipped for 45 days across oceans to London in a custom habitat with 50,000 worms to feed him. The "rare monotreme" was meant to boost diplomatic ties as World War II raged—Churchill was a noted lover of exotic animals—but days before arrival, Winston was found dead in his "platypusary," reports the BBC. To smooth the waters, officials blamed Nazi submarine shocks. The animal was stuffed and displayed in Churchill's office, and rumors of the true cause of Winston's demise swirled for decades. New research based on Australian and British has put lingering questions to rest.
Researchers pored over logbooks and correspondence, which established that the creature was at no point subject to blasts from a German U-boat. They read that the platypus' food ration had dwindled due to a worm die-off, but more crucially determined Winston endured prolonged heat above the threshold of about 80 degrees, after which things get unsafe for his species. Modern science confirms what the ship's crew couldn't have known: that "Winston was essentially cooked alive," per the BBC.
Australia's diplomatic platypus dreams didn't die with Winston. In 1947, the Bronx Zoo tried its luck with three platypuses—Betty, Penelope, and Cecil—sparking media frenzies, romance scandals, and dashed hopes for a platypus family. Yet the animals withered in captivity, and Australia tightened export rules, bringing the curtain down on platypus diplomacy. The only platypuses to leave Australia since have resided at the San Diego Zoo since 2019. (Read the full story here.)
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