Bobby was a Skye terrier, and he might have been a cross. We aren’t sure. Bobby belonged to a man called John Gray, who came to Edinburgh in Scotland along with his family and his dog in the early 1850s to become a policeman. Bobby became John Gray’s work partner and trotted along next to him as he walked his beat. He became a pretty good police dog. There were many criminals in the streets – pickpockets, muggers, and even highwaymen in lonely areas.

There were no motorcars, of course, and all the carts and carriages were drawn by
horses. There was much shouting and jostling, and many people sold their wares
on the streets. Every day John Gray and Bobby used to go to the eating-house at No. 6 Greyfriars Place for their mid-day dinner. And then tragedy struck. Most of the peoplen in the city lived in what were no better than slums. They were cold and draughty, and the freezing east winds blew down the streets.

John Gray became ill and had to leave the police force. For quite a while, he lay in
bed, too ill to get up, and then he died in the cold winter of 1858. The night after John Gray’s funeral, his son let Bobby out of the house before locking up for the night, but this time Bobby did not return.
In the morning, he was found lying on his master’s grave with his nose on his paws. The gravedigger chased him away, but it wasn’t long before he was back. And there he stayed, day after day, month after month, and year after year. Edinburgh is a very chilly city, and Bobby needed shelter from the bitter weather. The tombstone was raised on legs, and he would crawl underneath it, and sometimes he would go off to the eatinghouse in Greyfriars Place for food and warmth. The eating-house belonged to a kindly man called Mr Traill, and Bobby was always welcome there.

This was the way he spent the next fourteen years of his life. His fame spread far and wide, and many people came to draw him or take photographs of him, as those were the early days of photography. He was never short of food because – apart from being fed at the eating-house by Mr Traill - his many admirers used to bring him tidbits. The police were quite glad to have Bobby in the graveyard, because it was a dark and shadowy place at night, and it was good to know that Bobby was there keeping watch.

Mr Traill did his best to persuade Bobby to live at the eating-house, but he would stay there only on the coldest of nights. A cannon was fired from Edinburgh Castle every afternoon at one o’clock, and Bobby began to associate this with dinner-time. He had
made friends with a cabinet-maker called William Dow, who also had his dinner at the eating-house. Bobby would be waiting for him when the cannon fired, and off they would go together for their dinner.

William Dow’s son said they had tried again and again to coax Bobby to go home with them, but he would not leave the churchyard where his master lay buried. Bobby was a true police dog and very well able to look after himself. In fact, all the other dogs in the neighbourhood knew better than to pick quarrel with him, as he was always ready to have a good fight. There is always a busybody around somewhere… someone who is busy minding everyone else’s business. There was one near Greyfriars, and he reported that Bobby did not have a licence and demanded that
the police do something about it. Everyone was furious, and university students quickly collected more than enough to pay for a licence. Mr Traill was summonsed to court and pointed out that he would gladly pay the licence and would love to have Bobby as his dog, but Bobby had decided that he didn’t want to be anybody’s dog.

The case was settled in the most satisfactory way. The Lord Provost of Edinburgh, William Chambers, presented Bobby with an engraved collar with a dog licence attached. This collar can be seen in the Huntly House Museum in the Canongate in
Edinburgh to this very day.Bobby died in the winter if 1872 at Mr Traill’s home in Kew
Street. There is a stone in memory of him in the graveyard. It reads

Greyfriars Bobby
Died 14th January 1872
Aged 16 years
Let his Loyalty and
Devotion
Be a lesson to us all.
Erected by the
Dog Aid Society
Of Scotland & unveiled
H.R.H. The Duke of
Gloucester
GCUO
On 13th May 1981

But the best-known memorial to Bobby is the statue on what was once a drinking fountain for dogs at the head of Candlemaker Row. It was made by a sculptor who was famous in Edinburgh, William Brodie of the Royal Scottish Academy. Professor Blackie of Edinburgh University wrote an inscription in Greek. A translation of this reads:

This monument was erected by a noble lady, the Baroness Burdett
Coutts, to the memory of Greyfriars Bobby, a faithful and
affectionate little dog who followed the remains of his master
to the Churchyard in 1858 and became a constant visitor to the
grave, refusing to be separated from the spot till he died in the
year 1872.