Nellie, the Monticello "African lion": a butler attacked on the Allerton estate and a big cat scare around Decatur, Illinois

Summer 1917. Robert Allerton's estate, known as The Farms, lay on the upper Sangamon River just west of Monticello, in Piatt County, Illinois. Today it is Robert Allerton Park, 1,517 acres in Willow Branch Township. That July it became the starting point of a big cat scare.

Friday, 13 July 1917. Night. The butler, Thomas Gullett, was out gathering flowers on the grounds. Something emerged from the shrubbery and attacked him.

Gullett said it was an African lion. It pounced on him, toppled him to the ground, and grappled with him for a few moments before he seized it by the throat. The cat broke free and escaped into the hunting grounds of the estate, leaving Gullett shaken and bruised, with minor wounds. Robert Allerton assembled a hunting party and promised $250 to anyone who could capture or kill the beast. The animal got a name, Nellie.

Soon after, motorist Paul Baer was driving his Ford when the lion crossed in front of him. He told the Decatur Herald and Review: "I got out of the automobile and went over for the purpose of shooting the animal but it jumped the fence."

On 15 July about 300 people searched the woods around Decatur. They found nothing. A quarter mile from the search area, a woman named Mrs. Shaw reported seeing an "African lioness". Two days later, tracks five inches across turned up near Decatur, some reportedly showing claw marks. Two boys saw a large cat near the Sangamon River, east of Decatur.

The scare fed on itself. People began mistaking ordinary animals, collies among them, for the lion. One farmer took headlights for "shining lion eyes" and fired a shot.

29 July. 10:30 p.m. Chester Osborn and Earl Hill were driving with their wives on the Springfield Road. The two men, in the front seats, saw the cat trying to hide in the weeds beside the road. Then it moved. "The cat leaped about 20 feet and slammed into the side of the car." Police came. The animal escaped over an embankment.

On 31 July James Rutherford was on a hay wagon near a gravel pit. He saw "a large, yellow, long haired beast". It was the last recorded sighting. After that, nothing.

Nobody claimed the reward. No animal was caught or killed. Even at the time, some sightings were put down to dogs. The blogger behind Tyler's Cryptozoo asked whether Nellie was a real African lioness or a mountain lion, and judged the second guess the most likely. The It's Myth wiki files her as an Eastern puma.

An escaped captive lion was another proposed explanation, yet no circus, menagerie or owner is known to have reported a loss. Retellings also disagree on details. Atlas Obscura dates the attack to "the night of Friday, June 13", though 13 July 1917 was the Friday, and newspaper pages dated 15 to 17 July appear to carry the story. Tyler's blog moves the garden to Decatur. Atlas Obscura opens its survey of alien big cats with this case, and Nellie was never found.