Untold story of the English village that raised a gorilla as a boy that drank tea, made its bed and washed up

The extraordinary life of an English village's resident gorilla that had its own bedroom, went for walks with schoolchildren and could do its own washing-up has been revealed. The ape - called John Daniel - played with children, ate roses from gardens and even enjoyed drinking tea and
cider.Photographs of its Gloucestershire life - including being carried around by children in a wheelbarrow - have emerged in a new book.

John was later found for sale at the London department store Derry & Toms in 1918 and bought for £300 - the equivalent of £25,000 today - by Major Rupert Penny, who named the animal.
Mjr Penny's sister, Alyce Cunningham, nurtured and brought up the gorilla at her country house in Uley and nicknamed it "sultan".
She raised it as a human boy in the village and John used to go for walks regularly with children of  Uley Junior School.
Uley Society archivist Margaret Groom has unearthed a collection of photographs of John, which have been published in her book about the village's history.
It tells how the gorilla's adoptive owners were later tricked into selling him to a circus and he was moved to America, where he died.
The new pictures show the gorilla in its early days enjoying life in the small village.


Read more at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/25/untold-story-english-village-adopted-agorilla-raised-boy-drank/