LITTLE DONKEYS
A Christmas card staple, donkeys have a special place in our hearts – so special in fact that donkey charities receive tens of millions of pounds in donations every year. What’s their appeal, and can they win over a sceptic?
When my late wife’s aunt Christine died 20 years ago, she left several thousand pounds to The Donkey Sanctuary. It came as a bit of a surprise to the family. We were almost a bit, well, put out. Auntie Chris was a sophisticated lady, a former airline stewardess married to a suave pilot in the days when flying around the world was new and glamorous. It wasn’t so much that she didn’t seem the sort of person you would imagine leaving money to donkeys; it’s just that she had never in her lifetime mentioned her love for them.
I was again reminded of the emotional pull of donkeys this time last year when my partner and I received a Christmas newsletter from The Donkey Sanctuary, addressed to the ancient lady, Jackie, who died in the house we had just bought. It seemed that Jackie was already known to the charity, presumably as a donor. If Auntie Chris didn’t meet my preconception of someone who would support donkey charities, Jackie did even less. She was a renowned TV drama producer famous for her witty showbiz dinners, given in what is now our kitchen.
I became determined to find out more about the extraordinary appeal of the humble donkey. From the 1959 carol Little Donkey sung by primary school children to their presence in the Bethlehem stable – celebrated first in paintings by medieval artists such as Botticelli, later in any number of Christmas cards – donkeys and the Nativity story are inextricably linked. This is despite the awkward fact that the New Testament makes no mention of donkeys, or any other animal, being there.
Britain is the world centre for goodwill towards donkeys – as seen in the dozens of afternoon TV ads seeking to pull on the heartstrings of the public for donations and bequests. Such is the noise (we won’t call it braying), I’ve heard that The Donkey Sanctuary – the biggest of them all – is the richest charity in Britain (incorrect, as I was to learn). While The Donkey Sanctuary is far from Britain’s wealthiest, its pull is a little disproportionate. When a survey last year of 5,000 charity supporters over 50 asked which organisations respondents would consider leaving money to, The Donkey Sanctuary came in at fourth, behind Cats Protection and Dogs Trust, but ahead of Cancer Research UK, Alzheimer’s Research UK, Unicef and even the RSPCA and Guide Dogs for the Blind. In reality, in 2022, The Donkey Sanctuary received £36.7 million from wills, dwarfed by behemoths lik
