Queen Victoria knew exactly what to do if a long tailed fellow was seen lurking around her palace. She would send out for the Royal Rat-Catcher immediately.

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One of her favourite rat catchers was a Gypsy man called Mathias Cooper. He never let her down, in fact one day when he was summoned to Windsor Castle, which was the main residence of Queen Victoria after Prince Albert died, Mathias caught 50 rats and placed them out on a very expensive carpet. The Prince of Wales, Prince Edward, gave a half sovereign to Mathias in payment for his diligent work.

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Mathias Cooper was known as "Matty" and was part of a group of Romany Gypsy families camped near Claremont House in Esher, Surry, where Victoria had lived when she was a princess. During that time she came to know the extended families of the Coopers, Scamps, and Smiths well and made many trips to their camp taking clothes and food for the families.

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She spent several hours in the company of  her Gypsy families and even did some sketches and water colours of them. She wrote in her diaries about the Gypsies. There are entries in the diaries of 1836 and 1837 and on the 1st of January 1837 she wrote, "I must say that through what I have seen of their characters they are a superior set of Gypsies, full of respect, quiet, discerning and full of affection for one another."

 

Mathias lived until he was into his 80's. He died in 1900 after being hit by a train.

 

Coopers descendants are very proud of their ancestral Royal link, that they want to erect a memorial to "The Royal Rat Catcher."