Ahead of the 1966 FIFA World Cup in England, the Jules Rimet Trophy was stolen, causing a national crisis. After a week-long police manhunt failed, a dog named Pickles unexpectedly discovered the trophy wrapped in newspaper during a walk with his owner, David Corbett, turning the collie into a canine hero.
As the FIFA World Cup 2026 is almost upon us, the prestigious quadrennial football tournament is set to take place on June 12. There is an interesting piece of history linking the tournament’s past to a canine hero named Pickles.
While the 2026 edition of the FIFA World Cup, which will be jointly hosted by the United States of America (USA), Canada, and Mexico, marks the first time 48 teams will compete in the tournament, its history is famously intertwined with the 1966 World Cup in England. The eighth edition of the tournament saw England clinching their maiden, and to date, their only. World Cup title on home soil.
However, ahead of the World Cup, there was a dramatic heist that threatened the entire tournament. The coveted Jules Rimet Trophy was brazenly stolen while on display at an exhibition in Westminster, which sparked a serious concern among the organizers of the tournament.
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How the Jules Rimet Trophy Theft Happened?
An unexpected incident took place on March 20, 1966, less than a month before the FIFA World Cup, when the Jules Rimet Trophy was suddenly missing from its display cabinet at the Stampex stamp exhibition held at Methodist Central Hall in Westminster.
Since the coveted trophy was considered priceless and held immense symbolic value for the sport, its disappearance caused immediate panic among tournament officials and the Football Association. Despite the round-the-clock guard rotations and two police officers reportedly assigned to the case at all times, a church service was taking place on the ground floor, filled with people.
Between 11 a.m. and 12 p.m., the thief, who later investigations suggested was London gangster Sidney Cugullere, managed to bypass security and vanish with the trophy. While a man named Edward Betchley, a petty criminal, was later arrested and convicted for acting as a middleman in a ransom attempt, the actual mastermind behind the theft remained a mystery for decades.
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Interestingly, the thief completely ignored the rare and valuable stamps that were the primary focus of the Stampex exhibition. The Jules Rimet Trophy, which was valued at £3,000 at that time, sat alongside a philatelic collection estimated to be worth approximately £3 million.
Instead of walking away with a fortune in philatelic treasures, the thief had set his sights on a high-stakes gamble: holding the world’s most iconic football prize for ransom. By targeting the Jules Rimet Trophy, the perpetrators hoped to capitalise on the intense public and national pressure surrounding the upcoming tournament to extort £15,000 from the Football Association.
Pickles: The Canine Hero Who Saved the 1966 World Cup
The Football Association went into a complete panic mode, as the prestigious Jules Rimet Trophy was the ultimate symbol of the tournament. With the World Cup approaching, the possibility of holding an international tournament without its signature prize became a source of national embarrassment.
Since the theft took place, the police officials were unable to locate the trophy despite launching a massive, high-profile manhunt. However, the search turned out to be a surprise success thanks to an unlikely investigator, a four-year-old black-and-white collie named Pickles.
On March 27, 1966, just a week after the theft of the Jules Rimet Trophy took place, a Thames lighterman named David Corbett decided to take his dog, Pickles, for an evening walk in n Upper Norwood, South London. It was then a routine evening that became one of the most famous recoveries in the history of the World Cup, as Pickles found the trophy when no one else could.
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Pickles didn’t go any extra; the canine just sniffed out a suspicious, tightly bound package wrapped in newspaper and tied with a string and tucked it beneath the garden hedge, just a few miles away from where the heist took place. Initially, David Corbett suspected it might be a bomb, heightened concern during that era, but his curiosity overcame the caution.
Corbett carefully tore back a corner of the newspaper wrapping to reveal engraved names – ‘Uruguay’, ‘West Germany’, and ‘Brazil’, as they were the previous winners of the trophy. Realizing he was holding the coveted trophy, which had gone missing for a week, he immediately rushed to the nearest police station to report the incredible find.
Pickles’ discovery turned him into an overnight international sensation, hailed as a ‘canine hero’ who rescued England’s pride. His discovery ensured that the Jules Rimet Trophy was restored to its rightful place in time for the tournament, securing his legacy as the most famous four-legged figure in football history.
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