The Brown Dog affair was a political controversy about vivisection that raged in Britain from 1903 until 1910. It involved the infiltration of University of London medical lectures by Swedish feminists, battles between medical students and the police, police protection for the statue of a dog, a libel trial at the Royal Courts of Justice, and the establishment of a Royal Commission to investigate the use of animals in experiments. The affair became a cause célèbre that divided the country.

Battersea is a large district in southwest London, part of the London Borough of Wandsworth, England. It is centred 3.5 miles (5.6 km) southwest of Charing Cross it also extends along the south bank of the Thames Tideway. It includes the 200-acre (0.81 km2) Battersea Park.