The devoted owners of a dog who died earlier this year have traced the Scottish home where they first met the pet over a decade ago to express their neverending gratitude.

In a heart-wrenching letter to the original seller in Ayrshire, Julie and Alan Cousins thanked William McNeillie “for producing a great puppy that turned into a fantastic and amazing dog.”   

The Cousins adopted puppy Jos from Mr McNeillie in Patna in April of 2005.

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However, after an illness which saw his kidneys fail, his owners decided to put him to sleep in March.

Still reeling from the loss, and thankful to have had the golden retriever in their lives for so long, the owners tracked down the seller to let him know just how grateful they were to have bought Jos from them.

Glasgow Times:
The letter (Credit: @wmcneillie_/Twitter)

The letter read: “I think he has had an amazing life with us. He has travelled around the UK and he moved to Dubai in 2008. We all swam in the Gulf sea together, swam in our pool together, went to pet shows and generally had a great time.”

“We are completely devastated by our loss. I never knew that losing a dog could be so painful but he was our child, our boy and he gave us so much happiness in the almost twelve years,” it added.

The Cousins also attached some photos of “our boy” for Mr McNeillie to keep.

Glasgow Times:
The photos the Cousins sent along with the letter (Credit: @wmcneillie_/Twitter)

So moved by the letter, Mr McNeillie moved quickly to share it on Twitter.

He said: “When we had pups from Skye, this couple bought one from us back in 2005.. we woke up to this letter and these pictures this morning.”

In just two days, the tweet has received more than 250,000 reactions as users of the social media site shared their own stories of pets lost.