by Clay, Jeremy
On Wednesday afternoon three waggon loads of beehives, the property of Messrs Hicks & Hearts, were being conveyed from Sherburn to Givendale Head, and about two miles from Snainton the foremost waggon gave a lurch and one of the hives toppled over.
The bees escaped in thousands, and at once attacked the driver and the horse. The poor brute, maddened by the stinging insects, set off at a swinging gallop, and the unfortunate driver, who had himself to screen from the enemy, was utterly helpless to avert a catastrophe.
The waggon was finally overturned and the inmates of a dozen hives set at liberty. The waggoner and a lad who was with him luckily escaped without a broken limb, but they were so badly stung about the face and hands that the services of Dr Saymes had to be obtained, and they are reported to be progressing favourably.
The horse (a valuable animal belonging to Mr Heath) managed to smash the shafts and kick itself free of the waggon; but thousands of bees must have pierced its body – in fact, it was surrounded by a dense cloud of them – and dropped down dead, having been literally stung to death.
The Edinburgh Evening News, July 30, 1897
‘Father Christmas’ on Fire
At the Peterborough Infirmary on Thursday Mr A.C. Taylor, the dispenser, was dressed as ‘Father Christmas,’ with a flowing hirsute appendage of cotton wool, and was distributing the articles from a Christmas tree when the wool beard caught alight enveloping his head in flames. His moustache, eyelashes, and eyebrows were singed off, and his face, ears, and head were badly burnt. It is, however, hoped that his injuries will not be of a permanent character. Fortunately a panic among the inmates was prevented.
The Evening Telegraph and Star, Sheffield, January 3, 1891
Strange Accident
Seven persons have been dangerously hurt at Glasgow, by an explosion of gunpowder. A deaf and dumb man found a keg in a passage, and took it home; thinking it contained butter. Failing to force it open with a poker, he made the poker red-hot, and proceeded to bore a hole in the keg; the contents were gunpowder. The explosion which followed blew the roof off the house, and every person in the building, except an infant, suffered.
The Carlisle Journal, February 10, 1854
The Tragedy at Sunderland
The appalling catastrophe which occurred at Sunderland on Saturday will send a thrill of horror throughout the kingdom.
Not since the terrible collision on the Thames between the Princess Alice and the Bywell Castle has such an immense loss of life been recorded as the result of a preventable accident; and in the present case the calamity is, if possible, aggravated by the fact that the sufferers are children of tender years, and that their death was one of the most horrible that can be imagined.
No such holocaust of youthful victims has ever been recorded in the annals of our national disasters, and certainly no more heart-rending scenes could be imagined than those which were presented at the Victoria Hall, Sunderland on Saturday evening.
A well-known conjuror, by offering to give his entertainment at a merely nominal charge, had attracted from 1,100 to 1,200 children to the largest hall in the town, to witness an entertainment which has a special attraction to the juvenile mind. Everything passed off well till the close of the entertainment, when the children began to leave the hall.
The little ones, who for the most part were under 12 years of age, were coming trooping down the stairs leading from the gallery in hundreds, little dreaming, we may well suppose, of the awful ending which awaited their afternoon’s amusement.
It is stated that a door at the top of the first flight of stairs, through some most unaccountable mismanagement, was only open a space of about 20 inches, so that only one child could pass through at a time.
What followed recalled the terrible catastrophe that occurred at Bell Street Hall on New Year’s Day, 1865. The exit becoming blocked, and the youngsters continuing to press from behind, were heaped together in an inextricable mass, piled one upon another in all conceivable forms, and before proper assistance could be obtained nearly 200 had met with a most cruel death. A most sad ending this to what all had expected would prove a pleasant afternoon’s enjoyment!
Of course there will be a full inquiry into the cause of this most unfortunate occurrence, and until this has taken place it would not be proper to say who is to blame for the appalling loss of life that has taken place.
The facts, however, so far as they have as yet been ascertained, seem to point to the necessity that still exists for further regulations as to the means of exit from large public halls and places of amusement.
Especially is this the case when the audience consists for the most part or entirely of children. It is hinted, in the reports of the occurrence which have been furnished, that there was not a sufficient number of adults in charge of the multitude of children who were assembled to witness the performance.
This also is a matter that is sure to receive some attention from those who have the care of children committed to them.
The Dundee Courier and Argus, June 19, 1883
FASHION and CLOTHES
Preface
The day John Hetherington put on his new hat and went for a walk, he caused something of a stir. Children screamed, women fainted, and a boy on an errand was knocked over by the excitable crowd and broke his arm.
The hullaballoo in the centre of London in January 1797 was sparked by nothing more than the sight of Hetherington’s silk top hat, ‘such a tall and shiny construction on his head that it must have terrified nervous people’, said a witness. It was a riotous debut for a design that would become emblematic of sober authority in the century to follow.
After the fops, fribbles and popinjays of earlier eras, fashion in the Victorian age was characteristically muted. Like the straight-laced offspring of hippy parents, the Victorians were rather ashamed of the plunging necklines, elaborate wigs and general stylistic antics of previous, more daring generations.
Modesty became the guiding principle. Modesty and dignity. And if there was room for some gross discomfort too, so much the better. Corsets were worn swoon-inducingly tight. Skirts were the width of a supersized hula-hoop. A lady’s daily dress was built up in stages, in the style of a Russian doll.
As for men, they weren’t dressed properly until they looked like they had been freshly dipped in a solution of starch. The sole nod to frippery came in facial hair; the unrulier the better, from dundreary whiskers to beards of a length and bushiness to rival a desert-island castaway.
But if the Victorian era was no equal for the punky excess of the eighteenth century, it did at least boast one craze daft enough to match any other conjured up in the entire history of fashion.
It began with an outbreak of rheumatic fever that left the fondly-regarded Princess Alexandra lame. As she was a trend-setter, fashion-conscious women in the capital were soon to be seen affecting a hobble.
They called it the Alexandra Limp, and it spread quickly across the country. ‘It is as painful as it is idiotic and ludicrous’, wrote an Edinburgh journalist, after spotting three dedicated followers of fashion clump down Princes Street. ‘I heard that a fashionable Edinburgh shoemaker, one who carries the royal arms over his shop front, actually made and vended the boots necessary to produce the deformity, and exhibited them in his window, one with a high heel and one without.’
A Word for Crinoline
Some time ago a young lady walking in the country was suddenly attacked by a large and ferocious dog, so that her fate seemed inevitable.
But being amply provided with a crinoline, she soon had recourse to the usual expedient of stooping down, so as to allow the lower portion of her dress to collect around her; and the crinoline, by its enormous stiffness, kept off all the attacks of the animal until assistance arrived.
The Dundee Advertiser, September 11, 1863
Saved by Her Corset
A tailor shot at Mrs Dove, the wife of his employer, at Faversham, last evening, with a revolver. The bullet struck the
region of the heart, but was stopped by the corset steel. The man is in custody.
The Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette, September 25, 1900
Crinoline Accidents
In one case, crinoline has been the means of saving life. At Bristol, the other day, a woman either jumped or fell into the Float at the Stone Bridge, and it was some time before any person came to her assistance. She remained on the surface of the water, however, during that period, by means of her crinoline. She was eventually rescued with grappling irons. Two men who saw her in the water plunged in to save her, but being unable to swim, they narrowly escaped drowning.
We are glad to hear Lady Mildmay is pronounced in a convalescent state, though still, as well as Sir Henry Mildmay, suffering much from the violent kicks of the horse who was frightened by her Ladyship’s crinoline, when she went up to the horse-box in the stable. The fearful accident happened at Heckfield Park, Hampshire, the seat of her Ladyship’s father, Viscount Elmsley.
Near Carlisle, a party of young people were crowding round beehives, when, in stooping in the vicinity of these, one of the girls’ crinolines hooked over the top of the hive, and when the poor girl, ignorant of the fact, walked away, down came the hive, of course.
The whole corps d’armee instantly set upon their unwitting assailant, who, to escape their notice, was obliged to run for it, and eventually to take refuge in a pool of water. She was badly stung.
The Hereford Times, October 5, 1861
The Danger of Jute Chignons
It is reported that a woman died recently in Indianapolis from the effects of the ravages of jute worms, which had entered her scalp from the jute chignon which she had worn for a number of years.
The Dundee Courier and Argus, March 15, 1872
Inkslinging Extraordinary
‘Jack the Inkslinger’ has been creating an amount of consternation in New York, only second to that of ‘Jack the Ripper’ in London.
His aim has been to destroy the most beautiful dresses to be seen in the promenades, by throwing violet-coloured ink over them; and so many have been completely destroyed that big rewards have been offered for his capture.
According to the New York Tribune, the police believe they have captured him. Their prisoner is John Connors, a tall, lank, beardless Irishman, about 35 years old. He is said to have a roving eye, the expression of which indicates a diseased mind. His wife and four children live in the tenement house No. 443, West Fifty-Second Street. The family came from Ireland.
Connors has been employed every day for some time changing the harness on the car horses, and has finished his work about 10.30pm. On Friday night, Policeman Stafford saw Connors following two women in a suspicious manner at Ninth Avenue and Fifty-Ninth Street. Connors kept close behind them until they turned into a side street. Then he stood for a moment as if uncertain whether to follow them any further or not.
Stafford went up to him and asked him what was the matter. Connors said, ‘Nothing.’ As he was moving away, Stafford noticed that he put one hand into his coat pocket. The policeman caught the hand and found in it a bottle of violet ink. That was sufficient to cause the arrest of the man.
At the police station more evidence of guilt was found. In one pocket were three bowls of clay pipes. The bowls were stained with violet ink, and one bowl held a small quantity of the fluid. Part of another bowl, which had been broken, was found in one of the prisoner’s waistcoat pockets, and two of the pockets were stained with ink on the inside. There was ink on the prisoner’s fingers also.
Connors denied that he had thrown ink on women’s dresses. He said that he had found his little boy playing with the ink and bowls and had taken them away from him.
His actions led the police to believe that he was partly, at least, insane. His wife and children were questioned and they denied that they had ever seen the ink or the bowls.
Mrs Connors said her husband had been acting strangely and probably was not in his right mind.
The Citizen, Gloucester, July 1, 1890
Actress in Male Attire.
Attempt to Enlist as a Soldier
An extraordinary story was told at the Marlborough Street Police Court, London, today. Harriet Muir, aged 28, described as an actress, staying at Anderton’s Hotel, was charged with being in male attire. She appeared in the dock in the clothes in which she was arrested – dark striped trousers, pilot jacket, and wore her hair short.
It appeared that she presented herself yesterday afternoon at St George’s Barracks for enlistment as a soldier, and her sex being suspected, she was at once taken before the doctor, and her sex ascertained.
Mr Arthur Newton, for the defence, said the accused ran away about four years ago from her home at Christchurch, New Zealand, where her father was a sheep farmer. She had since maintained herself respectably on the stage, and had been acting at Bristol but finding herself out of employment came up to London last Sunday, and put up at Anderton’s Hotel.
She went to London Dock and endeavoured unsuccessfully to obtain a situation as a steward on some vessel going to New Zealand, and then walked to St George’s Barracks, and tried to enlist, thinking that in the circumstances that was the best thing she could do.
It was now proposed that her friends in the City should be communicated with and her passage to New Zealand arranged for. She was discharged on this understanding.
The Evening Telegraph and Star, Sheffield, March 6, 1889
Another Woman in Male Attire
A prisoner giving the name of John Bradley was sentenced to fourteen days’ imprisonment for vagrancy at Dublin on Saturday. On being directed when in prison to prepare for a bath, the prisoner refused, and when threatened with compulsion the culprit burst into tears, saying she was a woman.
She was subsequently removed to the women’s prison. She is a good-looking brunette, aged 24, and says her mother dressed her in boys’ clothes from childhood, and when her mother died saw no reason to change her attire.
The North-Eastern Daily Gazette, Middlesbrough, March 18, 1889
ARTS and ENTERTAINMENT
Preface
The story went something like this. Deep in the heart of the woods of Kostroma in Russia, a hunter spied a sudden burst of movement; two monstrous figures moving between the trees.
Returning with back-up, he tracked the beasts to their lair. Like any wild animal, they put up a savage fight when cornered, but the huntsman finally had his prize.
That’s how showman P.T. Barnum told the tale, anyway. And whether they believed him or not, the crowds came all the same, eager to see the spectacle Barnum billed as the ‘crowning mystery of nature’s contradictions’, ‘the incarnate paradox, for which Science stands confounded and blindly wonders’, ‘the most prodigious paragon of all prodigies’, or, for anyone pushed for time, Jo-Jo, the Dog-Faced Boy.
Jo-Jo was actually Fedor Jeftichew, who had toured the circuses of Europe and Britain with his father a decade before, where they were first advertised as the product of a repulsive liaison between a peasant and a bear, then later as proof of Darwinism, a hiccup in the evolution of mankind.
In truth, Fedor had simply inherited his vodka-swigging dad’s chronic condition of hypertrichosis, which obscured their features in great mats of hair.
But truth wasn’t really a concern for Barnum, who took Fedor to America in 1884, and worked him … well, like a dog. At the height of his fame he would perform more than twenty shows a day, occasionally growling and barking for the pleasure of the punters.
And there were plenty of them. After the industrial revolution came the recreational one. A series of reforms left people of the late nineteenth century with more time on their hands than the generations before, and more ways to spend it.
Theatres popped up like spring blooms; music halls and working men’s clubs too. Parks opened, sports stadiums were built, art galleries and museums flourished and a golden age of literature yielded riches upon riches. But the Victorians were foreve
r drawn to the grotesque, and the fairground mix of hokum, fraud and out-and-out exploitation.
Jo-Jo returned to Britain in 1898 and 1899, as Barnum’s vast, eclectic ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ toured the nation, dropping jaws wherever it went. A piece in the theatrical paper The Era in January 1899 ducked out of trying to describe all the acts and settled on listing the ‘extraordinary oddities’ involved. The moss-haired girl; the lady with a horse’s mane; the tattooed people; the human ostrich; the expansionist; the cat orchestra; the Yankee whittler; the Albino dislocationist; Little Peter, the dwarf; the Orissa Twins; the wild men of Borneo; the bearded woman; the card-playing pig; the human pin-cushion; the armless wonder; the legless wonder; the hard-headed wonder; the double wonder; the elastic man; and finally the ‘What Is It?’
And What Was It? A bloke from New Jersey, dressed up in a fur suit. ‘We’ve got something for everyone’, Barnum used to say. Particularly the gullible.
‘The Dog Faced Girl’
How Curiosities are Manufactured
A girl of fourteen, named Watine, who was missing from Roubaix, has been discovered by her parents at the Tourcoing Fair, where she was being exhibited in a booth as a woman with a dog’s face.
The showman had cleverly covered the girl’s face with gum, to which the hair and ears of a dog were attached. By order of the police, these were washed off, and after the parents had rescued their daughter, the Mayor ordered the booth to be shut up.
The Hampshire Advertiser, Saturday, August 6, 1892
A Chivalrous Cowboy
Austin, Texas, Friday: During a performance given here last night of a sensational border drama, ‘Wild Bill,’ a cowboy in the audience, carried away by excitement, drew his pistol and fired at the villain in the play. The villain was in the act of abducting the heroine, and the cowboy objected.
