Yorkshire Almanac 2026

Unedited excerpt

If an excerpt is used in the book, it will be shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.

On the 1st of June, a frightful accident happened at Wakefield to a female named Haslegrave. She lived at the house of her husband’s brother, who kept some pleasure grounds in Back Lane, in which was kept a bear and other animals. The bear was confined in a pit made for the purpose, and in the middle of the pit was a pole, up which the bear was in the habit of climbing. On Friday morning the animal climbed the pole, and springing from it on the wall of its den, made its escape. It attacked Mrs. Haslegrave who happened to be near the place, got her down, and mangled her dreadfully with its claws, tearing away part of one of her breasts, and inflicting other serious injuries. Assistance was rendered, and it was with some difficulty the animal was beaten off and afterwards shot.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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Tags

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• Accident (27) W/G ·
• Animal attack (1) W/G ·
• Bear pit (1) W/G ·
• Bear (3) W/G ·
• Menagerie (2) W/G ·
• Pleasure garden (1) W/G ·
• 📌Wakefield (37), cathedral city on the River Calder in the West Riding/West Yorkshire W/G ·
• Zoo (1) W/G ·

All tags.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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Similar

29 September 1684: It being Michaelmas, the Jolly Pinder of Wakefield (in song) deserts his beasts and pound and joins Robin Hood in the greenwood

2 December 1726: The Rev Hopkins of Kirkheaton castrates himself to prevent further mischief

29 May 1732: Old William Lindley of Dodworth tells various marvellous stories from his youth

9 January 1935: Returning from Bear Island, the trawler Edgar Wallace capsizes in the Humber at Hull, killing 15

11 April 1667: A hubristic Sam Mitchell impersonates a gypsy in a Halifax pub, and nemesis follows

16 August 1845: The York Herald is conned into posting the American actor Ira Aldridge’s sensational account of his own death

4 September 1947: Conflicting hopes for the future of the nationalised coal industry, as a wildcat strike against increased hours at Grimethorpe spreads through the South Yorkshire coalfield

4 December 1990: Paul Sykes – heavyweight boxer, literary prize-winner, habitual criminal – advises the nation from the back garden of his Wakefield council house on shark attack prevention

30 May 1835: The (Tory-dominated) Leeds Corporation gives its assets to three cronies to prevent their being inherited by the new (Whiggish) town council created by the Municipal Corporations Act

21 February 1853: Henry Warrass (14) dies like his fellow-Sheffielder, the infanticide Alfred Warrington

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

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