Yorkshire Almanac 2026

Unedited excerpt

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

On Sunday night, a child, Edwin Wild, aged six months, died at the Hospital under very singular and painful circumstances. It appears that his father, William Wild, a striker, lives at 4, Jessop lane, off Sheffield moor, but on the 27th April the child was at the house of its grandmother, Mrs. Haslam, of 10 court, Burgess street, she having taken charge of it in consequence of the illness of its mother. About nine that morning Mrs. Haslam left the little fellow asleep in the bedroom, but about ten minutes later her husband, John Haslam, sawmaker, on going up to fetch it down stairs, found that it had been attacked by a tame ferret, which he had borrowed to catch rats. The ferret, which was kept in a box in the bedroom, had got out, and attracted probably by the smell of the milk which the child had been sucking from a bottle, began biting the left side of its face. The child’s forehead, left eye, and cheek were one mangled mess, and presented a shocking sight. The child had not been heard to cry by its grandmother, and this is probably due to hoarseness, consequent on a cold from which it was suffering. The ferret was at once killed and the child removed to the Hospital, where it has since been. Although the wound was a serious one, it was not anticipated that it would terminate fatally, but during the latter part of last week the child got worse and died on Sunday night. A sad feature of the affair is that since the accident the mother’s illness has increased, and she is now an inmate of the Hospital. The coroner has been communicated with, but the date of the inquest has not yet been fixed.

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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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Comment

A striker in metalworking is the assistant operator who wields the heavy sledgehammer.

Burgess Street is where it was – just round the corner from Sheffield town hall – but I can’t find Jessop Lane.

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• Baby bottle (2) W/G ·
• Child (17) W/G ·
• Common cold (2) W/G ·
• Ferret (1) W/G ·
• Hoarse voice (1) W/G ·
• Metalworking (2) W/G ·
• Milk (3) W/G ·
• Rat (2) W/G ·
• Sheffield Royal Hospital (1) W/G ·
• 📌Sheffield (80) W/G ·
• Working animal (1) W/G ·

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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.

Comment

Comment

A striker in metalworking is the assistant operator who wields the heavy sledgehammer.

Burgess Street is where it was – just round the corner from Sheffield town hall – but I can’t find Jessop Lane.

Something to say? Get in touch

Similar

Order the book:

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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.

Comment

Comment

Re this wave of unofficial strikes:

Major-General Sir Noel Holmes, chairman of the north-eastern division of the National Coal Board, in a statement yesterday on the strike at Grimethorpe Colliery, said that 140 coal-face workers, out of 2,682 employed at the pit, were not doing a fair day’s work. A committee representing management and workmen had decided that the stint for the 140 workers should be increased by 2ft., but they refused to accept its findings and came out on strike. The other coal-face workers came out in sympathy. “As much as I dislike mentioning this fact,” said Sir Noel Holmes, “it is only right to recall that at Grimethorpe since January 1, 1947, and before the present strike, there have been 26 sectional unofficial stoppages, which have lost 33,000 tons of coal to the nation. The present stoppage up to date represents a further loss of more than 40,000 tons.” (Times 1947/08/27)

Holmes’s Wikipedia article curiously doesn’t mention this phase of his career.

I’m guessing that the Welsh ex-Puritan authoritarian Communist Arthur Horner is the voice of the NUM in the above – see e.g. the Times for 9 September.

Interesting comments on the wartime coal boards by T.S. Charlton, colliery manager at Cortonwood:

The management of the collieries is in the hands of men trained primarily in management of mines and miners. They have a working knowledge of all the machinery available and how best it can be used, but the details of this side are left to the mechanical and electrical engineer. Labour costs are two-thirds of production costs, and therefore the handling and the best use of men are of the greatest importance to managers. Why it should have been decided that labour leaders should be good labour directors is, apart from the political issue, difficult to understand, unless it is on the old adage of “poacher turned gamekeeper.” Unless and until the production director has control of his labour side, I can see little hope of his schemes proving effective.

The miners have put forward suggestions to improve output, but they appear to do no more than improve the position of the miner. Can it be said that any suggestion already put forward by the men has put up the output figure? Why should it be assumed the men’s side of the pit production committees should be able to improve output in any way? Their training, inclinations, and very job depend upon their obtaining the best for their electors rather than for production.
(Charlton 1943/12/01)

Charlton was clearly a clever and capable man – it would be good to know more about him.

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