Events and newspaper clippings from Scarborough
Some extracts from the Yorkshire Annals
1312. Pier Gaveston and his followers, who had been banished by Edward I., joined Edward II., at York by whom they were received as a "gift from heaven." Gaveston had excited the resentment of the barons, who had formed a powerful conspiracy against him, in consequence of which the king caused the walls of the city to be strongly fortified, and put into a posture of defence. Thomas earl of Lancaster, first prince of the blood, was at the head of the barons, who, by oath, had bound themselves to expel Gaveston. He therefore raised an army sxiddenly, and marched to York, whence he found Edward had removed
with Gaveston, to Newcastle ; thither he hastened, when the king and his favourite had just time to escape to Tynemouth, and the pursuit being continued he and Gaveston embarked and sailed to Scarborough, the castle of which port he made his favourite governor.
1318. Douglas, one of Robert Bruce's generals, burned the towns of Northallerton and Boroughbridge, and imposed
a contribution upon the inhabitants of Ripon. He then reduced Scarborough and Skipton to ashes, and with much plunder, carried of a great number of prisoners to Scotland.
1846:— July 5th. Died, this day, Jane Hall, aged 72 years, who had been an inmate of the Scarborough workhouse during
the period of fifty years. The deceased was never married, but her four children were brought up at the expense
of the union. Three of them died and were buried from the workhouse. The fourth, a daughter now forty-five years of age, has regularly lived in the house, and has also had four children, three of whom have died. It is calculated that those two generations of one family have cost the union not less than £1000.
1849:— On Tuesday morning, the 24th of April, at an early hour, a small vessel belonging to Boston, being off Robin Hood's Bay, near Scarborough, was struck by an electric fire-ball or meteor, which descended not more than a yard from the place where the crew were standing, and so sudden was the conflagration, that the poor men had only sufficient time to get into their boats and leave the unfortunate vessel; the ship's papers, and other articles of value, the men's clothes, and everything, in short, but life, was lost. Another Boston vessel, being near at the time, took the men on board, and landed them at Scarborough.
1861:- July 19th. The town of Scarborough was thrown into a state of gloom and sorrow, in consequence of the upsetting of,
a boat returning from Flambro', whereby the lives of ten gentlemen, all visitors, were lost.
1864 December About this time a Frenchman of extraordinary height and bulk, exhibited himself at, the Music Hall, Leeds,
Mons. J. Joseph Brice, the modern Goliath, had visited, the, metropolis, Scarborough, York, Glasgow, Dublin, Belfast, and many other cities and towns in the United Kingdom, and his levees everywhere had been fashionably and numerously attended, and before he left France he, had the honour of appearing before the Emperor of the French, by whom he was presented with a massive gold ring. His deportment at once affable and kind, and he has an agreeable expression of countenance, indicative of
goodness of disposition and an average amount of intelligence. As to his size, he is a giant in every sense of the word, being, though only 24 years of age, eight feet high, and thirty stone Weight. He is a remarkably well-built man. His proportions are good, his features agreeable, and his, manner gentlemanly and pleading. The tallest gentleman, in the room passed under his arm, when extended horizontally without touching it, and the largest ,hand in the room bore, about the same relation to the giant's that a child's hand would bear to that of a full-grown man.
1866 Jan 1st At twelve o'clock on Sunday night, the tolls on the highway between Malton and York, and Malton and Scarbro', were abolished.
1866 May 10th. This evening a truly horrible event took place at Scarborough. The Local Board were forming a new drain in Castle Road, and, as is the practice in such cases, the works were watched during the night by a man whose duty it was to warn passengers of danger and to attend to a brazier fire, used as a signal. John Rain, a labourer, was thus employed. He was spoken to a little after twelve o'clock, and it is supposed he was at that time partially intoxicated. Shortly before two o'clock on the following morning, a private in the militia discovered the puncheon in which the watcher sat to be burning. He went to the spot, and, to his horror, found the cask, the straw, and the man Rain all blazing, the cask being nearly consumed, and the man so far burnt away as to be past identifying The fire was put out by the police, and the remains taken to the workhouse. The feet and legs were entirely consumed; the thighs, hips, and back were exactly in a half-roasted state, while the face was wholly destroyed, and the skull fractured with the heat. It is supposed the poor fellow had been sleeping, when some of the straw had taken fire. He seems then to have made an effort to get out of the tub, as he was found face downwards, and with his arms extended, as though he had tried to creep out. He had not succeeded, and probably became unconscious from suffocation. Rain was a single man, and was a little over thirty years of age.
1866 May 16th - Information was received at the Police Office at Scarborough this afternoon, that another gentleman belonging to Bradford had come to an untimely end. The person referred to was Mr. Greenwood, brush manufacturer, of Bradford. Mr. Greenwood travelled on his own business account, and in the early part of this week was at Scarborough, at which place he received letters from his friends. On Wednesday, he went from his lodgings, and in the afternoon of the same day was seen on the beach near Cayton, a few miles south of Scarborough. The place was very secluded and lonely, but Mr. Greenwood was seen by a farming man who was walking along the Cliff top. The man was struck by certain gesticulations the stranger was making—hurrying to and fro, throwing his arms wildly about, and conducting himself in a rather extraordinary manner. Eventually he became still, and the observer passed on, thinking that exercise had been the object of the stranger's actions. Some time later he returned in the same direction, and then observed lying on the sands below what appeared to be a bundle of clothes. As he saw no one near, he became alarmed, and at once went to the spot, where he found a suit of clothes lying, but not a vestige of their owner was to be seen. There was a silver watch and gold chain, some money, and several letters and address cards, whereby the clothes were correctly supposed to belong to Mr. Greenwood, and whether the unfortunate gentleman, had been drowned and washed away by the tide or had committed suicide, could not be correctly ascertained.
1866 August 5th - Three large round barrows upon the Sherburn Wolds, near Scarbro', were successively opened under the supervision of the Rev. Fred. Porter, of Yedingham, with most novel and important results—the investigations suggesting new theories as to the people-of the North Wolds and their practices in pre-Roman times. The facts established that these Sherburn Wold barrows contain (1) On, their eastern side deposits of strangely broken up human bodies,heaped together in every possible variety of disorder and fracture;(2) that they also contain burials of unburnt and unbroken bodies; and (3) they are the graves of a people belonging markedly to the dolicho-cephalic type of skull—the supposed earliest race of pre-historic people of whom traces remain. These facts coincide pretty closely with the discoveries made in the long barrows of the Wolds and moors, and also in those of the south-west of England, where numerous and confused and distorted burials strongly suggested grave feasting and cannibalism, but which hitherto have only been found in the long barrows at their eastern ends. The conclusion was that the Yorkshire race made use of a differently-shaped barrow, using, in fact, both the rectangular and circular forms - the broken bodies being at the eastern end of the long barrows and on the eastern side of the round ones.
1866 September - The first pile of the promenade pier in the North Bay of Scarborough, was fixed, in the presence of a large number of spectators, by Major Woodall, of Scarborough, chairman of the company.
1866 Died, Alderman Bean, of Scarbro,' aged 79 years, well-known as an accomplished and devoted naturalist in the scientific
circles of England, the Continent, and America. During a long life Mr. Bean had been engaged in forming, mainly by his own indefatigable efforts, a Museum of Natural History, specimens of which was rivalled, perhaps, by no other private collection in the kingdom, and which was to scientific men one of the glories of Scarbro'.
1867 July 24th - The Grand Hotel, Scarbro', was opened. The building is from the designs of Mr. Cuthbert Brodrick, and the site is most commanding. The hotel is one of the largest, if not the largest building of the description in England. It was first started by a company with 12,000 £10 shares, but the contractor failing to complete his contract it was subsequently sold to a new company for £43,600, Slaving then cost, with the site, upwards of £90,000. It was estimated by Mr. Brodrick that about £60,000 additional would be required to finish and furnish the hotel. The building is in the Italian style, constructed of coloured and ornamental bricks, with terra cotta and stone facings. It is somewhat in the form of the V, with the apex looking towards the south cliff, and commanding a most magnificent view of the Spa Gardens, the south sands, the long line of beautiful coast that stretches as far as Filey, and an uninterrupted prospect of the broad ocean. The height of the building on the sea side is 160 feet, whilst that on the cliff, or town side, is 112 feet high. This inequality of the height is caused by its being erected on an incline of the cliff, which falls rapidly towards the sands. The building covers 3996 square yards of ground; the total area of the several floors is 17,500 square yards. About 6,000,000 bricks were used, and 50,000 cubic feet of stone, exclusive of that used in the staircases and stone floors.
1867 August 25th - An immense dispatch of fish to the interior took place from Whitby and Scarbro'. The herring trains
passing through the junction at Malton gave 135 truck loads from Scarbro' and 77 from Whitby—upwards of 1,000 tons. The rails were so greasy from the fish traffic that the first train on the following morning lost three quarters of an hour in getting up the Gothland incline going south.
1869 March - At the assizes at York, four men, Henry Walker, Joseph Almond, Robert Robinson, and Moses Johnson, were found guilty of hooting at three Scarborough policemen, with intent to do grievous bodily harm, five years' penal servitude was passed upon Walker, Almond, and Robinson.
1869 July 5th - Another attraction was added to Scarbro' by the opening of a splendid promenade pier on the North Sands, which commands the whole of the rugged and bold scenery of the Castle headland, hitherto unseen except from the water. There was a great influx of excursionists by railway.
1869 Nov 1st. His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales visited Yorkshire, having accepted an invitation from Lord Londesborough to visit him at his marine residence at Scarbro'for a few days shooting and hunting. The people of the town gave the Prince as public a welcome as the nature of the visit would permit. In addition to a triumphal arch and various signs of rejoicing, the Mayor and Corporation presented an address, after which the Prince drove through the main street of the town to the Londesborough Lodge Villa, being cheered enthusiastically along his progress. In the evening the town was illuminated.
1872 September 11th - A Life Boat, named "Lady Leigh," was presented to Scarbro'. The lifeboat and its equipment were the gift to the National Lifeboat Institution by the Freemasons of Warwickshire, of which Lord Leigh was the Provincial Grand Master.
1872 December 16th - A storm of mingled rain and snow this evening extended over a wide area. It caused an almost complete interruption of telegraphic communication between the principal towns of the kingdom. A gale blew with terrible force on the north-east coast. At Scarbro' the smacks Galilee, Victor, General Lee, and Maiden Queen, broke from their moorings and received much damage. The first was pitched right on the stone work near the fish market. Railway traffic was greatly delayed, and serious accidents occurred on many lines.
1873 September 18th - An interesting celebration took place at Whitby. Mrs.Harrison who was born in the locality, and had lived there all her life, celebrated her 100th birthday. After a drive out, she was joined at tea by her brother from Scarborough, who was 90 years of age. Her faculties were unimpaired. Her sister, who lived at Burniston, near Scarborough, and was 97 years of age, would have joined this deeply-interesting family gathering, so famed for longevity, had not her friends at the above place been busy with the harvest.
OTHER ARTICLES
• Characters of the Filey fishing industry
• Losses amongst Filey fishing cobles
• The history of Filey Lifeboats
• The German bombardment of scarborough in the First World War in 1914
• Filey and the gales of 1860,1867,1869 AND 1880
• The Home Guard and coastal defences in WW2 Scarborough
• Characters of Scarborough - colourful eccentrics and notorious drunks
• The Harwood and Bullamore fishing family history in Scarborough
• Thomas Crimlisk - First of the Crimlisks
• The Allen and Truman Scarborough fishing families
• The Merrie Islington - sunk by a U-boat off Whitby
• Scarborough's harbour and the coal trade. Thomas Hinderwell
• Scarborough fishermen and the U-Boats by Godfrey Arthur
• The early years of the Scarborough Lifeboat
• Tragedies in the Jenkinson fishing family in Filey
• Scarboroughs Heyday of Inns,smuggling and illicit stills
• Radio 270 - pirate radio station off Scarborough
• Scarborough newspapers - a rich source of history
• Charles Dickens account of Filey and Scarborough graveyards