?Arrested for swearing at Filey

Today police will often turn a blind eye to swearing. Back in 1920 Chas Ferguson was arrested for using obscene language at a football match between Westwood and Alma Rovers.

The Filey club had started to gain a reputation for bad behaviour amongst the crowd. P.C. Bennett noted that the defendant was acting in a very disorderly way and said the following.

"Throw the bastard off the field!"

"Put the bastard through it!"

The crowd urged him to stop behaving in this way. Ladies present told him that he should be ashamed of himself. He was then heard to say.

"You can't bloody well put me off"

"I'm not frightened of any bastard policeman in Filey or Scarborough!"

Source Scarborough Mercury, 1st April, 1920.