It's been awhile since I've stumbled on a really good piece of obscure nineteenth century journalism, but after a day of traipsing around a soaked Caerleon, this was the ideal tonic to end the day on. This entry, from 1897, recounts the unusual circumstances surrounding the awakening of a London baker, who found his shop to have been ransacked by an elephant at 5am. I also came across another account from the same year, reporting on an elephant gone wild in Glyn Neath and then Llanelli, attacking police officers, a councilors home windows, a public house (for shame) and a milk delivery cart. 1897...bad year for elephants.
0 Comments
It's that blissful time of year, when teaching goes into hibernation, and a research window suddenly opens up. I'm being ambitious this summer, with final editing on the PhD thesis still to do, I want to try and turn around three articles in three months - optimistic perhaps, but a worthy challenge. As time is at a premium, one of these research projects is making greedy use of the wonderful National Library Welsh Newspapers Online digital archive - far less time consuming than trekking back and forth to Aberystwyth. The only danger with such a resource is the near infinite scope for distraction. How is one supposed to ignore a headline like 'The Great Robbery at Llanfihangel'?! Published in 1882, Mr Evans had been relieved of a small fortune, no wonder then that he was 'agreeably surprised' at the overnight return of the bulk sum stolen. I'll be posting little snippets like this here over the coming weeks - otherwise my research will be heading in completely the wrong direction! |
Archives
January 2018
Categories
All
|