July 1875 News – Duels, Corsets and a Giant Octopus
Local News
The Courts
“An Incorrigible Woman” – Belfast Morning News 3rd July 1875
On the 3rd July 1875, the Belfast Morning News reported on the case of a young woman “of a masculine bearing” named Sarah Jane McMahon who was charged with being drunk and disorderly in Lynne’s Lane the previous Thursday.
The arresting officer, Sub-Constable McKeighney, explained that he encountered her in an intoxicated state using filthy and abusive language. On attempting to arrest her, the accused threw herself to the ground and attempted to bite his leg. Unable to do this, McMahon quietened and said she would go quietly if he let her get to her feet. When the sub-constable stood back to give her room she rose quickly and struck him in the eye.
Noting that McMahon had 87 previous convictions, a sentence of two months imprisonment was handed down.
Fatal Accident in Lurgan – Belfast Morning News 12th July 1875
Coroner E. D. Atkinson, Esq. and a jury held an inquest in the Commercial Hotel “upon the remains of an old man named Terence Fitzpatrick, who met his death by suffocation in a well in this town”.
The tragedy occurred as the victim and others were working on a pump within the well. One of the labourers brought down a coal to light a candle it is believed that this “generated foul air“. One plumber in the well, feeling dizzy, decided to return to the surface by climbing the rope suspended from the top of the well. On reaching the surface he promptly fainted.
The victim, Terence Fitzpatrick, and another man named McCluskey attempted to escape by the same means but the rope broke just as both neared the top. Both fell to the bottom, about 30-40 feet below. McCluskey renewed his attempt to reach the surface via a replacement rope and succeeded in escaping.
Fitzpatrick, however, lay unconscious perhaps as a consequence of the fall or, alternatively, as a consequence of the noxious air. He remained there for two hours as none were willing to descend into the well to rescue him.
Once the air was considered clear, a man climbed down to attach a rope to Fitzpatrick’s body. Doctor Shaw was on the spot when Fitzpatrick was taken from the well and examined the body but found that “life was then extinct.“
The jury returned a verdict “that the deceased met his death by suffocation, contracted by foul air, while at work in a pump.”
News from Abroad
The Duel – Impartial Reporter 8th July 1875
The Impartial Reporter published an account, taken from ‘The World‘ publication, of a French regiment enduring an extraordinary number of duels – “The officers were always fighting each other or getting up little affairs with the officers of other regiments“.
The French War Office, losing patience, replaced the existing commanding officer with a Colonel who was instructed to deal with the problem.
Just a few days later, he was approached by two offers requesting permission to indulge in a duel as a matter of personal honour. Surprisingly, the Colonel agreed to the duel. Those aware of his instructions were, frankly, amazed.
The two officers withdrew to the selected duelling location with their weapons and the duel commenced. The outcome was that both officers were slightly wounded and they ended the duel, happy that the “matter of honour” had been concluded satisfactorily.
When both men recovered from their injuries they were called to the Colonel’s office and were astonished when he instructed them to repeat the duel immediately as the matter had not been resolved to his satisfaction. Reluctantly, the officers exited to repeat the duel.
This time the officers “made right good holes in each other, which took them six months to heal“. On the recovery of both men, the Colonel sent them to duel again. On the Colonel’s instructions, the duel was repeated several times until they managed to kill each other.
The impact of this story was immediate as the appetite for duelling was lost in that regiment (and many others).
The report ends with a ringing endorsement of the actions undertaken by the Colonel, noting that the prevalence of duelling in modern society is based upon an unspoken understanding that an exchange of shots is sufficient to restore honour.
This, it is suggested, undermines the purpose of a duel completely. –
“It is, we have said, only on the condition of the duel being thoroughly in earnest and a fight to the death that it has a raison d’etre in modern society. When the duel comes really to mean death, it must be an event of the rarest occurrence in refined society. We shall not undertake to kill each other without the most irresistible reasons; if we can settle our bargain without killing, we may laugh at the code of honour which insists on pistols”.
A Thrilling Story – Impartial Reporter 29th July 1875
This story, originally published in the Paris Monde, told of “a terrible combat” that occurred on July 15th on the reefs of the Isle of St. Honorat close to Cannes, France.
Le Monde describes how, over a period of several months 25 or 30 divers and workmen have been occupied in raising the debris of the steamer which had been wrecked on the rocks.
During the previous week, two divers, starting work earlier than the majority of their comrades, descended into the sea. They had barely started working when one of the two felt his legs seized in a vice-like grip and was faced by “the dreadful eyes of a monstrous octopus, of which the membranes were attached to the rock”.
The horror-stricken diver fought desperately to free himself from the deadly embrace of the octopus using one of his tools – an iron bar used to lever wreckage apart. He struck the creature many times but his weapon proved ineffective, unable to pierce its dense skin.
His comrade, bravely rushed to help the captured workman but was seized in turn. The creatures grip on his legs tightened and he found one of his arms similarly enveloped. Struggling mightily, he used his free hand to reach the signal cord to raise the alarm to his comrades in the boat above, which carried the air-pump and diving gear.
Several divers descended at once, armed with cutIasses and other weapons. They attacked the octopus, initially in vain but then struck the creatures eye and severed one of its tentacles. Weakened, the creature’s grip on its two captives lessened and their rescuers succeeded in freeing their two comrades.
The divers then combined efforts to kill the wounded octopus which, according to Le Monde, subsequently served as supper for the workmen. The report concludes that a creature of this size would make short work of an elephant.
A Handkerchief Flirtation – Belfast Morning News 5th July 1875
A breach of promise case recently brought before the Baltimore Courts caught the attention of the Belfast Morning News. The case, centring on a “curious custom among the Polish Jews” was brought by a “Hebrew maiden named Yetta Mausinervitz against Isaac Mayloss“.
The plaintiff, Yetta, claimed that the accused had broken a vow to marry her and she requested a sum of $10,000 damages for the breakdown of their engagement. Isaac denied that he had made any commitment to marry Yetta.
The cause of the dispute resulted from a symbolic betrothal custom whereby each party takes hold of the ends of a handkerchief and pull it to signify that they are bound to each other.
In court it was confirmed that the defendant, with his sister, went to the plaintiff’s house and, after a conversation of an hour or so, the couple went through the handkerchief pulling ritual in the presence of several others
Instructing the jury, the judge said that, if such a custom exists among the Polish Jews and if the fulfilment of that custom had been observed by the parties present, then the contract of marriage had been made through his actions rather than the more traditional spoken commitment.
The jury ultimately found a verdict for the young lady who considered her affections blighted, but set damages of only 1 cent. Accordingly, the “blighter” had sufficient funds to cover the damages immediately and “the maiden left the court sadder, wiser, and one cent richer”.
Correspondence/ Opinion
Small Waists – The Impartial Reporter 29th July 1875
The Impartial Report reproduced an article, originally submitted by Dr. J. V. C. Smith to the Warehousemen and Drapers’ Trade Journal on the harmful effects of the prevailing fashion for narrow waists. A few extracts follow:
It is singular that, in the manifold styles of dress which succeed each other with the rapidity almost of barometrcal variations of temperature, not one of them favours the freedom of the thorax, or chest.
That is the axle to which all pieces are attached, and the pivot round which they revolve, if at all. A small waist is the first consideration.
This desideratum has been the premature death of thousands upon thousands of the fairest and most promising young ladies before they had time to learn the dangers they were inviting by following the example of those who teach by their practice that they require conformity to the requirements of a perverted taste.
Those who exercise no judgment in regard to this important matter seem oblivious to the damage done:
Stays are the instrumentalities for staying the development of the chest. Beginning early, the ribs are pinioned closely, and by unrelaxing ligation – the lacing being carried to the last endurable point without arresting respiration-their growth is arrested to an extent only familiarly known to anatomists. Their function is nearly destroyed, as they become ancakylosed, or welded, where they were intended to have motion up and down, according to the inflation and collapse of the lungs.
After being subjected to the torture of stays – for such it is, however eloquently those who have lived through the operation of having their chests kept down to the capacity of a child of twelve years may argue to the contrary – breathing with them is an abridged function, or it may be arrested without hesitation. They have counteracted nature, and in various ways must, and do, suffer in consequence.
Thoratic compression alters the frame of the lungs. The chest is naturally broad at the base, becoming narrower at the top – a cone-shaped structure. Women make it narrow where it should be broad, and broader at the apex, where it was originally narrow.
One end of each lung is compelled to do more towards maintaining life than it was organised to do… Favoured as many robust women are, with a fine organization in other respects, they can live out a long life in comparative health and comfort; but they are few compared to the vast number who fall short and die before they have attained all they might have on earth.
Varieties – Wit and Wisdom from The Londonderry Journal 19th & 21st July 1875
Noah was probably the only man who ever went to sea for fear of being drowned.
An Iowa bride made every girl of her acquaintance attend her wedding by keeping the name of the bridegroom a secret until the ceremony.
You can’t weigh an eel with scales, because they have no scales, you know.
When you get into hot water, go to your friends; you’ll find them cool enough.
A DILEMMA:
Gentleman (overcome by the heat of the weather): “Hoy! Cab!”
Driver: “All right, sir, if you’ll just walk to the gate.”
Gentleman: “Oh, bother, walking to the gate!”
Driver: “Well, sir, if you can’t get through I don’t see how I can get over!”
It is said that a man down in Lynn, Massachusetts made so many pairs of shoes in one day that it took him two days to count them! He was a smart one, but not equal to one up in New Hampshire, who built so many miles of stone wall in one day that it took him all night and next day to get home.
“There! That explains where my clothes-line went to!” exclaimed a Yankee woman, as she found her husband hanging in the barn.
The editress of the Stockton Leader refers to the orthodox hell as “the remote possibility of an accelerated temperature hereafter.”
Two things in this world that should not be trifled with, according to Mark Twain, are a woman’s opinion and the business end of a wasp.
The American Rochefoucauld says “It is highly amusing to see a man trying for ten minutes to light a toothpick by scraping it on a match-box. He never succeeds.“
Most of us have friends of whom it may be said, that the less we see them the better we like it.
Link to Previous Monthly News
Previous monthly news stories can be viewed here Monthly News of 150 Years Ago
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