A Run of Bad Luck

The menagerie that was sold off in the midst of the slums of Novia Scotia Gardens was in any case a sadly depleted one, as George junior explained to the Daily Mail:

“Did I get anything out of the sale of the menagerie? Not a penny. I had a run of bad luck. I can’t tell you the particular years; but my misfortunes commenced one winter’s day on a hill about a mile and a half out of Peebles. Six wagons were blown over, and we were obliged to let them remain on the ground, with the animals in them, until the wind abated. Meanwhile, in the town itself, we could see a big fire raging. It was the stables in which my horses were. Thirty were injured and twelve had to be killed. That was one of the worst things possible to happen, because we could not get to the places taken in advance in other times at the time stated.”

Photo from Hannah Velten's Pages, where other incidents with elephants on the road are described. Add some high winds and snow-storms and it is not hard to see how accidents may have occurred as the menagerists fought against the elements to keep to their schedules - to the point probably of foolhardiness on the part of George Wombwell junior.

“Then the carnivorous animals kept dying off, and although I was continually replacing them from Jamrach in London, and from Liverpool and Bristol, still they died. I could not account for it, until at last a specialist told me it was a sort of rinderpest. At that time I had a splendid group of lions. I lost eight out of nine. Another misfortune was the loss of my elephant. A menagerie is nothing without an elephant,” observed the aged showman parenthetically. “We were going from Huddersfield to Ashton-under-Lyne. On the top of a steep hill we were caught in a severe snow storm. The elephant wagon became fixed in a cutting. We had to leave it. The next morning we could not get within a mile and a half of the spot owing to the snow. It was twelve days before I could obtain any tidings about the elephant. Then I was told it laid down to take its mash. The next day my brother-in-law said it was dead. I had been offered 650 pounds for it only a short time before. That crippled me badly.”

Clin Keeling in a short but fascinating study of Menagerie Number Three dates the onset of this sequence of disasters to 1855. The final sale raised around 100 pounds leaving George with losses of around 5000 pounds, and bankruptcy. In short, he was ruined. Amongst the bargains to be picked up at the auction, were five 'beast wagons', two leopards, a jaguar, six monkeys, a bear, a wolf, a hyena, a baboon, and a nyalghai. The Russian bear went under the hammer for just three pounds fifteen shillings.

Leaving aside the cruelty inflicted on the animals themselves, George Wombwell junior seems to have had little first-hand knowledge either of how to keep his stock healthy, or transport it from one location to another with minimal risks. He quite literally ran his menagerie into the ground. Or, to put it in his own words to the Daily Mail:

“Afterwards things seemed to go from bad to worse. I got into debt. As soon as I lost my elephant I lost my show, and at last I was sold up, and then everything was gone.”

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Excerpt from: Glimpses of Peebles

Wombwell's Menagerie of wild beasts came to Peebles on gth February 1850. " On the way to the town several of the caravans were blown over at Lyne's Mill by the violence of a gale which was 
blowing; and, while putting their horses right for the night in the Crown Inn stables, fire broke out and burned the building. However, six horses were got out with great difficulty by Mr Macpherson, the landlord, and those who came to his assistance." 

The dates of course do not match, but this may be due to an error in the text, as this account seems to chime with George's own version. 

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