Reminiscences of Rotherham
by Alderman Geo. Gummer, J.P.
« « prevAnother escapade of Rotherham Bob and the last. On one occasion he found his way to a Salvation Army meeting, and heartily joined in the singing of 'Happy day. happy day, when Jesus washed my sins away.' His conduct became so objectionable that the police had to remove him. Summoned for disturbing the Army, he complained that the more he tried to be a gentleman the worse the police became. This made his seventy-third appearance before the magistrntes for drunkenness, he reached well over one hundred later.
PEACOCK
Many of the older inhabitants will recollect Peacock and Cuddy, his donkey. He came of good stock, being the son of a gentle man farmer residing at Whiston. In his early days Peacock could be seen at most of the hunt meetings. riding one of the many horses his father kept for this purpose. There was no better rider than he in the neighbourhood, and this proved itself when the annual horse fair came round. On these occasions Peacock“ delighted to take in hand some unruly horse which others were unable to control.
Peacock’s affections seem (or so his people thought) to have been misplaced. His father’s objections were so pronounced that Peacock left the paternal home, vowing he would never sleep under the roof of a house again. This vow, I have reason to believe, he kept, until his declining years and infirmity compelled him to break it. Retiring into semi obscurity, he first made his home in a hut in a wood near Royds Moor.
What money he posessed was soon frittered away in riotous living, chiefly at the Chequers public-house, where the girl he had formed an attachment for was employed.
Compelled to earn a living, he commenced buying and selling any old rubbish he could get hold of. Travelling about with Cuddy, harnessed, in a most unusual way, with gears nearly impossible for anyone but himself to unfasten, to an old bacon box on wheels, he became an object of derision for all the youngsters in the town and district.
On one occasion, for a lark the donkey was taken into the best room of the Crown Hotel, its legs tied, and the poor animal placed before the fire. In this predicament it was being scorched when Peacock appeared upon the scene and released his donkey. As a result, two of the young sparks responsible for this joke, namely, Willie Rising and Spud Flintham, were summoned, but they managed to escape punishment.
Peacock suffered serious injury at a fire under circumstances I have now forgotten. He had a hard fight for his life in the Work house, where he eventually found a home. His last appearance, after everyone thought him dead, was at a treat given to the Work house inmates at the theatre, to which he was taken in a cab.
Tommy Docking, the run-about for Billy Heeson, landlord of the White Hart, had an exceptionally thick skull. He would run full tilt at the chimney piece for a pint of beer, and curiously enough, this rough treat ment had little effect upon him except to increase his natural stupidity.
A peculiar character of the opposite sex, known as Fusty Bet, had control of the library in College street for a time. How she obtained this strange name I do not know, Residing in one of the Alms Houses in » next
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