Headingley Monster February 24, 2025
Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern , trackback
Here is a weird and disturbing story from the Sheffield Evening Telegraph, 16 Apr 1912:
Leeds Family Terrorised; Woman Bitten. For three months past, a strange little beast has been alarming a Headingley household. It has been variously held to be weasel, a rat, or some strange creature from the East. On several, occasions the animal has flown at and bitten a maid at the house in question. Professional rat-catchers and others have been on its track, but without success. So far only the maid has seen it [red light, red light], but the kitchen door of the house bears long scratches, as from the claws of some animal that has jumped from a shelf [?]. Flour has been scattered about and jars have been dislodged from the shelves. It is thought by some to be a weasel that has somehow taken up its abode in the house and though traps have been set and dogs introduced, no capture has been made. The family are in a state of terror, not knowing from day to day what will happen.
Beach has two immediate reactions to this. First, this is bunkum (weasel sprinkling flour indeed); and, second, we are seeing something closer to the poltergeist complex. This mysterious creature has only been seen by one member of the household, the same person who was so cruelly bitten. The obvious parallel – admittedly there are important differences – is with Gef the talking mongoose. But are there other cases where poltergeist phenomenon appear in animal form: drbeachcombing AT yahoo DOT com? Beach has previously covered the famous Wesley poltergeist and their headless badger (which is rather more credible than a weasel jumping out of flour pots into the face of a scullery maid). But there must be others out there.
This story would have been much more easily situated as ‘witchcraft’ in 1700 or even 1800 than in 1912 when it was a case for the ratcatcher. O tempora, o mores!
PS Readers might be interested to know that one reader of the Yorkshire Post 16 Apr 1912, identified the pest as a squirrel!
