Yorkshire Oddities, Incidents, and Strange EventsBaring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
History
Yorkshire Oddities, Incidents, and Strange Events
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
Legends -- England -- Yorkshire; Yorkshire (England) -- Miscellanea
The family of Barzillai Stead, a person who had been unsuccessful in
business, next became the object of Mary's iniquitous exactions. Upon
the husband's fears she contrived to work with so much success, by
representing the bailiffs to be in continual pursuit of him, that she
obliged him to enlist, and to share his bounty with her and her
imaginary wise-woman. Her next object was to arouse the jealousy of the
wife: this she did by assuring her that it was the intention of
Barzillai to take with him, when he went to his regiment, a young woman
out of Vicar Lane, Leeds. In order to prevent this it became necessary
to "screw down" the rival queen; this was to be effected by the agency
of Mrs. Moore, but Mrs. Moore's screws would never drive without
money--three half-crowns were to be produced for this purpose, and two
pieces of coal; the coals were to be placed at the woman's door in Vicar
Lane; they were then to be laid on the fire--the woman was to be thrown
into a sound sleep--the fire was to communicate to her clean clothes,
which had been washed in contemplation of the intended journey, and, the
clothes being consumed, she could not of course elope without them. The
morning after this charm had taken effect, Stead left Leeds to join his
regiment, and left the imaginary woman of Vicar Lane behind him. Mary
was then left at liberty to play off the whole artillery of her frauds
upon the unsuspecting wife of Stead. To enter into all the expedients
she adopted to fleece this poor woman would swell this article to an
inconvenient length; suffice it to say that she obliged her to sell or
pawn every article in her house that would raise money, and drove her to
such a state of desperation as to lead her victim to attempt suicide.
While Mary Bateman was practising upon this woman, her dupe was
confined, and the Leeds Benevolent Society, finding her in a state of
destitution, determined to apply a guinea to the relief of her wants.
This sum was given to her in three payments of 7s., and out of this
guinea Mary Bateman had the inhumanity to extort 18s. by persuading the
credulous woman that she would "screw down" the Benevolent Society, so
as to force the managers to give her more alms.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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