IOO YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (12th - 18th APRIL 1921)
This week's stories include the harsh sentences handed out to two gay men for committing gross indecency, the approval theft of a blouse by a new St Helens bride, a knock out blow in Robins Lane and a charge of cruelly terrifying a performing monkey at the Hippodrome.
We begin on the 12th when the two men who last month had appeared in court charged with committing gross indecency in St Helens Market late on a Saturday night faced the music at Liverpool Assizes. The police had found Norman Astles from Appleton and Samuel Pigott of Prescot Road in St Helens in what one officer described as an "extraordinary position" and immediately arrested them. Pigott ran away and violently assaulted Constable Tinsley after being apprehended.
The judge at the assizes was Rigby Swift who knew St Helens well. He had not only been brought up in the town but had served as its MP between 1910 and 1918. Despite being caught in the act both men denied the offence but offered weak defences. Norman Astles said he had been going home when the other man spoke to him. The 26-year-old claimed that they were simply standing together talking when the police suddenly appeared and in the struggle to get away his clothing became disarranged.
Samuel Pigott, for his part, said he had been arrested scores of times for other offences and had bolted because he feared the police might accuse him of planning to break into the market. So both men were, as expected, found guilty. Judge Swift was informed that Pigott had only come out of prison on January 4th and Astles when in the army had been a female impersonator performing concerts for the troops.
Sentences for consensual homosexual acts were severe with disgust probably playing a big role in the length of the sentence. Pigott received a 15-month sentence and Astles 12-months – both terms to be served with hard labour. I expect that the offences had been committed in some dark corner of the market place after the stalls had closed for the evening and only technically within a public place. Mind you it did not seem to matter much whether such acts took place in private or in public. In May 1939 Norman Astles was found guilty of committing (consensual) indecency offences in a private home in Widnes with two other men from Clock Face. For these offences the 44-year-old was given a five-year prison term.
In 1916 Sutton's champion boxer Ernie Proudlove from Herbert Street told the St Helens Newspaper that he had fought 80 bouts, won 60 and never been knocked out. His brother from Reginald Road knew how to fight too. William Proudlove acted as Ernie's trainer and sparring partner but was taken to court on the 13th after using his boxing skills on the street. Colliery worker Leslie Wheeler wanted £15 damages from Proudlove after being knocked unconscious in Robins Lane.
Proudlove told St Helens County Court (pictured above) that he had struck the man because earlier that evening, Wheeler had insulted him and the two young ladies he was with in Church Street – one of whom he had since married. This Wheeler denied but claimed he'd lost a week's wages while off work. The judge in the East Street court felt £15 was excessive but awarded him £6 and court costs.
James Sexton, the MP for St Helens from 1918 to 1931, was renowned for his sharp wit. On April 14th The Times described how in the House of Commons a member had asked the Minister of Health about the number of recorded cases in England and Wales from so-called sleeping sickness. The answer was 495 deaths during the past twelve months. To that Sexton said: "Is the Minister of Health's Department itself quite free from this disease?" The paper wrote: "No answer was returned."
The same edition of The Times reported that the national coal strike – that was now starting its third week – had come at a highly inopportune time. Newly released unemployment figures in Lancashire and Cheshire for March had shown signs of recovery. Since the miners had refused to accept a pay cut and been locked out of their pits, the industrial situation was described by the Ministry of Labour in Manchester as one of "extreme depression". Coal strikes had knock-on effects and Pilkingtons was reported as having served its workers with provisional notices to terminate their present employment contracts. The Times believed that was so the St Helens glass giant could re-hire workers on a day-to-day basis as needed.
Obtaining items on approval and then paying for them later is another type of shopping that has pretty much died out these days. Whether shopping in store or online, the seller now want the money first before letting you have the goods. As many will remember, obtaining goods on approval used to be very common but what might be deemed "approval theft" also occurred from time to time. That was a somewhat brainless crime as the police usually had little difficulty in identifying the thief.
That was the case on the 15th when the magistrates in St Helens Police Court heard how Margaret Ambrose from Oxford Street had got wed in a stolen blouse – or more precisely one obtained by false pretences. Up until a few months earlier Margaret had worked as a barmaid for a Mrs Mitchell at the Ring o’Bells in Westfield Street and had frequently been sent out shopping for the pub. Some time after leaving her job and a few days before getting married, Margaret obtained three blouses on approval from a shop owned by a Miss Callon, claiming that they were for Mrs Mitchell.
Two were returned but when Miss Callon sent the bill for £3 5s to the Ring o’Bells for the other blouse, Mrs Mitchell said she knew nothing of it. The police soon identified Margaret as the culprit and she told them that she did not know what had made her do it. Her solicitor asked the Bench to dismiss the case because Margaret came from a very respectable family and she would pay the cost of the blouse. That wasn't exactly what they did but it came close. The young woman was ordered to simply pay the price of the blouse and 20 shillings costs.
On the 18th in St Helens Police Court, the RSPCA brought the unusual charge of "cruelly terrifying a performing monkey" against animal trainer Frank Felix. Ernest Blease had initiated the charge after being in the audience at the Hippodrome one evening and seeing the act. The magistrates were told that a very small monkey had been forced to jump 18ft between two swinging trapezes. Three times the monkey attempted the leap but three times it failed and dropped on to the stage instead. Mr Blease said the animal looked badly stunned and so he reported the matter to the RSPCA. Five or six witnesses corroborated his claim that the monkey had fallen heavily and they said they believed the monkey was terrified.
Jeremiah Haslam Fox was the defending solicitor who always pulled no punches in court. Ernest Blease was a confectioner in Duke Street and Fox accused him of reporting the matter simply for the sake of publicity. He said his "desire for self-advertisement" was designed to benefit Blease's business and attempts to get on the Town Council. "He was a great advertiser, and had come forward simply with a view to publicity", Fox claimed.
The stage manager of the Hippodrome denied any cruelty, saying: "The performance was carried out in proper style, and the monkeys and dogs were very well looked after, and were very fond of their trainer." However the Chairman of the Bench said they felt that there had been a certain amount of cruelty involved and imposed a fine of 20 shillings.
But they exonerated the theatre and Ernest Blease from any criticism, adding that the confectioner had, in their opinion, "reported the affair simply out of a feeling of humanity". The outspoken solicitor challenged their view saying Blease had been the only person out of thousands who had objected and he knowing the man thought it a proper comment for him to have made.
And finally, the Liverpool Echo published this week a short – but what would prove to be a seminal article – on a bright idea that an MP had had with regard to telephones:
"An important suggestion for telephone call boxes at practically every corner was made by Mr. Richardson, a member of the new Parliamentary Committee appointed to inquire into the working of the telephones. “I will make this suggestion for the consideration of the telephone department,” said Mr. Richardson: “Call boxes as plentiful as pillar boxes, at a reasonable charge. Those people who want frequently to use the telephone, but cannot afford an installation in their homes would be such free [regular] users of them that the department would get a substantial revenue.” Sir Evelyn Murray [secretary to the Post Office] replied that the idea was new, and promised that it would be considered."
It certainly was as the first public telephone boxes were installed later in the year. There were such things as public call office telephones available in places like the main post office in Church Street in St Helens. But these were very few and far between and dependent upon the office being open. And so Richardson's idea appears to have been the genesis of telephone kiosks, although the familiar red design in cast iron – as opposed to its original concrete – would not be introduced until 1926.
Next week's stories will include the two perished women that chose the wrong house in Dentons Green to seek shelter, the happy end to the French polisher's separated family and the violent row in Atherton Street that led to summonses flying all over the place!
We begin on the 12th when the two men who last month had appeared in court charged with committing gross indecency in St Helens Market late on a Saturday night faced the music at Liverpool Assizes. The police had found Norman Astles from Appleton and Samuel Pigott of Prescot Road in St Helens in what one officer described as an "extraordinary position" and immediately arrested them. Pigott ran away and violently assaulted Constable Tinsley after being apprehended.
The judge at the assizes was Rigby Swift who knew St Helens well. He had not only been brought up in the town but had served as its MP between 1910 and 1918. Despite being caught in the act both men denied the offence but offered weak defences. Norman Astles said he had been going home when the other man spoke to him. The 26-year-old claimed that they were simply standing together talking when the police suddenly appeared and in the struggle to get away his clothing became disarranged.
Samuel Pigott, for his part, said he had been arrested scores of times for other offences and had bolted because he feared the police might accuse him of planning to break into the market. So both men were, as expected, found guilty. Judge Swift was informed that Pigott had only come out of prison on January 4th and Astles when in the army had been a female impersonator performing concerts for the troops.
Sentences for consensual homosexual acts were severe with disgust probably playing a big role in the length of the sentence. Pigott received a 15-month sentence and Astles 12-months – both terms to be served with hard labour. I expect that the offences had been committed in some dark corner of the market place after the stalls had closed for the evening and only technically within a public place. Mind you it did not seem to matter much whether such acts took place in private or in public. In May 1939 Norman Astles was found guilty of committing (consensual) indecency offences in a private home in Widnes with two other men from Clock Face. For these offences the 44-year-old was given a five-year prison term.
In 1916 Sutton's champion boxer Ernie Proudlove from Herbert Street told the St Helens Newspaper that he had fought 80 bouts, won 60 and never been knocked out. His brother from Reginald Road knew how to fight too. William Proudlove acted as Ernie's trainer and sparring partner but was taken to court on the 13th after using his boxing skills on the street. Colliery worker Leslie Wheeler wanted £15 damages from Proudlove after being knocked unconscious in Robins Lane.
James Sexton, the MP for St Helens from 1918 to 1931, was renowned for his sharp wit. On April 14th The Times described how in the House of Commons a member had asked the Minister of Health about the number of recorded cases in England and Wales from so-called sleeping sickness. The answer was 495 deaths during the past twelve months. To that Sexton said: "Is the Minister of Health's Department itself quite free from this disease?" The paper wrote: "No answer was returned."
The same edition of The Times reported that the national coal strike – that was now starting its third week – had come at a highly inopportune time. Newly released unemployment figures in Lancashire and Cheshire for March had shown signs of recovery. Since the miners had refused to accept a pay cut and been locked out of their pits, the industrial situation was described by the Ministry of Labour in Manchester as one of "extreme depression". Coal strikes had knock-on effects and Pilkingtons was reported as having served its workers with provisional notices to terminate their present employment contracts. The Times believed that was so the St Helens glass giant could re-hire workers on a day-to-day basis as needed.
Obtaining items on approval and then paying for them later is another type of shopping that has pretty much died out these days. Whether shopping in store or online, the seller now want the money first before letting you have the goods. As many will remember, obtaining goods on approval used to be very common but what might be deemed "approval theft" also occurred from time to time. That was a somewhat brainless crime as the police usually had little difficulty in identifying the thief.
That was the case on the 15th when the magistrates in St Helens Police Court heard how Margaret Ambrose from Oxford Street had got wed in a stolen blouse – or more precisely one obtained by false pretences. Up until a few months earlier Margaret had worked as a barmaid for a Mrs Mitchell at the Ring o’Bells in Westfield Street and had frequently been sent out shopping for the pub. Some time after leaving her job and a few days before getting married, Margaret obtained three blouses on approval from a shop owned by a Miss Callon, claiming that they were for Mrs Mitchell.
Two were returned but when Miss Callon sent the bill for £3 5s to the Ring o’Bells for the other blouse, Mrs Mitchell said she knew nothing of it. The police soon identified Margaret as the culprit and she told them that she did not know what had made her do it. Her solicitor asked the Bench to dismiss the case because Margaret came from a very respectable family and she would pay the cost of the blouse. That wasn't exactly what they did but it came close. The young woman was ordered to simply pay the price of the blouse and 20 shillings costs.
On the 18th in St Helens Police Court, the RSPCA brought the unusual charge of "cruelly terrifying a performing monkey" against animal trainer Frank Felix. Ernest Blease had initiated the charge after being in the audience at the Hippodrome one evening and seeing the act. The magistrates were told that a very small monkey had been forced to jump 18ft between two swinging trapezes. Three times the monkey attempted the leap but three times it failed and dropped on to the stage instead. Mr Blease said the animal looked badly stunned and so he reported the matter to the RSPCA. Five or six witnesses corroborated his claim that the monkey had fallen heavily and they said they believed the monkey was terrified.
Jeremiah Haslam Fox was the defending solicitor who always pulled no punches in court. Ernest Blease was a confectioner in Duke Street and Fox accused him of reporting the matter simply for the sake of publicity. He said his "desire for self-advertisement" was designed to benefit Blease's business and attempts to get on the Town Council. "He was a great advertiser, and had come forward simply with a view to publicity", Fox claimed.
The stage manager of the Hippodrome denied any cruelty, saying: "The performance was carried out in proper style, and the monkeys and dogs were very well looked after, and were very fond of their trainer." However the Chairman of the Bench said they felt that there had been a certain amount of cruelty involved and imposed a fine of 20 shillings.
But they exonerated the theatre and Ernest Blease from any criticism, adding that the confectioner had, in their opinion, "reported the affair simply out of a feeling of humanity". The outspoken solicitor challenged their view saying Blease had been the only person out of thousands who had objected and he knowing the man thought it a proper comment for him to have made.
And finally, the Liverpool Echo published this week a short – but what would prove to be a seminal article – on a bright idea that an MP had had with regard to telephones:
"An important suggestion for telephone call boxes at practically every corner was made by Mr. Richardson, a member of the new Parliamentary Committee appointed to inquire into the working of the telephones. “I will make this suggestion for the consideration of the telephone department,” said Mr. Richardson: “Call boxes as plentiful as pillar boxes, at a reasonable charge. Those people who want frequently to use the telephone, but cannot afford an installation in their homes would be such free [regular] users of them that the department would get a substantial revenue.” Sir Evelyn Murray [secretary to the Post Office] replied that the idea was new, and promised that it would be considered."
It certainly was as the first public telephone boxes were installed later in the year. There were such things as public call office telephones available in places like the main post office in Church Street in St Helens. But these were very few and far between and dependent upon the office being open. And so Richardson's idea appears to have been the genesis of telephone kiosks, although the familiar red design in cast iron – as opposed to its original concrete – would not be introduced until 1926.
Next week's stories will include the two perished women that chose the wrong house in Dentons Green to seek shelter, the happy end to the French polisher's separated family and the violent row in Atherton Street that led to summonses flying all over the place!
This week's stories include the harsh sentences handed out to two gay men for committing gross indecency, the approval theft of a blouse by a new St Helens bride, a knock out blow in Robins Lane and a charge of cruelly terrifying a performing monkey at the Hippodrome.
We begin on the 12th when the two men who last month had appeared in court charged with committing gross indecency in St Helens Market late on a Saturday night faced the music at Liverpool Assizes.
The police had found Norman Astles from Appleton and Samuel Pigott of Prescot Road in St Helens in what one officer described as an "extraordinary position" and immediately arrested them.
Pigott ran away and violently assaulted Constable Tinsley after being apprehended.
The judge at the assizes was Rigby Swift who knew St Helens well. He had not only been brought up in the town but had served as its MP between 1910 and 1918.
Despite being caught in the act both men denied the offence but offered weak defences.
Norman Astles said he had been going home when the other man spoke to him.
The 26-year-old claimed that they were simply standing together talking when the police suddenly appeared and in the struggle to get away his clothing became disarranged.
Samuel Pigott, for his part, said he had been arrested scores of times for other offences and had bolted because he feared the police might accuse him of planning to break into the market.
So both men were, as expected, found guilty. Judge Swift was informed that Pigott had only come out of prison on January 4th and Astles when in the army had been a female impersonator performing concerts for the troops.
Sentences for consensual homosexual acts were severe with disgust probably playing a big role in the length of the sentence.
Pigott received a 15-month sentence and Astles 12-months – both terms to be served with hard labour.
I expect that the offences had been committed in some dark corner of the market place after the stalls had closed for the evening and only technically within a public place.
Mind you it did not seem to matter much whether such acts took place in private or in public.
In May 1939 Norman Astles was found guilty of committing (consensual) indecency offences in a private home in Widnes with two other men from Clock Face.
For these offences the 44-year-old was given a five-year prison term.
In 1916 Sutton's champion boxer Ernie Proudlove from Herbert Street told the St Helens Newspaper that he had fought 80 bouts, won 60 and never been knocked out.
His brother from Reginald Road knew how to fight too.
William Proudlove acted as Ernie's trainer and sparring partner but was taken to court on the 13th after using his boxing skills on the street.
Colliery worker Leslie Wheeler wanted £15 damages from Proudlove after being knocked unconscious in Robins Lane.
Proudlove told St Helens County Court that he had struck the man because earlier that evening, Wheeler had insulted him and the two young ladies he was with in Church Street – one of whom he had since married.
This Wheeler denied but claimed he'd lost a week's wages while off work.
The judge in the East Street court (pictured above) felt £15 was excessive but awarded him £6 and court costs.
James Sexton, the MP for St Helens from 1918 to 1931, was renowned for his sharp wit.
On April 14th The Times described how in the House of Commons a member had asked the Minister of Health about the number of recorded cases in England and Wales from so-called sleeping sickness.
The answer was 495 deaths during the past twelve months. To that Sexton said:
"Is the Minister of Health's Department itself quite free from this disease?" The paper wrote: "No answer was returned."
The same edition of The Times reported that the national coal strike – that was now starting its third week – had come at a highly inopportune time.
Newly released unemployment figures in Lancashire and Cheshire for March had shown signs of recovery.
Since the miners had refused to accept a pay cut and been locked out of their pits, the industrial situation was described by the Ministry of Labour in Manchester as one of "extreme depression".
Coal strikes had knock-on effects and Pilkingtons was reported as having served its workers with provisional notices to terminate their present employment contracts.
The Times believed that was so the St Helens glass giant could re-hire workers on a day-to-day basis as needed.
Obtaining items on approval and then paying for them later is another type of shopping that has pretty much died out these days.
Whether shopping in store or online, the seller now want the money first before letting you have the goods.
As many will remember, obtaining goods on approval used to be very common but what might be deemed "approval theft" also occurred from time to time.
That was a somewhat brainless crime as the police usually had little difficulty in identifying the thief.
That was the case on the 15th when the magistrates in St Helens Police Court heard how Margaret Ambrose from Oxford Street had got wed in a stolen blouse – or more precisely one obtained by false pretences.
Up until a few months earlier Margaret had worked as a barmaid for a Mrs Mitchell at the Ring o’Bells in Westfield Street and had frequently been sent out shopping for the pub.
Some time after leaving her job and a few days before getting married, Margaret obtained three blouses on approval from a shop owned by a Miss Callon, claiming that they were for Mrs Mitchell.
Two were returned but when Miss Callon sent the bill for £3 5s to the Ring o’Bells for the other blouse, Mrs Mitchell said she knew nothing of it.
The police soon identified Margaret as the culprit and she told them that she did not know what had made her do it.
Her solicitor asked the Bench to dismiss the case because Margaret came from a very respectable family and she would pay the cost of the blouse.
That wasn't exactly what they did but it came close. The young woman was ordered to simply pay the price of the blouse and 20 shillings costs.
On the 18th in St Helens Police Court, the RSPCA brought the unusual charge of "cruelly terrifying a performing monkey" against animal trainer Frank Felix.
Ernest Blease had initiated the charge after being in the audience at the Hippodrome one evening and seeing the act.
The magistrates were told that a very small monkey had been forced to jump 18ft between two swinging trapezes.
Three times the monkey attempted the leap but three times it failed and dropped on to the stage instead.
Mr Blease said the animal looked badly stunned and so he reported the matter to the RSPCA.
Five or six witnesses corroborated his claim that the monkey had fallen heavily and they said they believed the monkey was terrified.
Jeremiah Haslam Fox was the defending solicitor who always pulled no punches in court.
Ernest Blease was a confectioner in Duke Street and Fox accused him of reporting the matter simply for the sake of publicity.
He said his "desire for self-advertisement" was designed to benefit Blease's business and attempts to get on the Town Council.
"He was a great advertiser, and had come forward simply with a view to publicity", Fox claimed.
The stage manager of the Hippodrome denied any cruelty, saying: "The performance was carried out in proper style, and the monkeys and dogs were very well looked after, and were very fond of their trainer."
However the Chairman of the Bench said they felt that there had been a certain amount of cruelty involved and imposed a fine of 20 shillings.
But they exonerated the theatre and Ernest Blease from any criticism, adding that the confectioner had, in their opinion, "reported the affair simply out of a feeling of humanity".
The outspoken solicitor challenged their view saying Blease had been the only person out of thousands who had objected and he knowing the man thought it a proper comment for him to have made.
And finally, the Liverpool Echo published this week a short – but what would prove to be a seminal article – on a bright idea that an MP had had with regard to telephones:
"An important suggestion for telephone call boxes at practically every corner was made by Mr. Richardson, a member of the new Parliamentary Committee appointed to inquire into the working of the telephones.
"“I will make this suggestion for the consideration of the telephone department,” said Mr. Richardson:
"“Call boxes as plentiful as pillar boxes, at a reasonable charge. Those people who want frequently to use the telephone, but cannot afford an installation in their homes would be such free [regular] users of them that the department would get a substantial revenue.”
"Sir Evelyn Murray [secretary to the Post Office] replied that the idea was new, and promised that it would be considered."
It certainly was as the first public telephone boxes were installed later in the year.
There were such things as public call office telephones available in places like the main post office in Church Street in St Helens.
But these were very few and far between and dependent upon the office being open.
And so Richardson's idea appears to have been the genesis of telephone kiosks, although the familiar red design in cast iron – as opposed to its original concrete – would not be introduced until 1926.
Next week's stories will include the two perished women that chose the wrong house in Dentons Green to seek shelter, the happy end to the French polisher's separated family and the violent row in Atherton Street that led to summonses flying all over the place!
We begin on the 12th when the two men who last month had appeared in court charged with committing gross indecency in St Helens Market late on a Saturday night faced the music at Liverpool Assizes.
The police had found Norman Astles from Appleton and Samuel Pigott of Prescot Road in St Helens in what one officer described as an "extraordinary position" and immediately arrested them.
Pigott ran away and violently assaulted Constable Tinsley after being apprehended.
The judge at the assizes was Rigby Swift who knew St Helens well. He had not only been brought up in the town but had served as its MP between 1910 and 1918.
Despite being caught in the act both men denied the offence but offered weak defences.
Norman Astles said he had been going home when the other man spoke to him.
The 26-year-old claimed that they were simply standing together talking when the police suddenly appeared and in the struggle to get away his clothing became disarranged.
Samuel Pigott, for his part, said he had been arrested scores of times for other offences and had bolted because he feared the police might accuse him of planning to break into the market.
So both men were, as expected, found guilty. Judge Swift was informed that Pigott had only come out of prison on January 4th and Astles when in the army had been a female impersonator performing concerts for the troops.
Sentences for consensual homosexual acts were severe with disgust probably playing a big role in the length of the sentence.
Pigott received a 15-month sentence and Astles 12-months – both terms to be served with hard labour.
I expect that the offences had been committed in some dark corner of the market place after the stalls had closed for the evening and only technically within a public place.
Mind you it did not seem to matter much whether such acts took place in private or in public.
In May 1939 Norman Astles was found guilty of committing (consensual) indecency offences in a private home in Widnes with two other men from Clock Face.
For these offences the 44-year-old was given a five-year prison term.
In 1916 Sutton's champion boxer Ernie Proudlove from Herbert Street told the St Helens Newspaper that he had fought 80 bouts, won 60 and never been knocked out.
His brother from Reginald Road knew how to fight too.
William Proudlove acted as Ernie's trainer and sparring partner but was taken to court on the 13th after using his boxing skills on the street.
Colliery worker Leslie Wheeler wanted £15 damages from Proudlove after being knocked unconscious in Robins Lane.
Proudlove told St Helens County Court that he had struck the man because earlier that evening, Wheeler had insulted him and the two young ladies he was with in Church Street – one of whom he had since married.
This Wheeler denied but claimed he'd lost a week's wages while off work.
James Sexton, the MP for St Helens from 1918 to 1931, was renowned for his sharp wit.
On April 14th The Times described how in the House of Commons a member had asked the Minister of Health about the number of recorded cases in England and Wales from so-called sleeping sickness.
The answer was 495 deaths during the past twelve months. To that Sexton said:
"Is the Minister of Health's Department itself quite free from this disease?" The paper wrote: "No answer was returned."
The same edition of The Times reported that the national coal strike – that was now starting its third week – had come at a highly inopportune time.
Newly released unemployment figures in Lancashire and Cheshire for March had shown signs of recovery.
Since the miners had refused to accept a pay cut and been locked out of their pits, the industrial situation was described by the Ministry of Labour in Manchester as one of "extreme depression".
Coal strikes had knock-on effects and Pilkingtons was reported as having served its workers with provisional notices to terminate their present employment contracts.
The Times believed that was so the St Helens glass giant could re-hire workers on a day-to-day basis as needed.
Obtaining items on approval and then paying for them later is another type of shopping that has pretty much died out these days.
Whether shopping in store or online, the seller now want the money first before letting you have the goods.
As many will remember, obtaining goods on approval used to be very common but what might be deemed "approval theft" also occurred from time to time.
That was a somewhat brainless crime as the police usually had little difficulty in identifying the thief.
That was the case on the 15th when the magistrates in St Helens Police Court heard how Margaret Ambrose from Oxford Street had got wed in a stolen blouse – or more precisely one obtained by false pretences.
Up until a few months earlier Margaret had worked as a barmaid for a Mrs Mitchell at the Ring o’Bells in Westfield Street and had frequently been sent out shopping for the pub.
Some time after leaving her job and a few days before getting married, Margaret obtained three blouses on approval from a shop owned by a Miss Callon, claiming that they were for Mrs Mitchell.
Two were returned but when Miss Callon sent the bill for £3 5s to the Ring o’Bells for the other blouse, Mrs Mitchell said she knew nothing of it.
The police soon identified Margaret as the culprit and she told them that she did not know what had made her do it.
Her solicitor asked the Bench to dismiss the case because Margaret came from a very respectable family and she would pay the cost of the blouse.
That wasn't exactly what they did but it came close. The young woman was ordered to simply pay the price of the blouse and 20 shillings costs.
On the 18th in St Helens Police Court, the RSPCA brought the unusual charge of "cruelly terrifying a performing monkey" against animal trainer Frank Felix.
Ernest Blease had initiated the charge after being in the audience at the Hippodrome one evening and seeing the act.
The magistrates were told that a very small monkey had been forced to jump 18ft between two swinging trapezes.
Three times the monkey attempted the leap but three times it failed and dropped on to the stage instead.
Mr Blease said the animal looked badly stunned and so he reported the matter to the RSPCA.
Five or six witnesses corroborated his claim that the monkey had fallen heavily and they said they believed the monkey was terrified.
Jeremiah Haslam Fox was the defending solicitor who always pulled no punches in court.
Ernest Blease was a confectioner in Duke Street and Fox accused him of reporting the matter simply for the sake of publicity.
He said his "desire for self-advertisement" was designed to benefit Blease's business and attempts to get on the Town Council.
"He was a great advertiser, and had come forward simply with a view to publicity", Fox claimed.
The stage manager of the Hippodrome denied any cruelty, saying: "The performance was carried out in proper style, and the monkeys and dogs were very well looked after, and were very fond of their trainer."
However the Chairman of the Bench said they felt that there had been a certain amount of cruelty involved and imposed a fine of 20 shillings.
But they exonerated the theatre and Ernest Blease from any criticism, adding that the confectioner had, in their opinion, "reported the affair simply out of a feeling of humanity".
The outspoken solicitor challenged their view saying Blease had been the only person out of thousands who had objected and he knowing the man thought it a proper comment for him to have made.
And finally, the Liverpool Echo published this week a short – but what would prove to be a seminal article – on a bright idea that an MP had had with regard to telephones:
"An important suggestion for telephone call boxes at practically every corner was made by Mr. Richardson, a member of the new Parliamentary Committee appointed to inquire into the working of the telephones.
"“I will make this suggestion for the consideration of the telephone department,” said Mr. Richardson:
"“Call boxes as plentiful as pillar boxes, at a reasonable charge. Those people who want frequently to use the telephone, but cannot afford an installation in their homes would be such free [regular] users of them that the department would get a substantial revenue.”
"Sir Evelyn Murray [secretary to the Post Office] replied that the idea was new, and promised that it would be considered."
It certainly was as the first public telephone boxes were installed later in the year.
There were such things as public call office telephones available in places like the main post office in Church Street in St Helens.
But these were very few and far between and dependent upon the office being open.
And so Richardson's idea appears to have been the genesis of telephone kiosks, although the familiar red design in cast iron – as opposed to its original concrete – would not be introduced until 1926.
Next week's stories will include the two perished women that chose the wrong house in Dentons Green to seek shelter, the happy end to the French polisher's separated family and the violent row in Atherton Street that led to summonses flying all over the place!