150 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (3rd - 9th MAY 1871)
This week's stories include the disastrous fire at St Helens Town Hall, the inquiry into abuses in the Prescot watchmaking industry releases a critical report, two men are accused of raping women in Parr, the Bold Heath race between a bicycle and two pedestrians, the attendants at Rainhill Asylum that had to play a musical instrument and the Earlestown row in a butcher's shop over a sheep's head with no brains.