A Nautical-lingo
Bonaparte Broadside Blast
at Napoleon’s
projected invasion of England.
| Downes. Printer. Yarmouth. |
The illustrations are from Collectanea Napoleonica, 1905.
Showing posts with label Broadsides. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Broadsides. Show all posts
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Nancy Dawson
On 18 April 1823 the company of the Baltimore Circus put on a benefit for Mr. Lawson, Riding Master, “With a magnificent display of beautiful horses; to conclude with an Arabian horse dancing to the tune of Nancy Dawson.” In the 1840’s “Nancy Dawson” was one of the favorite names for yachts and race horses, almost as popular as “Dolly Varden” and “Becky Sharp.”
Nancy Dawson was a real personality; she was a celebrated horn-pipe dancer at Covent Garden Theatre in the 18th Century. According to Timms in The Romance of London, Nancy Dawson “set up the skittles” at a tavern in High Street, Marleybone, then married a publican from the Scottish borders. She then took up dancing and her appearance as a dancer in The Beggar’s Opera in 1759 was so popular that her fame spread all over London.
“Nancy died at Hampstead 27th of May 1767; and was buried behind the Foundling Hospital, in the ground belonging to St. George the Martyr, where is a tombstone to her memory, simply inscribed, “Here lies Nancy Dawson.”” [Timbs]
E. M. Sanchez-Saavedra, who supplied the ballad-broadside, says that judging “by the typography, the ballad sheet is British, of the 1800-1810 period.” This example is what is known as a “White letter” ballad in Roman type. The “Black-letter” ballad was common in the 16th and 17th centuries and feature headlines in Gothic type.
Catnatch and his successors, who were active after 1813, carried the names and addresses of the publishers at the bottom of the broadsides. J. Stevens Cox, F.S.A. issued a facsimile pamphlet called Broadside Ballads of the 18th and Early 19th Centuries in 1976. J. Pitts was at 14, Great St. Andrew Street, Seven Dials. Others were J. Jennings, 13 & 15, Water-lane, Fleet Street; T. Batchelar, Little Cheapside, Moorfields, London; T. Evans (Evans Printer), Long-lane, London, and J. Jennings, 13, Water-lane, London. Many of the sheets indicated no publishers.
One Dictionary of Slang issued in 1890 notes that “Nancy Dawson” was “a name for a molly, an effeminate youth, apathetic &c.” A variant was “Miss Nancy” and another ballad went:
I’ll tell you of a fellow who’s a very heavy swell,
Who fancies he’s the idol of each fashionable belle,
And they call him Nancy Dawson,
And isn’t he a caution!
Oh, Mr. Nancy Dawson, what a tricky man you are!
Oh, Nancy Dawson, can’t you do the la-di-dar?
The tune of “Nancy Dawson” was apparently that of “Here we go ‘round the Mulberry Bush.” All together now --
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Gallows Literature
“Gallows Literature,” common in England and the United States from about 1730 to the eighteen-eighties, consisted of biographies, “last speeches,” and “dying verses”. They could be found in any country with a printing press, Spain, France, Germany or Russia. When a celebrated burglar or murderer was scheduled to be publicly “turned off,” enterprising street publishers issued “whole-sheet” broadsides, in one or two columns of wretched, aging type, with a woodcut at top, to be sold in shops and hawked at the foot of the gallows.
In Regency England, the two major publishers were Jemmy Catnatch and “Old Mother Pitts,” derided by her rival as “a former bumboat woman.” James Catnatch’s business was founded in 1813, and, in the hands of his successor, lasted until 1883 when the famous Seven Dials establishment was torn down. Its tempting to speculate on what happened to Catnatch's type and woodcut stock, containing “many designed and cut by Thomas Bewick.”
This late example, a Charles Peace broadside, from the collection of Stewart Evans, was published by George Slater, Snighill, sometime before Peace was executed on 25 February 1879. The last public hanging in England was in 1868 so instead of sales under the gallows broadsides seem to have been sold at newsagents. The only reference to a British publisher named Slater I found was from 1849, One George Slater was publisher of Slater's Shilling Series from 252, Strand.
The bill-sticker cartoon from Punch, below, was published when Jack the Ripper was still active. It seems a little unfair to the bill-stickers, who were probably not paid much by the publishers.
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