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| The incident as depicted in The Police Illustrated News. |
In the past it was common practice for the animals of travelling
circuses to be lodged at local inns if the stables were large enough
to accommodate them. In April 1872, Bostock and Wombwell’s circus was at Hanley
for the Wakes and on the morning of Saturday 13th, a small group of children
were feeding bread and nuts to one of the circus elephants in a
passage leading to the Angel Inn. Its keeper, Thomas Hurley, was
standing a few yards from the young female elephant, waiting for the key to the stable. He had driven the
children away several times but they kept coming back and now while
Hurley was distracted, one of the children, George Stanton, decided
rather unwisely to play a prank on the elephant by feeding her a
stone. Immediately and without warning, the elephant - normally a very gentle creature - went mad and
lifting the boy in her trunk she crushed him against a wall with her
head and tusks. Mr Hurley turned on hearing the screams from the
children and shouted out, at which the elephant dropped the boy and
he was carried away. George Stanton suffered wounds to his head and
back and had been badly squeezed by the elephant. He died from his
injuries on Sunday evening.
Reference: Staffordshire Bugle, February 1993