the words weren’t mine

Contemporary accounts of Andrew Whiston (or sometimes Whitson or even Weston) described him as a ‘miserable’ or ‘wretched -looking object’, as ‘little, diminutive, and deformed’, and as a ‘remarkable production of the human species’. Just two feet four inches tall and known as the King of the Beggars, he was born in Dundee in 1770 but spent most of his adult life in London where he wheeled himself around in a handmade cart between his home in Southwark and his prime begging spots north of the river in the Adelphi. His unusual appearance and irascible disposition earned him a degree of fame in Regency London; Pierce Egan featured him as one of the picturesque cadgers in ‘Life in London’ and his exploits frequently made the newspapers. On 29 December 1825 the Public Ledger and Daily Advertiser reported that the magistrates at Union Hall had listened to the evidence against a ‘respectably attired young man, named Stokes’. The young man was accused of being one of a gang of raucous and high-spirited young men who had ‘exceedingly ill-treated’ the dwarf by burying him beneath a pile of mud. Stokes was acquitted after he explained he had tried to come to the rescue of the dwarf but had been interrupted by a patrol of Bow Street runners who immediately assumed he was the guilty party and, after exchanging a few words with him, “struck him on the eye”; the newspaper admitted that “the defendant bore visible marks of having received a severe blow”. When Andrew was placed on a chair to give his evidence, he admitted that he could not say whether the defendant had assaulted him or not. read more

IMAGE: Ken Domon