Misadventure and A Cow on the Head

The following newspaper cuttings come from The Hull Advertiser from the 30th April 1852. 

They relate to two unfortunate fatal events in the Hull Docks. 

The first column could be from the current day as it involves the perennial attraction to youths of wastelands and industrial land and buildings for mischief and entertainment. 

I had to look up the meaning of "deals" which are planks of softwood timber such as Norway Spruce, Scots Pine or Fir and with the word originating in the 12th Century. Hull Docks were in 1852, as today a major point of import for timber from the Baltic States. 

FATAL ACCIDENT- week after week the Hull Police Court is almost overrun with cases in which boys are charged with playing on the dockside quays and under the dock shed, whereby property in not only much damaged but the lads' lives are frequently endangered. The Magistrates have taken much pains to suppress it by warning the parents of the danger of allowing their children to range about the quays but it seems all to no purpose. A fatal instance of the necessity of parents keeping their children at home occurred on Wednesday evening last to a boy, five years of age, named William Atkinson. It appeared that the deceased and several other boys were amusing themselves by jumping on some deals which has just been delivered from the steam-ship Courier from Gothenburg and which were laid on the Humber Dockside, rather unsafely piled when the deals fell and crushed the deceased to death. An Inquest was held over the body yesterday before John Thorney ESq Coroner when the jury returned a Verdict of "Accidental Death"

The second column is just tragic , a clear indication of someone just being in the wrong place at the wrong time and victim to a wholly freakish series of interconnected events. 

That someone was one of the 2.2 million souls who landed in Hull in the 19th and early 20th Centuries escaping persecution, poverty and deprivation en-route from Europe to North America and all-points West. 

It is perhaps an indication of the sheer volume of those migrating and their anonymity, either intentionally or not, that the individual is not actually named in the Newspaper Report. 

On Sunday morning last, as a bullock was being hoisted upon deck out of the hold of the steam ship Seagull some of the tackling gave way and the animal fell upon a German emigrant who was between decks at the time, The poor fellow's chest was severely injured and he was taken to the Infirmary where he lingered until Wednesday night before he died. An inquest was held over the body yesterday (John Thorney Esq Coroner) and a verdict of Accidental Death was given.

I will try at some time to find out this information out of respect and commemoration for the unfortunate German who may have been travelling with his family, dependants or friends.