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The Showman's Parson: Tales from the Memoirs of the Rev Thomas Horne

Tony Lidington

David Blount

Thomas Horne

The Showman's Parson: Tales from the Memoirs of the Rev Thomas Horne: Episode 1: The Dwarf's Stratagem

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Episode 1

Episode 1: The Dwarf's Stratagem

The Dwarf's Stratagem

BBC Radio 4 - The Showman's Parson: Tales from the Memoirs of the Rev Thomas Horne, The Dwarf's StratagemSearch BBC

Tony Lidington tells a tale of bravery set in a 19th-century waxwork show.

The Rev Thomas Horne tells how a burglary is foiled by the cunning and bravery of a dwarf employed in a Victorian waxwork show.

Thomas Horne was born in 1849 in a caravan at Nottingham Goose Fair. He spent the first part of his life as a working showman - dressing up as a performing bear, running a Penny Bazaar around the Lancashire Wakes, working as a doorman in Mrs Williams' Waxwork, and finally becoming an actor in a Mumming Booth and a partner in an Illusion Show. Latterly, he joined a missionary brotherhood in Oxford, and was ordained as a priest in Leeds in 1885.

Until his death in 1918, Thomas Horne was a vigorous campaigner for the rights of travelling people. With his education, training as a priest, and family association with the fairground, he was their ideal representative. He travelled throughout the country, preaching to showfolk and, in one year alone, he travelled over 12,000 miles, visiting fairs as far apart as Penzance in Cornwall to Ayr in Scotland.

The stories in this series are taken from his memoirs held in the National Fairground Archive in Sheffield.

Today's story concerns the exploits of a cunning dwarf, Peter Piper, who is in charge of an amazing mechanical waxwork exhibition visiting Cardiff. 

Read by Tony Lidington

Producer David Blount
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4.

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Series of stories about fairground sideshow life in the 19th century

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