Grisly Gawler – Part II – Fatal Tiger Attack

Grisly Gawler – Part II

FATAL TIGER ATTACK

On the 17th of June 1898, the Bunyip Newspaper in Gawler, South Australia reported a “sensational incident” that occurred at a circus event held in Gawler South, by travelling Circus “Harmston”.
The newspaper reported that on Saturday the 11th of June, the Harmston Circus had put on a great show, but at its closing act “Gomez” the Tiger trainer, otherwise known by his real name, John Issac, entered the tiger cage to put the Tigers through the finale escapes of the Circus event.
As Gomez finished the act and turned his back on the tiger to leave, it pounced on the South African trainer, and sunk its teeth into his neck just under the back of his head. The tiger carried Gomez over the division of the gate, possibly with the intention of pulling its prey to pieces and feasting on his meat.
The crowd, not knowing if this was part of the act or not, reacted slowly to the Tigers act, but soon blood was spotted by the crowd, and they realised this was not part of the act.
Fear and confusion reigned, and the crows ran for the exits, some jumping over the wall surrounding the seating to make a hastier escape. Whilst this was happening, a group of circus attendants began to beat the tiger with sticks to try and free Gomez, who was still caught within the animals jaws.
The attendants beat the tiger off and Gomez stood and walked out the door, but was soon overcome by his extensive injuries, and collapsed. He was immediately taken to Dr Dawes surgery where the good Doctor did all he could to stop the bleeding and ease the man’s pain.
On Monday. Gomez had recovered enough to be taken to the Adelaide Hospital, but by Tuesday his condition worsened, and at 5pm on Tuesday the 14th of June 1898 he passed away.

Mr Love, the sole lessee of the show, offered his condolences for Gomez, and talked of him being a man of excellent character and kindness.
However, when questioned upon the safety aspect of how the Tiger act was run, he lay much of the blame on the head of the young, now dead, Tiger Trainer.
He stated that Gomez had not taken the necessary precautions which had been put in place by the circus, and had gone into the cage with only a small whip, which only antagonised the Tiger. Staff outside had metal forks and a pistol if anything occurred, and they had seen to the Tiger being beaten off the trainer.
Love pointed out one thing, that above all other things took the blame away from himself and the Circus, Gomez had not lit the fire which sat above the gate – in his words “an unprecedented act”. He stated “ the animal was cunning enough to see that it had the advantage. The brute was well used to Isaac’s attentions, for he had been its regular warder for the past twenty months, and had performed with it as many as nine times a week”

An inquest was opened into the death of John “Gomez” Issacs, and it was noted by Dr Morris of Adelaide Hospital, that he entered the hospital on the Monday in a very fearful state, and also in a severe state of shock, his injuries included a two inch puncture wound on the left side with two smaller punctures also on that side, and two puncture wounds on the right side of his neck. He had lost all movement in his left arm. The wounds had already become inflamed, which the Doctor stated, was akin to being poisoned and his breathing was considerably affected by the strain.
A post-mortem examination was done and it was found one of the wounds had penetrated his spine, breaking the vertebrates, and the base of his spine was inflamed as well as the membranes of his spinal cord.

The Tiger:

“Duke” was the Tiger’s name, an 8 year old native of Japan, who was sired by “Bromo” and “Kitty”, two tigers that had found a home with the Mikado.
Duke was a twin, his brother remained with the Mikado in Japan and became an attraction at the Royal Gardens at Uno Park Tokyo.
Duke was five years old when he was trained to appear in public, and in his three years as a circus Tiger, he had had five trainers. His first a Mexican, second a Chinaman and his third an Australia. The second and third men were both mauled by two jungle tigers, and were subsequently replaced.
The fourth trainer, a Singapore native, was re
cently training Duke, when the Tiger attacked and broke his jaw, through a “sever crushing”. Gomez, the fifth trainer, had only just stepped into the job, and believe it or not, the previous trainer from Singapore, was one of the first to rush into the cage to try and save Gomez from Duke!

Duke was not euthanised, he continued on with the Circus…and another trainer…

Grisly Gawler – Part II – Fatal Tiger Attack

On the 17th of June 1898, the Bunyip Newspaper in Gawler, South Australia reported a “sensational incident” that occurred at a circus event held in Gawler South, by travelling Circus “Harmston”.

The newspaper reported that on Saturday the 11th of June, the Harmston Circus had put on a great show, but at its closing act “Gomez” ( John Issac) the Tiger trainer, entered the tiger cage to put the Tigers through the finale escapades of the Circus event.

As Gomez finished the act and turned his back on the tiger to leave, it pounced on the South African trainer, and sunk its teeth into his neck just under the back of his head.
 The tiger carried Gomez over the division of the gate, possibly with the intention of pulling its prey to pieces and feasting on his meat.
The crowd, not knowing if this was part of the act or not, reacted slowly to the Tigers mauling, but soon blood was spotted by the crowd, they realised this was not part of the act.
Fear and confusion reigned, and the crows ran for the exits, some jumping over the wall surrounding the seating to make a hastier escape. Whilst this was happening, a group of circus attendants began to beat the tiger with sticks to try and free Gomez, who was still caught within the animal’s jaws.

The attendants beat the tiger relentlessly to distract it to drop Gomez. The tiger gave in, dropping its prey on the ground and retreating from its attackers. Gomez, bleeding profusely, stood and walked out the door, but was soon overcome by his extensive injuries, and collapsed. He was immediately taken to Dr Dawes surgery where the good Doctor did all he could to stop the bleeding and ease the man’s pain.
On Monday. Gomez had recovered enough to be taken to the Adelaide Hospital, but by Tuesday his condition worsened, and at 5pm on Tuesday the 14th of June 1898 he passed away.

Mr Love, the sole lessee of the show, offered his condolences for Gomez and talked of him being a man of excellent character and kindness.
However, when questioned upon the safety aspect of how the tiger act was run, he lay much of the blame on the head of the young, now dead, tiger trainer.
He stated that Gomez had not taken the necessary precautions which had been put in place by the circus, and had gone into the cage with only a small whip, which only antagonised the tiger. Staff outside had metal forks and a pistol if anything bad occurred, and they had seen to the tiger being beaten away from the trainer.

 Mr Love pointed out one thing, that above all other things took the blame away from himself and the Circus, Gomez had not lit the fire which sat above the gate – in his words “an unprecedented act”. He stated “ the animal was cunning enough to see that it had the advantage. The brute was well used to Isaac’s attention, for he had been its regular warder for the past twenty months, and had performed with it as many as nine times a week”

An inquest was opened into the death of John “Gomez” Issacs, and it was noted by Dr Morris of Adelaide Hospital, that he entered the hospital on the Monday in a very fearful state, and also in a severe state of shock.
 His injuries included a two-inch puncture wound on the left side of his neck, with two smaller punctures also on that side. He also had two puncture wounds on the right side of his neck. He had lost all movement in his left arm. The wounds had already become inflamed, which the Doctor stated, was akin to being poisoned and his breathing was considerably affected by the strain.
A post-mortem examination was concluded. It found one of the wounds had penetrated his spine, breaking the vertebrates, and the base of his spine was inflamed as well as the membranes of his spinal cord.

The Tiger:

“Duke” was the tiger’s name, an 8-year-old native of Japan, who was sired by “Bromo” and “Kitty”, two tigers that had found a home with the Mikado.
Duke was a twin, his brother remained with the Mikado in Japan and became an attraction at the Royal Gardens at Uno Park Tokyo.
Duke was five years old when he was trained to appear in public, and in his three years as a circus Tiger, he had had five trainers. His first a Mexican, second a Chinaman and his third an Australia. The second and third men were both mauled by two jungle tigers, and were subsequently replaced.
The fourth trainer, a Singapore native, was recently training Duke, when the Tiger attacked and broke his jaw, through a “sever crushing”. Gomez, the fifth trainer, had only just stepped into the job, and believe it or not, the previous trainer from Singapore, was one of the first to rush into the cage to try and save Gomez from Duke!


Duke was not euthanised, he continued on with the Circus…and another trainer…

Researched and written by Allen Tiller ©2014

The Bunyip: The Ghosts of Gawler Part Four

The Bunyip

The Ghosts of Gawler Part Four

“The Bunyip” newspaper began its existence in 1863 as a monthly pamphlet published in collaboration with  “The Humbug Society”. Editor Dr George Nott and Printer, William Barnet teamed together to create what was to become South Australia’s longest running family owned newspaper.

When the paper began it was a satirical look on life around Gawler, but later, it was to become a weekly “orthodox” styled newspaper, still with a strong community focus, but expanding into further suburbs and country areas surrounding Gawler.

 The Bunyip Newspaper, in its early life, was situated in a shop near the Baptist Church in Murray Street, Gawler, later it moved further along the street to be situated near the Prince Albert Hotel, but after those premises were destroyed by a fire, it was relocated to its present location, of which it has remained since 1885
The Bunyip newspaper was sold to the “Taylor Group” of newspapers in 2003 by the Barnet family, ending the families long ownership of this local icon (September 1863 until April 2003).

The haunted staircase

Since the sale, The Bunyip  has seen many changes in formatting, design and presentation, including the adding of colour to its format. The Bunyip continues to be one of Gawler’s most respected icons and sources of news and entertainment, The Bunyip contributes to a great many of the towns events with sponsorship and support and continues to be the best resource for local news and events.
Karen and I were lucky enough to be invited by the newspaper’s General Manager, Margaret, to investigate the Bunyip office and printing area. We had a tour of the location including the cellar, which still contained a lot of the old printing tools from the beginning of the 1900’s. We also found another room adjacent to the basement that had long been sealed off, no doorways were visible into the room from the old hole in the wall through which we looking.

Karen in the Basement

The majority of the phenomena reported to us seemed to be taking place upstairs in the offices. We headed up stairs and started recording a number of EVP’s, with questions tailored to the research we had previously done. We heard a couple of loud knocks during our EVP session, but they did not appear on the audio recordings, in their place however was the low pitch sounds of a dog bark, which no-one in the room with us heard at the time.
The other active area was a downstairs office, where chairs have moved by themselves and the sounds of someone sitting at a desk writing have been heard by numerous witnesses, this was intriguing, but on this occasion we didn’t manage to capture anything on video or audio.
Perhaps the most intriguing is the sound of someone walking up the walking staircase in the centre of the building with no-one present. We ruled out the expansion and settling of the wood and building, and set about conducting a number of experiments to try and recreate the reported sounds, with no success. It would seem the person (or Ghost) that is responsible for the noise has some large heavy boots and really wants to be heard!

© 2013 Allen Tiller

www.eidolonparanormal.com.au

All content on “Eidolon Paranormal & The Haunts of Adelaide” site, blog and corresponding media pages (eg Facebook, twitter etc) is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any means or process without the written permission of the author. © 2012, 2013

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The Bunyip: The Ghosts of Gawler Part Four

The Bunyip

The Ghosts of Gawler Part Four

  The Bunyip Newspaper began its existence in 1863 as a monthly pamphlet published in collaboration with  “The Humbug Society”. Editor Dr George Nott and printer, William Barnet teamed together to create what was to become South Australia’s longest-running family-owned newspaper.

When the paper began, it was a satirical look at life around Gawler. Later, it was to become a weekly “orthodox” newspaper, still with a strong community focus, but expanding into further suburbs and country areas surrounding Gawler.

 The Bunyip Newspaper, in its early life, was situated in a shop near the Baptist Church in Murray Street, Gawler. Later its offices were moved further along Murray Street to be situated near the Prince Albert Hotel. Those premises were destroyed by a fire and ‘The Bunyip’ relocated to its present location, of which it has remained in since 1885.

The Bunyip Newspaper was sold to the “Taylor Group” of newspapers in 2003 by the Barnet family, ending the families long ownership of this local icon (September 1863 until April 2003).

The haunted staircase

Since the sale, The Bunyip has seen many changes in formatting, design and presentation, including the adding of colour to its format. The Bunyip continues to be one of Gawler’s most respected icons and sources of news and entertainment, The Bunyip contributes to a great many of the events of the town, with sponsorship and support and continues to be the best resource for local news and events.

Karen and I were lucky enough to be invited by the newspaper’s General Manager, Margaret, to investigate the Bunyip office and printing area. We had a tour of the location including the cellar, which still contained a lot of the old printing tools from the beginning of the 1900s. We also found another room adjacent to the basement that had long been sealed off, no doorways were visible into the room from the old hole in the wall through which we were looking, so we do not know exactly what the rooms use may have once been.

Karen in the Basement

The majority of the phenomena reported to us seemed to be taking place upstairs in the offices. We headed upstairs and started recorded a number of EVP’s, with questions tailored to the research we had previously undertaken.
 We heard a couple of loud knocks during our EVP session, but they did not appear on the audio recordings, in their place, however, was low pitch sounds of a dog barking, which no-one in the room with us heard at the time.

The other allegedly active area was a downstairs office, where chairs had moved by their own volition and the sounds of someone sitting at a desk writing had been heard by numerous witnesses. This was intriguing, but on this occasion, we didn’t manage to capture anything on video or audio we would deem as paranormal in origin.

Perhaps the most intriguing alleged paranormal phenomena were the sounds of someone walking up and down the staircase in the centre of the building. Witnesses to this phenomena went to inspect who else was inside the building with them only to find the place securely locked down, and no one else inside!
  Through rigorous debunking, we ruled out the expansion and settling of the wood of the staircase and that of the building. We conducted a number of experiments to try and recreate the reported sounds, with no success. It would seem the person (or Ghost) that is responsible for the noise has some large heavy boots and really wants to be heard, but not seen!

© 2013 Allen Tiller

www.eidolonparanormal.com.au