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Poetry
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Suffer Little Children
By Talisker
10 May 2007
In memory of the Victoria Hall Disaster (or stampede), Sunderland, 16th June 1883 - when 183 innocent children were crushed to death at a magic show.

Disaster struck when Magician (Mr. Fay) cast small "presents" into the crowded stalls.


Oli

They came three thousand strong.

Funnelled along Toward Road,

teeming on Murton Street

The great Victoria Hall,

a giant catchers mitt

trapped and gathered

the innocents.


A penny was the fee

to see the miracle monger.

Smoke and mirrors,

a cloak of invisibility,

the spectre of death.

For Satan sat alone,

up in the The Gods,

devouring the scene,

totting up.


Trinkets cast like ground bait -

A tin whistle, a peg doll, a dice,

upon the boiling, seething mass

of desperate childhood.

A commotion, a rush from the circle,

stampede, doors unyielding,

the dull crack of bone - yet soft,

hiss of lungs squeezed,

like tiny accordions -

but no music.


They laid the pale and broken

in anguished, horizontal ranks.

Broken mothers, ruined fathers

tallied up their hurt.

But one heart in each breast

to break.


Suffer little children.

Needlessly.


Oli 10/05/07

Reviews

Written by Fledermaus (3448 comments posted) 10th May 2007
Shocking piece of history. sadly enough such things sometimes still happen where many people gather... Pop-concerts, football matches, religios gatherings... But 183... I wonder what this must have done to the magician's conscience. Did he ever perform again?

Written by Phil (6838 comments posted) 10th May 2007
Never heard of this before Oli. Funny how things like that fade pretty quickly in the historical memory. I suppose it's still remembered well enough in the North East of England. 
 
'Liked' this. For all its comment this had a cold journalistic feel for me that worked well. I like the last two lines very much - for all sorts of reasons. At first i felt they didn't fit the tone of the piece so well, but on second reading I changed my mind. 
 
Phil. 
Suffer Little Children
Written by Josie (2825 comments posted) 11th May 2007
Of course, the word "Suffer" in"Suffer Little Children" means "permit" - not suffer as we know it today. Jesus was saying "Suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not" meaning permit them to come - because people were holding them back. But no-one thinks you mean that children should be permitted to have such a dreadful thing happen to them. 
 
Thanks Oli for bringing this story forward. I hadn't heard of it, but have read it now. You have told the story well in your poem, and, of course, it must have been unimaginable - even more unimaginable that someone should have put an iron bolt on a door to keep back thousands of children coming downstairs at speed. How ever that person lived with the memory of what he did is bayond me. Well done.

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