Burglary at Slade Hooton
28th February 1857
BURGLARIES IN THE WEST RIDING - At about 2 o'clock on Thursday morning a daring burglary was committed at the house of Mr. Samuel Hall, of Slade Hooton, a few miles from Doncaster. Four men effected an entrance into the house by breaking through the kitchen window. They proceeded at once to the bedroom of Mr. Hall, who was roughly awakened from his slumbers, and told by the thieves that they wanted his money. He said he had none, upon which which one of the ruffians dealt him a blow on the head with a bludgeon, which laid open his skull and rendered him senseless. They then proceeded to ransack the house, and succeeded in carrying away six £5 notes, £27 in gold, six silver teaspoons, two silver tablespoons, a silver lever watch, a silver plated cup with lid, 2Ib. of tea, 1Ib of tobacco, and a box of cigars, with which they decamped.
Mr. Hall is an elderly man, and would have had no chance of coping with the four thieves even if he had been aroused in time, while his house is situated too far from any other dwelling for any alarm he might have made to reach his neighbours.
On Sunday morning last the lock-up at Conisborough, not far from the scene of the above robbery, was broken into. The keeper, an old man named James Hobson, hearing a noise got up, and on going downstairs received a severe blow on the face from a brass candlestick, which one of the thieves had snatched up, and thus used to avoid detection. It was afterwards discovered that two flitches of bacon, two hams, one chap, and about £2. 10s. in money had been taken away. The thieves had obtained admission into the house by taking out a small window at one end of it.