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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 19m

A very good dog 😂

Spotted today in Clacton

Photo I've just taken in Clacton of the back of a white caravan. It's decorated with two photos of a dog - I don't know what this breed is, like a boxer sort of thing with saggy mouth - and the dog in the photo can also be seen in the back window. A heart sticker says Beryl so I assume Beryl is the dog.

Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

My kid's Clacton nursery has cut hot lunches for toddlers to save money, and sent round leaflets to parents advising us on preparing packed lunches for around 90p per day.

They have no waiting list for places because there's so few jobs here worth doing once you've covered childcare.

Otto English @ottoenglish.bsky.social · 2d

Twelve Jobs Nigel has earned over £1 million in additional income since the general election.

To understand the scale of it, since the July 2024 election he's earned roughly £100k more as a brand ambassador for Direct Bullion than Starmer gets as PM.

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news...

Nigel Farage earns over £1m from 12 'second jobs' - check how much your MP earns

The Reform UK leader's most lucrative second jobs include hosting on GB News, serving as a brand ambassador for Direct Bullion and recording videos for Cameo

www.mirror.co.uk

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 51m

Nigel woke up, looked at all the country and world's many, many, problems, and then decided that today he was going to get angry about... Useful sanitary products in public toilets 😂

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1h

Reading the words God, Nigel Farage, the National Trust, and vegan tampons in one post has absolutely done me in.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 3h

Thank you! Will be on shelves either November 2026 or Spring '27, TBC 🙏🏻

Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 4d

I'm writing this book partly, mostly, for readers who aren't already into boxing 🥊

The Devil's Dance Floor is about pugilists, pressmen, policemen, and Alf Ball's pet puma. Murder, madness, Jem Smith's tight tights. We got wives. Bald bears. A Victorian epidemic of discarded orange peel! Smallpox!

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 4d

Seconds out! Round one!

THE DEVIL'S DANCE FLOOR

This isn't an official announcement from Duckworth. It's a page from my agent's newsletter and book fair rights catalogue, which is public. So, a tiny-text soft launch? Details subject to change.

A lot of thank yous and less Disney, to come.

🐻🥊👊🏾👊🏻🦁🍺

Page from literary agency Curious Minds rights guide for Frankfurt Book Fair etc. Alongside a photo of me looking slightly drunk and a lot hostile, it says, in tiny font:

NEW DEALS
AGENT - Eli Keren
PUBLISHER - Duckworth
PUBLICATION - Spring 2027
STATUS - Manuscript due April 2026
LENGTH - 80,000 words
RIGHTS SOLD
World English (Duckworth)
The Devil’s Dance Floor
Late-Victorian London and the Last Bareknuckle Boys
SARAH ELIZABETH COX
An 1880s’ group biography of the last of Britain’s
bareknuckle boxers from the historical consultant behind
A Thousand Blows (Disney+/Hulu)
THE DEVIL’S DANCE FLOOR is the first popular book from Sarah Elizabeth Cox,
the historical consultant behind Steven Knight’s television series A Thousand Blows
and author of the historical blog ‘Grappling with History’.
A group biography of Victorian boxers, THE DEVIL’S DANCE FLOOR is a cultural
history that does far more than recount the true story behind the fictionalized
version now streaming. Taking a narrative approach, Cox charts the decline of
bareknuckle boxing over the 1880s, and, in doing so, explores subjects ranging
from policing and healthcare to the press and entertainment – all while offering a
personal-scale view of the melting point of Victorian London (think Hallie
Rubenhold’s The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper but
with a lot more getting punched in the face).
The subjects themselves hail from as far afield as London’s East End and the North
to the United States and the Caribbean. Each has a unique story to tell and reveals
something not only about our shared history but also about the world we live in
today.
Sarah Elizabeth Cox was a historical consultant on season one and two of Steven Knight's
1880s’ boxing and crime TV drama A Thousand Blows. She researches biographies of
Victorian and Edwardian boxers and wrestlers for her website ‘Grappling with History’ and
works as the British Science Association’…

1888 portrait of boxer Hezekiah Moscow, a slim Black or Black/East Asian mixed heritage man, taken by Harry Carpenter. He is shirtless, fists raised, wearing white tights and a chequered sash at the waist. There are painted palms on the studio backdrop.

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Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

Brian Groom @groomb.bsky.social · 5h

Wigan pit brow lasses, or coal mine surface workers, 19th century (WiganWorld).

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 6h

What are editors for if not catching sentences that start well but trail off and go nowhere because a small voice from below was yelling for Hogi (a Korean hedgehog cartoon) and milk and laughing like a maniac while somehow Houdini-ing himself out of a fully buttoned up sleep sack.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 6h

🤤🤤🤤🤤🤤

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 6h

'It reads like it was written in 500 word snatches at 5.30am in an attic by a woman with more coffee in her veins than blood and she is perhaps very close to losing her mind? Also omg why did we need that detail about a burnt wolf with its skin peeled off' is the sort of book review I'm expecting.

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Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

N16Breda Corish @n16breda.bsky.social · 6h

A very evocative phrase seen in the occupations listed for the residents of St Botolph Aldgate, London in the 1881 census. 46 year old Abraham Keys was a "Nurse of the sick & watcher of the dead". His 38 year old wife Sarah Keys was also a "watcher of the dead".

Screenshot of a detail from 1881 census return for St Botolph Aldgate, London showing two entries for the occupations "Nurse of the sick & watcher of the dead" and "watcher of the dead"
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/search/collections/7572/records/14829222

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 15h

There's a new book coming out next year called Amazons of the Arena ed. by academics at University of Texas and Uni. Ulster - a global women's wrestling history. I am contributing a chapter on a 6ft 2, 252lb, Edwardian UK Lady Wrestler, her identity, & bigger female bodies in wrestling generally! :)

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Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 22h

This month in 1909 -

Lady Wrestler Violet Stanley, who had recently performed at the Agricultural Hall, Islington was imprisoned for three months for keeping a brothel. She was later done for sex work as Emily Baillie, and in 1911 for using counterfeit coins in Newcastle as Rose Daley.

LADY WRESTLER SENT TO PRISON At the Clerkenwell Police-court on Saturday afternoon, Bertram Young, 26, described as a salesman, and Violet Stanley, 22, a “lady wrestler,” were charged with assisting in the management of a brothel at Caledonian-road, between the 11th and 17th September. Mr Bramall prosecuted for the Islington Borough Council, and Mr. Harry Ricketts appeared for the defence. Sub-divisional Inspector Rogers, G division, executed the warrant, after the usual police observation, and in the coarse of the case it was stated that both the prisoners had travelled the country as wrestlers - the lady having given an exhibition side show in the Agricultural hall. The couple had cohabited together. When the police raided the premises in Caledonian-road a loaded revolver, ready cocked, and two "life preservers” were found there.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 20h

Hah, it's all so seedy! Bertram has a long record stretching from age 16 well into his 40s - proper wrong 'un - but I can't trace what happens to Violet/Emily/Rose after the Newcastle events in 1911 which involved a chap called Ernest...

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 22h

Oh, Bert!

From the long list of criminal charges and convictions of Bertram Young. This one says 'Stealing one case and 600 pairs of knickers'. He was actually found not guilty of this particular one.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 22h

Steven Knight should definitely pay me to source characters for TV shows. Oh, wait.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 22h

I'm in day job / mum / omg it's nearly the weekend mode and don't have time to follow up in detail right now, BUT Bertram Young alias Bertrand Jones alias Bertram Adolphus was a lifelong ROGUE and VAGABOND. Mad he served longer for stealing margarine than he did for assaulting a cop though, hah...

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 22h

This month in 1909 -

Lady Wrestler Violet Stanley, who had recently performed at the Agricultural Hall, Islington was imprisoned for three months for keeping a brothel. She was later done for sex work as Emily Baillie, and in 1911 for using counterfeit coins in Newcastle as Rose Daley.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

Does 1880s boxers whacking down a glass of sherry and an egg for breakfast count? 💪🏻🥚🥃

Conor Heffernan @physcstudy.bsky.social · 1d

To mark the release of my new book, When Fitness Went Global: The Rise of Physical Culture in the Nineteenth Century (Bloomsbury, 2025), I’m giving away a copy.

To enter:
💪 Repost
🌍 Comment with your favorite strength tradition

I’ll pick a winner next week.

#StrengthHeritage #SportHistory

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Reposted by Sarah Elizabeth Cox

Spitalfields Life @thegentleauthor.bsky.social · 1d

I am giving an illustrated lecture of Spitalfields & Whitechapel in Old Photographs on Thursday 16th October at 7pm at the Hanbury Hall in Hanbury St, E1 6QR. Tickets shorturl.at/I0Ywf

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

Having JUST written this week for my book on the incredible funeral procession of a boxer who died tragically young, the photographs from Ricky Hatton's are even more moving -

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cy...

PA photos from the funeral procession of boxer Ricky Hatton in Manchester, showing floral tributes spelling out RICKY and HATTON, his Only Fools and Horses yellow car on the back of a truck, a young boy on shoulders with flowers.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

If you can smell someone's vintage corduroy from afar, they might want to consider a trip to the launderette instead of the market...

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

Hah! They're v. silly creatures. Mine's 22 months & he's just learned how to put the yoghurt pot or pouch in the bin when he's finished. But of course, the spoon HAS to go in there as well. Then he gives himself a round of applause. Makes a change to it being my phone or the TV remote, I guess... 😅

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

I had to open three different yoghurts today, following the request for yoghurt, and only the third one was acceptable, but only with the second spoon option, as the first spoon (the same as the second spoon, but a different colour) was also completely incorrect.

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Sarah Elizabeth Cox @oispooky.bsky.social · 1d

I don't disagree. I'm in Jaywick several times a week (the council has a LOT to answer for - they'd never let burnt out buildings sit there like this in Frinton for years). But why isn't Farage getting an easy win (and thousands of votes next time!) by saying or doing ANYTHING about it...

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