The Last Duel

Just before dawn on a cold frosty December morning in 1805, two army officers, Colonel Bolton and Major Brookes along with their seconds and a surgeon, made their way to waste land in Pembroke Place to fight out a duel of honour. However, this type of honour, was going to be the very last to be fought out in Liverpool.

The duel came about when Major Brookes asked Colonel Bolton what salary he was receiving. The Colonel flatly refused to tell him. The Major found the answer to his question to be very insulting and challenged him to a duel.

Whilst filming Liverpool’s last duel in Pembroke Place, something wonderfully strange occurred that could only happen in Liverpool. I was talking into the camera and demonstrating how Colonel Bolton took aim and fired his pistol at his adversary Major Brookes, killing him instantly!

I could see three elderly ladies out the corner of my eye, looking and listening to what I was saying. As I was finishing what I was saying, I could see the ladies becoming more agitated with me! Finally I finished,  by saying ‘The Major, fell,  right here, dead’. After emphasising the word dead,  one of the elderly ladies, came up to me and in no uncertain terms, said ‘ Here, no murders or shootings go on, this is a nice place and news people like you make up stories about us,  the only things that happened here was the bombs through ‘Itler’’. I tried to tell her that this particular shooting had taken place over 200 hundred years ago. Obviously, they wouldn’t have it! And as the three elderly ladies disappeared down Gill Street, they kept repeating ‘No shootings ever happen here, only them ‘Itler’ bombs.......’

Wonderful stuff, and it could only happen here in Liverpool

Frank Carlyle - LiverpoolUnravelled.com