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Audio: Headingley folk singer joins Leeds skulls campaign
The campaign to get a pair of 18th century skulls moved back to their original home in Leeds has received an unlikely vote of support – from a Headingley folk singer who wrote a song about the spooky memorial.
Duncan McFarlane penned Bed of Straw after reading a YEP article about the plaque, which was hung on a wall near the Corn Exchange after two men died at a nearby pub.
According to legend, the would-be soldiers were "press-ganged" into the army and then locked in the stables at the Crown and Fleece, where they suffocated in the straw.
Their ghosts are said to haunt the building, which is now a takeaway.
Moved
Duncan, who sings with the Duncan McFarlane Band, is lending his support to the campaign by the Leeds Historical Expedition Society (LHES) and Secret Leeds members to get the skulls put back in their original resting place.
They were moved from outside the Crown and Fleece in 1974, decades after the pub closed in the 1930s, when the owner of the building re-located to Buslingthorpe, one mile north of the city centre.
Duncan said: "I absolutely agree with the campaign and I'll put my name to anything.
"Those skulls are a memorial to the dead. They should be moved back as close as possible to the original site.
"Looking into history and keeping stories like this alive is why I write a lot of my songs in the first place.
"We've got a very interesting piece of history right here in Leeds that's been totally sidelined.
"It's quite wrong and they should be in a much more prominent place so that people can learn about the city."
Bed of Straw, which is on Duncan's album All Rogues and Villains, was written in 2001 and archived by the English Folk Dance and Song Society in 2003.
Dr Kevin Grady, director of the Leeds Civic Trust, told the YEP last week that he was keen to find out more about the skulls – but he could not say whether the trust would be able to move them.
Phill Davison, founder of the LHES, said: "It's great to have so much support. The thread on Secret Leeds has had about 6,000 hits so far.
"We just feel that Leeds should be proud of its ghost stories in the same way that York is."
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Sunday 05 February 2012
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