Rolling mob able to sniff out trouble in city centre bar

The connoisseurs of chaos padded the streets of Victorian Dundee with patient intent. Like crows searching carrion, they were attuned to the slightest ripple of trouble. They knew a rammy could be crafted into a riot far more exhilarating and cheap than a night at a music hall.

So when young David Thomson got into bother in Speed’s bar, Commerical Street, on a Saturday night in August 1891, a rolling mob soon barrelled towards the scene.

Thomson, of Peep o’ Day Lane, had a skinful that night but tried to get served beer in Speed’s between 8pm and 9pm. He was refused but obdurately declined to leave the bar.

Publican Mr Speed and a barman hustled him towards the door. Incensed at his treatment, Thomson rapped Mr Speed in the face.

A customer ran to find a constable but the mob had become alert to the fracas and gathered in Commercial Street with murmering belligerence.

When the police officer arrived, Thomson laid into him, cheered on by the growing crowd. The constable was knocked to the ground and would have been seriously injured had a butcher not stepped in.

The mob, by now in the hundreds, pelted the officer with pies, mud and anything to hand. Our archive recorded the crowd quickly grew so large Commercial Street was blocked and the pie throwing was stepped up.

Into the chaos waded one stout carter, who bravely tried to rescue the constable. An elderly woman anticipated his actions, however, and whacked the carter over the head with her umbrella.

The vast crowd rolled though the city centre but when it reached the post office in Meadowside it was met by a detachment of night police and began to scatter.

Thomson was arrested and later, in court, he admitted assaulting Mr Speed and two barmen. He was fined 60 shillings with the option of a month in prison.

The sheriff said this was one of the most serious disturbances in Dundee in recent years and noted it took 12 police officers to arrest Thomson.

The mob pelted the officer with pies, mud and anything to hand