Last night I crowed mightily that due to the good offices of our friend Theo Paijmans in Holland we had snapped up a teensy piece of cryptozoological history. But then the e-mails came flooding in. What was the Allendale Wolf you wanted to know.....
Local farmers from the village of Allendale, very near to Hexham, had reported the loss of their livestock, so serious that many sheep were being stabled at night to protect them. A shepherd found two of his flock slaughtered, one with its entrails hanging out, and all that remained of the other was its head and horns. Many of the sheep had been bitten about the neck and the legs - common with an attack made by a wolf.
Hysteria soon set in. During the night, lanterns were kept burning to scare away the wolf, and women and children were ordered to keep to the busy roads and be home before dusk. The 'Hexham Wolf Committee' was soon set up to organise search parties and hunts to bring down the beast using specialised hunting dogs, the 'Haydon Hounds', but even they could not find the wolf. The Wolf Committee took the next step and hired Mr W. Briddick, a trained tracker.
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