Sal Madge - a Whitehaven colliery worker and wrestler

Sal Madge - a Whitehaven colliery worker and wrestler

A photograph of Sal Madge - a nineteenth-century woman who adopted a number of traditionally 'male' attributes and activities.

Sal Madge worked in Whitehaven's colliery and wrestled men for sport. She usually dressed as shown the photograph, with a man's jacket, shirt and waistcoat above a long skirt, and is said to have worn her hair cut short.

Sal Madge was born in a workhouse in Penrith in 1831 but lived and worked most of her life in Whitehaven. She died a pauper in 1899 but huge crowds attended her funeral. She was known for her enjoyment of beer-drinking, card-playing, tobacco-chewing and Cumberland wrestling. It seems that she was not employed underground, but worked with horses at ground level.

Anonymous photographer.

Cumbria Image Bank http://www.cumbriaimagebank.org.uk/

Lancaster University

Sal Madge died in 1899.

Reproduced by courtesy of Cumbria Image Bank, who retain all rights over this image. No further reproduction is permitted without written permission of Cumbria Image Bank.

An account of the reinstatement of Sal Madge's headstone in 2012: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-19828177

Nineteenth century

Photograph