JAMES BURNE WORSON was a shoemaker who lived in Leamington, Warwickshire,
England. He had a little shop in one of the by-ways leading off the road
to Warwick. In his humble sphere he was esteemed an honest man, although
like many of his class in English towns he was somewhat addicted to
drink. When in liquor he would make foolish wagers. On one of these too
frequent occasions he was boasting of his prowess as a pedestrian and
athlete, and the outcome was a match against nature. For a stake of one
sovereign he undertook to run all the way to Coventry and back, a
distance of something more than forty miles. This was on the 3d day of
September in 1873. He set out at once, the man with whom he had made the
bet—whose name is not remembered—accompanied by Barham Wise, a linen
draper, and Hamerson Burns, a photographer, I think, following in a light
cart or wagon.
For several miles Worson went on very well, at an easy gait, without
apparent fatigue, for he had really great powers of endurance and was not
sufficiently intoxicated to enfeeble them. The three men in the wagon
kept a short distance in the rear, giving him occasional friendly “chaff”
or encouragement, as the spirit moved them. Suddenly—in the very middle
of the roadway, not a dozen yards from them, and with their eyes full
upon him—the man seemed to stumble, pitched headlong forward, uttered a
terrible cry and vanished! He did not fall to the earth—he vanished
before touching it. No trace of him was ever discovered.
After remaining at and about the spot for some time, with aimless
irresolution, the three men returned to Leamington, told their
astonishing story and were afterward taken into custody. But they were
of good standing, had always been considered truthful, were sober at the
time of the occurrence, and nothing ever transpired to discredit their
sworn account of their extraordinary adventure, concerning the truth of
which, nevertheless, public opinion was divided, throughout the United
Kingdom. If they had something to conceal, their choice of means is
certainly one of the most amazing ever made by sane human beings.