George Viccars
Who is he?
• George was a journeyman tailor who had secured
some work with Alexander Hadfield.
• He was a very skilled tailor who had come from
Canterbury.
• ‘He seemed to be a modest man’ pg.23
• He was born in a village near Kinder Scout.
• He was sent to Plymouth to take up tailoring.
• He was not tied down by Puritan ideology which
let him have a free and sexual relationship with
any woman he wanted such as Anys Gowdie.
How the plague arrived in Eyam?
• George had been infected by the plague when
he had received a box of linen for his work
from London.
• Once George had passed from the Plague,
Edward Hadfield and his two younger brothers
were the next to fall victim of the plague’s
wrath.
• ‘The plague is cruel. Its blows fall and fall
again upon raw sorrow...’ pg81
George’s warning to Anna
•Burn it all! Burn it
all! For the love of
God burn it!’ pg44
George’s symptoms
• ‘...his head was pushed aside by a lump the
size of a new born piglet, a great, shiny,
yellow-purple knob of pulsing flesh. Pg42
• ‘...blotched, with shapes like rings of rose
petals blooming under his skin.’ pg42
How George treated Anna
• Compared to the other men that Anna met,
‘...he kept his gaze down on the floor,
respectfully.’ pg23 when greeted her.
• George made sure he did not offend Anna
when he spoke to her of his stories from other
places in the world. ‘No. Mistress. If anything,
I am exaggerating in the contrariwise
direction, for I have no wish to offend you.’
pg27
George and Anna’s children
• George kept Anna’s children entertained by
playing games with them.
• He also let Jamie play in the scapes of fabrics
that were in his whisket.
• When he was staying with them he, ‘...brought
laughter back into the house.’ pg24
George’s knowledge of the outer
world
• Due to his work, George encountered many
different cultures and he shared his stories
with Anna.
• He Mussulman traders that he bought his
fabric from and learnt that they had several
wives.
• Also he was able to speak of London and how
he grew weary of living among the ‘...very
young and the very rich.’ pg26