Martini Maccomo

Maccomo is recorded as being born in Angola, although he was also reported as being either born Arthur Williams from the West Indies, or as previously being a sailor born in Liverpool,[1] and also described as a Zulu.[2] His year of birth is also unclear as his death certificate gives his age as 35, his gravestone claims 32, his age in the 1861 census gives his age as 25 (and birth place as Angola)[3] and his death notice in the York Herald states he was 31, thus placing his birth year between about 1835 and 1840.[4]

Poster advertising Maccomo

Although his origins are somewhat unclear, it is known that Maccomo joined William Manders' Grand National Mammoth Menagerie (later known as Manders' Royal Menagerie and later still as The Grand National Star Menagerie) in late 1857 at Greenwich Fair. Advertisements for Manders' shows were well publicized in national newspapers, wherein Maccomo was given such sobriquets as 'the African Wild Beast Tamer',[5] 'Angola's Mighty Czar of All Lion Tamers',[6] 'the Black Diamond of Manders' Menagerie',[7] 'the Dark Pearl of Great Price',[8] 'the most talented and renowned Sable Artiste in Christendom' and 'The Hero of a Thousand Combats'.[9]

Maccomo used whips, pistols and knuckledusters during his act. While performing at Great Yarmouth in 1860, a lion attacked Maccomo and his pistol was accidentally fired into the audience, resulting in a piece of wadding becoming lodged in the eye of a local carpenter named Gillings. In the resulting case of Gillings v. Manders, the plaintiff was awarded £150 in damages.[10][11]

During a show at Liverpool in 1861, Maccomo's hand became wedged in the mouth of a Bengal tigress, which only became free five minutes later when one of the keepers pressed a hot iron bar against her teeth.[12]

In 1862, a lion bit Maccamo's hand during a performance near Norwich Victoria railway station, dragging him across the floor and resulting in him losing part of a finger.[13]

Photograph of blind children and the now stuffed Wallace the Lion, which attacked Maccomo in 1869.

In 1869, Maccomo was attacked by a lion named Wallace while performing at Sunderland. The lion died about four years after Maccomo and was bought by Sunderland Museum (adjacent to the site of the former hotel where Maccomo died) in 1879, where it has been displayed ever since.

Maccomo's grave

Maccomo was staying in The Palatine Hotel in Sunderland where he died of rheumatic fever on 11 January 1871.[14] He was buried in nearby Bishopwearmouth Cemetery and his gravestone was erected by Manders. The grave now lies amongst the Commonwealth War Graves section. He was succeeded at Mander's by Thomas Macarte, who would be killed in the ring in January 1872.

The lion tamers in M. J. Trow's Lestrade and the Sawdust Ring and Zizou Corder's Lionboy books are both named Maccomo.

• Stevenson, E. (1870), Illustrated and descriptive catalogue of Manders' Grand National Star Menagerie: With life and adventures of Martini Maccomo, the African lion king