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Dixon's Three Jumps, Mardale
Dixon's Three Jumps
locality:-   Blea Water Crag
locality:-   Mardale
civil parish:-   Shap Rural (formerly Westmorland)
county:-   Cumbria
locality type:-   hill
coordinates:-   NY446104 (roughly) 
1Km square:-   NY4410
10Km square:-   NY41
SummaryText:-   Site of Dixon's Fall; a huntsman who fell off Blea Water Crag while fox hunting.

evidence:-   old text:- Clarke 1787
placename:-  Dixon's Three Jumps
item:-  accidentfallhunting
source data:-   Guide book, A Survey of the Lakes of Cumberland, Westmorland, and Lancashire, written and published by James Clarke, Penrith, Cumberland, and in London etc, 1787; published 1787-93.
image CL13P041, button  goto source
Page 41:-  "..."
"At one of these huntings [on a shepherds meet, High Street] a man, now living at Kentmere, whose name is Dixon, fell from the immense rock called Blea-Water Cragg: this precipice is commonly said to be 500 yards high, (but I think 300 will be near the truth,) and in many places over-hangs its base. He had no bones broke, but was terribly bruised, and was almost compleately scalped, so that he now has no hair upon his head, except a little above one of his ears. He struck against the rock several times in his fall, but says he was not sen-"
image CL13P042, button  goto source
Page 42:-  "[sen]sible of it; and when he came to the bottom he spoke a few words about the way the fox had taken, and instantly fell down insensible. It is 26 years since this remarkable accident, and the place has ever since borne the name of Dixon's Three Jumps. It is worthy the learned to remark, that in all accidents of persons falling from vast heights, their locomotive powers and faculty of speech seldom fail them at once; they generally speak a few words, or walk a few yards, and then drop down: ..."

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