The tragic secret that the Russian He-Man of Hockley took to his grave (From Echo)

The tragic secret that the Russian He-Man of Hockley took to his grave

8:00pm Thursday 8th January 2009 in Memories By Tom King

VISITORS from across the length and breadth of Russia are expected to flock to a major exhibition next year.

Mounted by the historical museum of the city of Orenburg, in the Ural mountains, it represents the culmination of years of detective work.

The exhibition will, for the first time, tell the full story of Alexander Zass, a Cossack native of the city, one of the most celebrated Russian heroes of the 20th century.

Using the stage name Samson, Zass toured the world’s circus circuit, billed as “the world’s strongest man”. Nobody ever succeeded in challenging that claim.

His feats during the First World War made him the stuff of legend thanks to carrying his wounded horse off the battlefield on his shoulders and escaping from a German prison by bending the bars of his cell.

His self-help manuals on body-building sold hundreds of thousands of copies and inspired two generations of Soviet young men.

Samson also operated as a spy and secret agent. His travels with the big top gave him an ideal cover and vantage point.

In 2006, Memories revealed one of the most extraordinary facts about this colourful life – Samson spent his final years in south Essex.

He lived in a bungalow in Plumberow Avenue, Hockley, which he shared with another one-time circus performer, a disabled lady named Betty Tilbury, and Betty’s husband, Sid.

As his physical strength waned with age, Samson found a new and almost equally successful role, as an animal trainer for British TV acts.

In his back garden, he built a replica circus ring. He used it to train a range of animals, from dogs to lions.

Samson died in 1962, and lies buried in the graveyard of Hockley Parish Church. One more extraordinary story linked to Samson has now emerged from the mists of the past.

Improbable but true incidents and bizarre mysteries swirled around Samson all his life, but none seems more rum than the story of the death of his young wife.

Following publication of the initial story about Samson, a number of people contacted Memories to provide their own reminiscences. Several had known him well, providing the material for several gaps in the Samson story to be filled.

A number of his old friends referred to the fact he had been married, a long time ago. Yet even the strongman’s closest acquaintances remained in the dark about his marriage, or the fate of his wife.

Open and happy to chat about almost every subject under the sun, including most of his own past, Samson never talked about his wife or even allowed the name Blanche to pass his lips.

A number of people also mentioned an undercurrent of sadness that seemed to hang about this generally sunny man, and speculated that it might have had something to do with his wife.

Whatever the answer, he took the story with him to the grave. The seal seemed to have been set for ever on the mystery of Mrs Zass.

Then, 18 months after the publication of the story in Memories, a copy of the article found its way to Angela Vidler, of Totnes, Devon, perhaps the only person alive in a position to throw light on Blanche Zass.

As dramatic revelations go, this was top dollar. “Blanche,” she says, “was killed by a baboon.”

Mrs Vidler knew something about the Samson and Blanche story because her mother, Gladys (nee Wakeley), had been Blanche’s best friend.

“She repeatedly talked about Blanche,” she says. “I don’t think she ever got over losing her friend, or the shocking way in which she had died.” Gladys repeatedly told the story all through her daughter’s childhood.

“But you don’t always listen that closely when you’re young,” says Mrs Vidler. “Now I wish I’d asked her for a bit more detail.”

The facts Angela Vidler has managed to establish are these.

Blanche was the daughter of music hall artistes.

The friendship between her and Gladys began as childhood neighbours in Coldharbour Lane, London, and remained strong for the rest of Blanche’s short life.

Blanche met and married Samson when she was very young, and was just 17 when she died. Samson was besotted with his young bride.

The stage act that led to her death took place on the stage of the Palace Theatre, Manchester.

“Those are the facts as I’ve been told them,” says Mrs Vidler. “But you can speculate a bit beyond that.

“Presumably Samson would have met Blanche because they were both involved in the performing world. Going by my mother’s age, the year of Blanche’s death would have been around 1926.”

Baboons, a strong and aggressive species, are an unusual choice for an animal act, but Mrs Vidler points out baboon wrestling was a slang term for American wrestling.“Samson had a strong sense of humour, so he may have been staging a comedy act, using real baboons, to send it up.”

The exact circumstances of Blanche’s violent killing are unclear, but Mrs Vidler can recall the line “the monkey bit her”, and being told that Blanche died on the way to hospital.

There the story rests. Despite much research on the web and through the Circus Historical Society, she has been unable to locate any eyewitness reports or find any more details.

But the impact of Blanche’s death was undeniable. Gladys kept a picture of her friend all her life. “It meant so much to her that, we put Blanche’s photo into her coffin when she was cremated,” Mrs Vidler says.

Yet the humorous ghost of Samson still had a trick or two in store. “The funny thing when you look at his photograph, and everyone comments on this, is that I look just like Samson,” Mrs Vidler says. “The similarity really stands out.”

She found it hard to escape his shadow in other ways. When she started to do volunteer work at Paignton Zoo, she found Samson had been manager of the zoo in the 1950s.

There was a further resonance in the work she found herself doing, baboon welfare.

“It’s odd,” says Mrs Vidler, “but people always seem to react with a smile when I say Blanche was killed by a baboon. But it was a lasting tragedy for all who knew her.”

No doubt the smiles have something to do with incredulity.

But bizarre circumstances, both tragic and comic, were a natural part of the world of Alexander Zass.

Clearly the death of his beloved young wife after just a short spell of marriage took its toll. It explains the undercurrent of sadness that lasted the rest of Samson’s life. Such a loss was one that even the world’s strongest man probably never quite found the strength to overcome.