Charles Dibdin, playwright, composer and writer, set up a circus in a temporary wooden arena at the foot of Union Street in the summer of 1799 after working briefly with Philip Astley equestrian troupe. This was hugely popular and, after a few nights, collapsed due to overcrowding. A local paper reports: ‘Many were maimed, there were some fractured limbs, and one poor Woman so much bruised that she died in the Infirmary within a few days’. This marked the end of Dibdin’s circus.