Anna Haining Bates - Touring and Marriage

Touring and Marriage

Anna excelled at literature and music and was considered to be very intelligent. She also excelled at her studies of acting, piano and voice. She played Lady Macbeth in one play.

She had to be rescued from a fire at Barnum's museum in July 1865. The stairs were in flames but she was too large to escape through a window. In her fear she bowled over the men sent to help her. Employees of the museum found a derrick nearby, smashed the wall around a window on the third floor, and lowered Anna by block and tackle with 18 men holding the end of the rope. At the time Anna weighed 394 pounds or 28 stone 2 pounds (179 kg). Usually however, her weight was around 25 stone or 350 pounds (159 kg). Her highest recorded weight was 413 pounds, or 29 stone 7 pounds.

As part of her shows, Anna had a tape measure put around her waist and then had a lady from the audience put it around her waist. The tape would go around the average woman's waist three times. In 1869, whilst on a tour of Britain, one newspaper reporter described Anna as "Towers above all men when stood up, and most women when sat down. She has an oval face, and is softly spoken, with a gentle voice". She was also presented at court.

When visiting a circus in Halifax with which Martin Van Buren Bates — another enormously tall person — was travelling, Anna was spotted by the promoter and hired on the spot. The giant couple became a touring sensation and eventually fell in love and, on 17 June 1871 in St Martin-in-the-Fields in London, they married. Rev. Rupert Cochrane, a friend of Anna's family who happened to be preaching in London at the time, agreed to conduct the ceremony. Despite his 6-foot-3-inch (1.91 m) stature, the Reverend looked small when standing next to the giant bride and groom.