Reported in the Teesdale Mercury on 4 July 1855.
A lesson for over particular people – on Saturday last, says the Carnarvon Herald, a person reading a few miles from Ruthin, having a bed of early potatoes got them up.
In consequence of the early rains they were very dirty, he accordingly washed them thinking people would not like to purchase dirt by the pound.
They were hawked through the town and offered at fourpence per lb., but not a purchaser could be found because the potatoes had been washed.
Twelve pounds of them had been carried home again the same evening.
A quantity of soil was mixed with water and made quite muddy, in which the potatoes were steeped in for an hour and afterwards placed on the bed they were originally taken from, fresh soil being thinly scattered over them. In this way they had the benefit of the soaking rain of Saturday and Sunday nights. On Monday morning they were taken up, and in their dirty state weighed fifteen pounds, they were taken to town again by a female, and readily sold at sixpence a pound to most of the parties who had refused them on Saturday for fourpence.