THE photograph of a little boy looking up at a model of Napoleon in the doorway of The Kiosk in Lendal in 1966 which we ran in Yesterday Once More a couple of weeks ago (Snapshots of city life, May 19) has prompted a number of readers to get in touch.

"That took me back to my childhood!" wrote reader Stuart Castle. "I would often see the figure while in town with my parents. There was also a red indian chief somewhere in town, there's the Highlander in the Castle Museum of course today."

Mr Castle ended with a plea: What happened to the figure of Napoleon?

We have the answer, thanks to Lauren Marshall of the Merchant Adventurers' Hall.

"We are very familiar with Napoleon as he has lived at the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall since 1997," she wrote. "He is on long -term loan to us from Mrs Judith Thorpe whose shop was in the photo in The Press.

"This model of Napoleon was used to advertise snuff. He was known as a great snuff taker and was therefore a useful promotional tool! He is one of three models imported from France in 1820. One went to London and the second to Leeds. York’s Napoleon was a well-known figure in the city for more than 177 years - standing outside in all weathers. As far as we know he is the only model that survives.

"Carved out of a single piece of oak, he spent his first 153 years standing outside Mr Clarke's shop in Bridge Street before moving to Lendal where he stood outside Mrs Judith Thorpe's tobacconists shop for 24 years.

"During the Second World War he was 'captured' by a group of celebrating soldiers and was rescued out of the Ouse at Naburn Lock. On another occasion he was left outside overnight by mistake and the following morning was found in the cells after a night in police custody!"

So now you know, Mr Castle.

Meanwhile, another reader - David Wardell from Malton Road - has been in touch about a photograph we carried in Yesterday Once More last week: the one showing the children's ward at Yearsley Bridge Hospital in the 1950s, and the iron lung used for children suffering from polio.

As a child, Mr Wardell contracted polio himself - possibly, he thinks, from swallowing river water while swimming near theYork Co-op coal barges. "The photo of Yearsley Hospital reminded me of the time I spent there in1954," he wrote. "I was paralysed from the neck down, I woke up one morning and could not move and finished up in the hospital. I was lucky as I eventually walked out, yet suffer today at the age of 67.

"The nurses were absolutely brilliant, every wall was glass floor to ceiling, you could see from one end of the building to the other."

Stephen Lewis