Actually I seem to remember that the monkey landed in Whitby about the time that Bram Stoker imported a black dog called Dracula. The mayor of Harrogate was holidaying in Whitby at the time which is irrelevant except that he was staying in the same seaside boarding house as the Chief Executive Officer of Hartlepool District Council. He had a cousin whose next door neighbour's father was rather too fond of a "binge-drinking club" in Hull - are you with me so far?
I'm not sure I am - I seem to have lost the thread - but I know that some sort of misunderstanding happened because the Chief Exec. and his cousin got drunk together at ... somebody's ... funeral in Selby.

Then Dracula burst in and turned them all into monkeys!!

I think that's right ... may have got some of the details a bit mixed up ...