The Notorious Mrs Jeffries. Brothel keeper to the E

[miss marple]

I am not claiming this fascinating tale as anything to do with Mary Kelly, draw your own conclusions, but MK did appear to have knowledge of upmarket brothels.

Mary Frances Jeffries was one of the most notorious Brothel keepers and white slavers in London. Widow of a publican, she owned at least eight brothels, three in Chelsea, an S & M house in the Grey's Inn rd, others included 15 Brompton Sq, for which she took out a lease for 21 years in 1876. Brompton Sq is one of the finest and most expensive squares in London,and technically in Knightsbridge. Mrs Jeffries catered for only the most exclusive clientele including, Aristocrats, members of the House of Lords, Guards Officers and other members of the establishment. Leopold, the King of the Belgiums was reputed to be a client, although he denied it.
What is certain is that she was protected by the establishment for many years with the police taking bribes to leave her houses alone.

In July1885, William Stead published in the Pall Mall Gazette his extensive investigation into the vice trade, the kidnapping and abuse of children in brothels and the traffic of girls to the continent. The Maiden Tribute to Modern Babylon. The age of consent was 13, which had been raised from 12 in 1861. Stead wanted this raised to 16. The Criminal Act amendment bill which sought to raise the age of consent had failed to be passed until Stead's articles were published. Stead was hated by many members of the establishment for his raising of this issue and was duly punished for it.
Maiden Tribute is still a powerful read for anyone who wants to understand Victorian prostitution. Mrs Jeffries was one of the witnesses who gave information on the vice trade to Stead.

Mrs Jeffries age 68 was prosecuted in May 1885 at Middlesex Sessions for keeping a disorderly house at Chelsea, the only thing they could get her on. She was accompanied by many guards officers. The prosecution was brought by the London Committee for the Suppression of the Traffic in Girls for Continental Prostitution. Mrs Jeffries supported by the great and the good, represented by Forrest Fulton MP was let off with a fine of £200 instead of imprisonment and Inspector Minahan of the Chelsea police who had accused the Chelsea police of taking bribes to ignore the brothels and was expected himself to take bribes,resigned and was discredited by the Home Secretary William Harcourt, who stated there was nothing in the accusations!

She was not so lucky the second time. Things had got a little out of hand at 15 Brompton Sq in 1887. it was not as well run as previously. In 1881 it was inhabited by 'two actresses' May Jameson 24 born in Cork and Lily de Lisle 27 and their two middled aged maids.

Charles Warren gave police orders for the house to be left alone but the respectable and wealthy neighbours were having none of it. The police would not prosecute, so the case was taken up by the Vestry of Kensington.

The influence of the Criminal Law Amendment had an effect on aiding the prosecution. In Oct 1887 Jeffries and Elizabeth Hobbs alias Travers 24 were charged with keeping and assisting in a brothel at 15 Brompton sq The case against Hobbs was dismissed, but Travers was involved in the vice trade.
Jesse Holt, a wealthy builder who lived at no 13 and14 talked about disturbances day and night and'scenes of'indecorous nature' A man with a bandaged headshouting 'dont kill me' as he got into the carriage
Elizabeth White a servant at no 16 had seen in April a man with a bandaged head getting into a carriage and heard brawling and cries of murder. She saw blood on the steps next day.
James Davies of numbers 10,11.12 [ income from property] a married man with two children ; he was also in the 81 census,said the place had been used as a brothel since a Mrs Parker occupied it in March. Mrs Travers came in August and it got worse, with cabs driving up at all hours he saw three men being accosted on the street.
To cut it short, Jeffries was found guilty, sentenced to 6 months without hard labour.
Jeffries was ruthless, and there were many like her,she exploited children, would go the railway stations and abduct children offering to 'mind' them while their parents got tickets. She was a white slaver who exported drugged girls to the continent in coffins.

About the two actresses in the 81 census i have found very little. I cannot find a record of Lily De Lisle's acting career. It is a french name but there is an Aristocrat family, a Lord De Lisle, no apparent connection. I think these girls were high class courtesans. I found this reference in the Morning Post 16th March 1889.
The marriage between Edward Shaw and Miss May Jameson will not take place.
If this was her, were there objections to the marriage?
A Miss May Jameson married Henry Edward Dering of the Scots Guards in 1891 in Donnybrook Dublin/ He was made a Captain in 98.

Thats All Folks, for the moment.

Miss Marple

[Rosemary]

Sans Pol Roger

Since I am being curtailed in matters alcoholic, I must thank you for a splendid post. Provocative, informative, riveting. Merci

[Mayerling]

Excellent job

Ms Marple thank you for such an interesting posting. Your own inquisitive research methods live up to the character whose name you use on these boards!

Jeff

[DJA]

MK did appear to have knowledge of upmarket brothels.

Charles Warren gave police orders for the house to be left alone

The influence of the Criminal Law Amendment had an effect on aiding the prosecution. I

Getting very,very warm........

One of the amendments to the Amendments of 1885 was........

[DJA]

Major Henry Smith was the first cousin of.......

[DJA]

Which novella written in 1885 resurfaced as a stage play in August 1888......

[SuspectZero]

Which novella written in 1885 resurfaced as a stage play in August 1888......

That would be Jekyll & Hyde and the play starred Richard Mansfield who was so convincing he was initially suspected of being JTR.

[DJA]

Close.

[Debra A]

About the two actresses in the 81 census i have found very little. I cannot find a record of Lily De Lisle's acting career. It is a french name but there is an Aristocrat family, a Lord De Lisle, no apparent connection. I think these girls were high class courtesans. I found this reference in the Morning Post 16th March 1889.
The marriage between Edward Shaw and Miss May Jameson will not take place.
If this was her, were there objections to the marriage?
A Miss May Jameson married Henry Edward Dering of the Scots Guards in 1891 in Donnybrook Dublin/ He was made a Captain in 98.

Thats All Folks, for the moment.

Miss Marple

Hi MM
Interesting stuff.
I found some information in an 1894 legal case about a May Jameson which seems to be the same woman:

In 1880 May Jameson met and married a rich man named George H Salisbury, this marriage supposedly happened in Scotland and was not perfectly legal and so a legal ceremony was undergone in 1889 in Tottenham Register Office. The couple lived together as man and wife for 14 years until George died in 1894.
May's mother had taken her to the US with her two sisters when she was young but returned to London in 1868 with May and one of her sisters.
In 1876 May took to the stage and appeared at the Theatre Royal in Dublin and then had engagements in London until 1882-3 playing at the Alhambra (described as utility parts in court). She produced photographs of herself as an actress in court in 1894.
May had had an illegitimate child in Kennington in 1879 and that child lived with May and George and was named May Montague, nickname Monty and went by the surname Salisbury but the couple had no children of their own. When George Salisbury died in 1894 May would later claim she was pregnant when George died and that he had known this. The child was supposedly born later in April 1894 and instantly became the subject of a claim to an inheritance from the estate of her father George Salisbury left him by an Uncle- George Kirkman Priestley. The inheritance involved a huge income for life and property and would have passed to a cousin if George had no children.
May supposedly had gone back to the address her first child was born for her confinement and a nurse she claimed delivered her 1894 baby gave evidence against her in court to say that she had not given birth to a child and had asked the elderly nurse to find a child who was up for adoption.
I haven't found out the conclusion of that case though yet!

[kookingpot]

Hi MM
Interesting stuff.
I found some information in an 1894 legal case about a May Jameson which seems to be the same woman:

In 1880 May Jameson met and married a rich man named George H Salisbury, this marriage supposedly happened in Scotland and was not perfectly legal and so a legal ceremony was undergone in 1889 in Tottenham Register Office. The couple lived together as man and wife for 14 years until George died in 1894.
May's mother had taken her to the US with her two sisters when she was young but returned to London in 1868 with May and one of her sisters.
In 1876 May took to the stage and appeared at the Theatre Royal in Dublin and then had engagements in London until 1882-3 playing at the Alhambra (described as utility parts in court). She produced photographs of herself as an actress in court in 1894.
May had had an illegitimate child in Kennington in 1879 and that child lived with May and George and was named May Montague, nickname Monty and went by the surname Salisbury but the couple had no children of their own. When George Salisbury died in 1894 May would later claim she was pregnant when George died and that he had known this. The child was supposedly born later in April 1894 and instantly became the subject of a claim to an inheritance from the estate of her father George Salisbury left him by an Uncle- George Kirkman Priestley. The inheritance involved a huge income for life and property and would have passed to a cousin if George had no children.
May supposedly had gone back to the address her first child was born for her confinement and a nurse she claimed delivered her 1894 baby gave evidence against her in court to say that she had not given birth to a child and had asked the elderly nurse to find a child who was up for adoption.
I haven't found out the conclusion of that case though yet!

This reads like a soap opera!

[Mayerling]

Hi MM
Interesting stuff.
I found some information in an 1894 legal case about a May Jameson which seems to be the same woman:

In 1880 May Jameson met and married a rich man named George H Salisbury, this marriage supposedly happened in Scotland and was not perfectly legal and so a legal ceremony was undergone in 1889 in Tottenham Register Office. The couple lived together as man and wife for 14 years until George died in 1894.
May's mother had taken her to the US with her two sisters when she was young but returned to London in 1868 with May and one of her sisters.
In 1876 May took to the stage and appeared at the Theatre Royal in Dublin and then had engagements in London until 1882-3 playing at the Alhambra (described as utility parts in court). She produced photographs of herself as an actress in court in 1894.
May had had an illegitimate child in Kennington in 1879 and that child lived with May and George and was named May Montague, nickname Monty and went by the surname Salisbury but the couple had no children of their own. When George Salisbury died in 1894 May would later claim she was pregnant when George died and that he had known this. The child was supposedly born later in April 1894 and instantly became the subject of a claim to an inheritance from the estate of her father George Salisbury left him by an Uncle- George Kirkman Priestley. The inheritance involved a huge income for life and property and would have passed to a cousin if George had no children.
May supposedly had gone back to the address her first child was born for her confinement and a nurse she claimed delivered her 1894 baby gave evidence against her in court to say that she had not given birth to a child and had asked the elderly nurse to find a child who was up for adoption.
I haven't found out the conclusion of that case though yet!

This type of questionable birth issue has existed for centuries. In 1688 King James II and his second, Catholic, wife had a son who is known as James Stuart, the "Old Pretender" (or King James VIII and James III of Scotland and England and Ireland to Jacobites). The anti-Catholic Whigs who soon overthrew James II in the "Glorious Revolution" spread a rumor that a living baby was smuggled into the royal bedchamber of the Queen in a bed warmer (that contraption with a container for coals, and a long pole, that was used to warm bedding).

However there was a similar American murder case in 1857 in New York City that ended with this. A well-to-do dentist, Dr. Harvey Burdell, had been stabbed to death in the parlor of his boarding house in the early hours of a morning, and despite suspicions regarding the landlady (who had been intimate with the Doctor) and a rival boarding house roomer, the case was really never solved. But the landlady tried to claim the Doctor's estate for a baby she said was the Doctor's and that she was expecting shortly. The result was that this baby was found to be a "phony" like that of the Miss Jameson the actress.

Jeff

[Debra A]

This type of questionable birth issue has existed for centuries. In 1688 King James II and his second, Catholic, wife had a son who is known as James Stuart, the "Old Pretender" (or King James VIII and James III of Scotland and England and Ireland to Jacobites). The anti-Catholic Whigs who soon overthrew James II in the "Glorious Revolution" spread a rumor that a living baby was smuggled into the royal bedchamber of the Queen in a bed warmer (that contraption with a container for coals, and a long pole, that was used to warm bedding).

However there was a similar American murder case in 1857 in New York City that ended with this. A well-to-do dentist, Dr. Harvey Burdell, had been stabbed to death in the parlor of his boarding house in the early hours of a morning, and despite suspicions regarding the landlady (who had been intimate with the Doctor) and a rival boarding house roomer, the case was really never solved. But the landlady tried to claim the Doctor's estate for a baby she said was the Doctor's and that she was expecting shortly. The result was that this baby was found to be a "phony" like that of the Miss Jameson the actress.

Jeff

Indeed. I bet there were plenty of women who got away with it too pre DNA. In this case the courts decided that the child was not George H Salisbury's and not May's either. May Jameson's first illegitimate child b 1879 was christened May Alice Montague Jameson Dashwood and it was stated on the baptism record that her father was Julian Agnew Dashwood, a lieutenant in the navy. Perhaps May had tried the scam before as curiously she returned to the same nurse who's delivered her 15 years earlier when looking for a child to pass off as Salisbury's.

[miss marple]

The Salisbury Case is very interesting Debra but I am not a hundred percent sure its the same May Jameson. Research always throws up more problems and coincidences than it solves!
Mrs Salisbury lost her case. The child Georgina, was the daughter of Florence Wright. Sir Edward Clark described it as an obvious and wicked fraud and thought that she should be prosecuted for perjury.
Mrs Salisbury was described as a beautiful woman,who had been on the stage and the daughter of a non commissioned Irish Officer.
George Henry Salisbury married Mary Ann Jameson in March 1889 at Edmonton [that covers Tottenham] and died age 37 at Bridport March 1894

Mrs Salisbury's daughter May born 1879 lived with her and her husband.
In the Brompton Sq census of 1881 May Jameson 24 is described as unmarried and there are no men, childen or nurses living with her only Lily De Lisle 27 and her maid. I can find no trace of Miss De Lisle. I think it is a professional name. Actresses would be a polite way of describing courtesans. The locations of the Saliburys do not suggest a Knightsbridge address, they could have been in Scotland in 1881. I am still looking at census records etc. The two women do appear to have a lot in common but the lack of a marriage or child in 81 means there is more to do. There are not as many Mays as MaryKellys but still quite a few.
The May Jameson who married Dering in 91 may have been a member of the Jameson Whisky family. A May Jameson attended one of the very grand receptions held by The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and the Marchioness of Londonderry in Dublin in 1887.
What concerns me is the industrial scale of prostitution in Victorian times and as today establishment protection.

Miss Marple

[Debra A]

The Salisbury Case is very interesting Debra but I am not a hundred percent sure its the same May Jameson. Research always throws up more problems and coincidences than it solves!
Mrs Salisbury lost her case. The child Georgina, was the daughter of Florence Wright. Sir Edward Clark described it as an obvious and wicked fraud and thought that she should be prosecuted for perjury.
Mrs Salisbury was described as a beautiful woman,who had been on the stage and the daughter of a non commissioned Irish Officer.
George Henry Salisbury married Mary Ann Jameson in March 1889 at Edmonton [that covers Tottenham] and died age 37 at Bridport March 1894

Mrs Salisbury's daughter May born 1879 lived with her and her husband.
In the Brompton Sq census of 1881 May Jameson 24 is described as unmarried and there are no men, childen or nurses living with her only Lily De Lisle 27 and her maid. I can find no trace of Miss De Lisle. I think it is a professional name. Actresses would be a polite way of describing courtesans. The locations of the Saliburys do not suggest a Knightsbridge address, they could have been in Scotland in 1881. I am still looking at census records etc. The two women do appear to have a lot in common but the lack of a marriage or child in 81 means there is more to do. There are not as many Mays as MaryKellys but still quite a few.
The May Jameson who married Dering in 91 may have been a member of the Jameson Whisky family. A May Jameson attended one of the very grand receptions held by The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and the Marchioness of Londonderry in Dublin in 1887.
What concerns me is the industrial scale of prostitution in Victorian times and as today establishment protection.

Miss Marple

Yes, I agree there are some problems with the 1881 entry, Miss Marple but that could be explained by the the 1880 'Scottish' marriage may not have been entirely legal, in fact it may have been an invented part of the back story but there's no doubt May Jameson b 1857 in Ireland married George Salisbury in 1889 and lived with him after that, before that is a bit hazy, maybe he was just 'keeping' her before that? The child May Alice Montague Jameson Dashwood b 1879 may have been staying with someone else as May Jameson supposedly didn't give up acting until 1884. The 'actress' May Jameson at Brompton Square was also born 1857 in Ireland. Actress was often a euphemism for prostitute but there were also legitimate actresses around and there were also genuine bit part actresses who supplemented their income by prostitution I'd bet.

[Debra A]

There's a Lily Delisle listed as a cast member in a production of 'The Octoroon' at The Theatre Royal, Manchester on July 23rd 1892. This was billed as the last week of Mr Flannagan's stock company's performances.