How did Mary conduct her "transactions?"

[GUT]

G'Day Dave

Those arrears always worry me. His story just doesn't ring true, there had to be some reason to let them run on so long. IF they existed.

[Cogidubnus]

As a McCarthy (not related I think) descendant

Maybe as the shopkeeper at the head of the passage he was some kind of go-between sometimes...or a full-time pimp...I wouldn't know...but it might help explain the truly significant arrears....

However, if McCarthy was really pimping in any real sense of the word, would he really have put in for a claim...If he had the balls, maybe....difficult...

All the best

Dave

[DRoy]

G'Day DRoy



Perhaps it was with McCarthy in charge.

That may have been why he wasn't worried about any outstanding rent.

That may also have been why his "man" went to room 13 the next morning, to collect the bosses cut of the take.

GUT,

Possible and has been suggested before. Based on McCarthy's actions, his story and Bowyer's story not jiving it makes you wonder that's for sure. Maybe he was in charge or perhaps protecting someone who was?

Cheers
DRoy

[DRoy]

Hi Mark and welcome to the boards,

Pimping is looking at things from a twenty-first Century American perspective, not a nineteenth Century British perspective. No evidence of pimps and I am fairly sure that's a later happening. The numbers of London street prostitutes at the time was somewhere between 8,000 and 80,000; so any common lodging house would have had a number of full-time or part-time prostitutes. As did Millers Court, of course. The real-life character Leather Apron did run some sort of protection racket which made him a suspect, while the injuries inflicted on Emma Smith seem to be gang-related.

Pimp is the word I used and maybe that is incorrect. However, there were surely 'third parties' if you prefer that expression. Whether it was a Madam
running a brothel house (or even a Court?), a 'bodyguard', a pimp, or other type of pander...they did exist. Obviously not every prostitute had one but some did which makes it possible someone could have had control over the prostitutes in Miller's Court.

Cheers
DRoy

[GUT]

G'Day DRoy

If the Court was as littered with unfortunates as the witnesses and press say, surely there was a pimp or gang who would have had control over them? Perhaps the entire court was being run as a brothel?

Perhaps it was with McCarthy in charge.

That may have been why he wasn't worried about any outstanding rent.

That may also have been why his "man" went to room 13 the next morning, to collect the bosses cut of the take.

[markmorey5]

Pimping is looking at things from a twenty-first Century American perspective, not a nineteenth Century British perspective. No evidence of pimps and I am fairly sure that's a later happening. The numbers of London street prostitutes at the time was somewhere between 8,000 and 80,000; so any common lodging house would have had a number of full-time or part-time prostitutes. As did Millers Court, of course. The real-life character Leather Apron did run some sort of protection racket which made him a suspect, while the injuries inflicted on Emma Smith seem to be gang-related.

Economically women would not have made ends meet on wages at the time, so many women did part-time prostitution. There were as many permutations as prostitutes: widows, wives with sick husbands, daughters with sick fathers, orphaned younger women, women with drinking problems who then had relationshup failures (the majority of the 1888 murder victims). The pick-up seems to be to engage a likely man in conversation and then offer sex for an amount of money. It's rather disorganised by contemporary standards.

The one thing we do not know is what prostitution of the time was really like. All we have to go on are police reports and articles written by men observing the women, but absolutely nothing written by the women. This applies to many aspects of life in the nineteenth century where the female perspective on life, love and more has been completely lost.

[DRoy]

Barnett's claimed discomfort at the prospect of sharing 13 Miller's Court with Mary and one or more other prostitutes is (if true) entirely understandable. There's not just the issue of living on immoral earnings in such circumstances. Two prostitutes operating from the same premises constitutes a brothel.

Colin,

If you are correct that two prostitutes would make her room a brothel, that really opens up pandora's box in regards to those living/staying in Miller's Court at the time.

If the Court was as littered with unfortunates as the witnesses and press say, surely there was a pimp or gang who would have had control over them? Perhaps the entire court was being run as a brothel?

Cheers
DRoy

[Bridewell]

Barnett

Barnett's claimed discomfort at the prospect of sharing 13 Miller's Court with Mary and one or more other prostitutes is (if true) entirely understandable. There's not just the issue of living on immoral earnings in such circumstances. Two prostitutes operating from the same premises constitutes a brothel.

[Bridewell]

Hi Mark,

Welcome to Casebook.

we don't know how many other low-priced East End brothels there were at the time.

I believe (from memory) that Don Rumbelow alluded to 63 in the immediate area (Whitechapel/Spitalfields).

[markmorey5]

It's clear from Barnett's testimony that One Breezers Hill run by John and Mary McCarthy was a brothel, and we don't know how many other low-priced East End brothels there were at the time. West End brothels existed quite openly, of course.

[Suzi]

13 Miller's Court!!!!!!!!!

[markmorey5]

Procurement and living off the earnings were illegal for quite some time, but in the case of procurement the punishment was pitiful, so these penalties were substantially increased in the criminal law amendment act of 1885. The Maiden Tribute gave the impression that hundreds and perhaps thousands of 13 to 16 year olds were groomed to be defiled but such numbers were creative journalism. Nonetheless the kidnapping, sale or trickery (often through offering domestic service jobs to 13 year olds only to end up in brothels) was vile and abhorent.

Living off the earnings related to third parties so the offence automatically made any brothel illegal by default, which explains the relative high proportion of street workers in Britain at the time, at least compared to European countries and especially France which had regulated, legalised brothels. The legal situation in Britain is the same today, so saunas which are default brothels are illegal, but prostitution is not (soliciting is illegal still). In Australia when I was younger, a massage parlour was a brothel by any other name.

In Australia living off the earnings of prostitution was progessively decriminalised commencing over 30 years ago, and now the industry is legal and the workers and / or brothels are registered (legislation varies state by state). Indeed some brothels have been listed on the sharemarket. As with Britain, prostitution in Australia was never illegal except for soliciting.

When I see the word 'offence' spelled offense I assume American or possibly Canadian. It's a give-away, isn't it?

[GUT]

I've always wondered at the offense of "living off the earning of prostitution" what was she supposed to do with what she earned.

[GUT]

G'Day markmorey5

I haven't had cause to look at the act for some time, but my recollection is that procurement, brothels and living off the earnings of a prostitute was illegal but prostitution itself was not.

[markmorey5]

The Criminal Law Amendment Act and the Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon feature in my forthcoming novel. The act raised the age of consent to 16 and introduced heavier penalties for procurement, and both amendments were well overdue. The legal situation prior to 1885 was that living off the earnings was illegal and remained so, which meant brothels were illegal. However brothels existed as they do now, primarily through the police showing a disinterest. It appears that Mary McCarthy (real name) ran a brothel at One Breezers Hill. Soliciting was a crime and had been for a while.

The most infamous brothel was Cleveland Street, but police interest there came about through homosexuality being available, which was a step too far.

Our stereotype of the Victorians is one of sexual prudery, and there was no doubt they were prudish about the language of sex. However prudishness about sex itself wasn't necessarily true, and they did enjoy sex lives that are at odds with the stereotype. Sexual moderation was recommended, being twice a week for couples which isn't really that moderate. Barrier methods of birth control but typically not condoms became widespread in useage. Manuals were made available not only about birth control but also about sexual pleasure. Many Victorians were pregnant when married and many lived together unmarried. The pregnant when married was more a case of sexual intimacy after engagement.

Some of the Victorian, sexual stereotypes such as women are disinterested with sex come from one or two written sources quoted out of context. However, you don't have to look very hard to find many written sources to the contrary.

The immediate aftermath of the Criminal Law Amendment act saw The Salvation Army and other groups use the momentum of the pressure involved in getting that act passed to press for other, moral changes. Artworks and literature were censored, birth control pamphlets and marriage manuals were censored and we start to see the beginnings of true, sexual prudery which then continued through to the 1960s. Josephine Butler distanced herself from this campaign while complaining that it was ridiculous to compel individuals to be moral by force. The demonstrations leading to the passing of the act in 1885 were substantial, bordering on riots, and this seemed to spook the Commons into action in areas that were well beyond preventing 13 year from olds working in brothels.

So the dim, dark era of sexual ignorance that characterised my parent's generation seems to commence in 1885, given that laws passed in England would apply to Australian colonies in due course. None of my discussion on Victorians and sex applies to Americans of that era who I don't know much about, but who seemed to have a different take on things. They too had child prostiution but beyond that I don't know anything about American sexual morals and values in the Victorian era. However it does seem that the late 19th Century there saw a similar move towards true, sexual prudery, and probably from the same forces as in Britain at the time.