Georgian London - Filed under 'Criminal London'

February 12, 2010

Burking and Body-Snatching: The Deadly Side of Medicine in Georgian London

Some time ago I noted in a blog post about Bart's Hospital that the hospital's methods of obtaining bodies for anatomical study would bear further scrutiny, ideally as a PhD thesis (not by me, I hasten to add). Last weekend, an article appeared in the Guardian regarding Don Shelton's latest paper in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, where he posits that surgeons William Hunter and William Smellie had women at their full-term of pregnancy murdered or 'burked' to provide bodies to further their obstetric studies. He's right in that the numbers don't add up, and that it is rare for a woman to die at full-term but without having begun labour, which seems to be their favoured choice of subject. However, whilst he has made a valuable study and some very salient points, I stall at his inference of murder. If you care what I think (and why should you?), this is why I don't agree.

There is no argument that both Smellie and Hunter were unscrupulous when it came to acquiring subjects for study, or for Hunter's medical 'museum' of freakery. Hunter in particular behaved appallingly over the corpses of various subjects he had his eye on, bribing family and friends to bring the body to him after the final illness, whatever the wishes of the person in question. Most famously, he paid the friends of Irish giant Charles Byrne five hundred pounds to supply him with Byrne's body, despite the fact that Byrne hated Hunter and specifically requested that he be buried at sea to avoid the anatomist's knife <this is an error on my part - it was actually John Hunter, William's younger brother who did this>. Being utterly ruthless and sanctioning murder are not the same. At one point, Hunter noted against Smellie's study of twins in utero that Dr MacKenzie, Smellie's assistant had procured and dissected the body without Smellie's knowledge 'was the cause of a separation between them, as the leading steps to such discovery could not be kept secret'. This indicated that the woman had been obtained by methods not sanctioned by Smellie and that he did not want to be associated with such methods. Hunter and Smellie were rivals medically, and both were aware that the whole business of procuring subjects would not bear scrutiny in polite society, but it doesn't mean they were turning a blind eye to the possible murdering of pregnant women.

Shelton examines the mechanisms of burial and arrives, quite rightly, at the conclusion that most 'resurrected' bodies were obtained from the poorhouses, either pre or post burial. He also asserts that people in a paupers' cemetery were placed in large pits and left uncovered until the pit was full. Nowhere in any of my studies have I found this to be true. Yes, destitute people were placed in communal graves in burial grounds throughout the city, but they were placed there with a bit of dignity and covered over with earth, even if others were later to be added to the grave. They were also prayed over by the incumbent. The pragmatism displayed by Georgian Londoners in the face of death and illness is not the same as being callous or unfeeling.

The rarity of death in women at full-term is a fact that cannot be argued with. However, in this we are largely influenced by modern statistics and the success of modern obstetric medicine, but pre-eclampsia is a dangerous condition still common now, affecting up to ten percent of pregnancies. Characterized by very high blood pressure, pain in the chest, damage to vital organs through raised blood protein levels, seizures and possible cerebral haemmorhages, there was no effective treatment for this condition in the 18thC. Sufferers describe the attendant pains of pre-eclampsia as unbearable, and medicate accordingly which may have resulted in overdose. If untreated, pre-eclampsia can prove fatal to both mother and child, and in Georgian London, would have meant many more mothers died when heavily pregnant, but without loss or damage to the body that would prevent an anatomist making a detailed study of the gravid uterus.

My last point is upon Shelton's light treatment of the 'resurrectionists'. Obtaining corpses for anatomical study wasn't an obvious career choice, granted. It would require a strong stomach, both morally and literally and a network of connections with like-minded individuals. Nevertheless, it was a job, perhaps coupled with another part-time occupation, but one taken seriously by those who engaged in it. They would know the poorhouses and those who supervised, they'd watch to see who came and went. Scoliotic, palsied, deformed or otherwise 'freakish' subjects were all required, as well as pregnant women. No doubt palms were heavily greased for word of a death. I don't believe for a moment that resurrectionists simply disinterred corpses 'randomly'. Most were probably never even buried. Vultures may be abhorrent creatures, but they let nature do the killing.

From the study of Smellie and Hunter's extant works, it appears they obtained 32 full term corpses in 13 years. I believe this number of women were available through natural death, but their bodies were obtained through fairly creepy and suspect supply chains, rather than murder. The woman pregnant with twins was clearly too much for MacKenzie to resist, and I am sure there were indeed murders associated with the study of anatomy, but I disagree with the condemnation of Smellie and Hunter as serial-killers and the sensationalism is both unpleasant and inaccurate. The inference that the men also worked on women rendered unconscious but still alive has no basis in fact whatsoever.<to further clarify this point: women were not 'anatomized' whilst still alive, although there are cases where C-sections were undertaken with little hope of the mother's survival. This does not make the operating doctor a monster.> Smellie and Hunter were at the top of the medical tree, doing valuable work. Associated with them were a large number of 'worker bees', from the artist Jan van Rymsdyk, who produced the astonishing images in the gallery to the poorhouse supervisor who shuffled the bodies out of the back door, to the grave-digger who after dark disinterred a body he had only just covered over. For my money, Rymsdyk is the scary one: he sat with these bodies for hours, studying them in minute detail and there is an adoring beauty to his renderings of these unfortunate women and their children: the sitting posture of the gravid woman, with her knees covered by a blanket, but her internal organs displayed by the neat flaying of the anatomist, and the baby curled snugly inside her, a stray wisp of its hair escaping the womb. There is a liveliness and humanity to the drawings that eludes the photographer's lens in post-mortem photography.

It is too easy to look back at history and attribute cruelty and inhumanity to people who lived in a time when death was a closer companion than it is now. As I hope this blog has shown, the 18thC is an interesting enough place to spend time even without sensationalism.

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February 1, 2010

Princess Serafina: London's First Recorded Drag Artist

This post is the first in a short series on the history of homosexuality and transgender people in 18thC London to celebrate LGBT History month. I like to think the blog constantly celebrates every individual who contributed to making London one of the greatest European cities of the 1700s but this is my small addition to an excellent cause.

On the 5th of July 1732 Thomas Gordon was indicted for robbing one John Cooper, of Number 11, Eagle-court, the Strand. The two men had taken a walk together in Chelsea Fields 'to a secret place', and Gordon had threatened Cooper with a knife unless he gave up all his clothing and his jewellery and changed it with Gordon's. At first, it appeared to be one of those robberies that happens late at night on Clapham Common, between two previously unacquainted gentlemen. The vast majority of such crimes are never even reported let alone prosecuted even in these 'enlightened' times, so the fact that John Cooper brought this to trial in 1732 is quite astonishing. The trial that followed was to be even more incredible.

Gordon had left Cooper with the words that if he 'charged him with Robbery, by and by', he would in turn tell the authorities Cooper had given him the 'Cloathes' as payment for 'Buggery'. (Cooper's clothes are closely detailed as fine masculine apparel, and this fact was to become central later on.) Bizarrely, the two men walked back to Piccadilly together, where Cooper shouted for two passing men (it must have been about dawn by this point) to restrain Gordon. Bundling him into yet another all-night pub, they had a shouting match in which Cooper accused Gordon of theft, and Gordon made good on his threat to announce to his detainers that he had been paid for services rendered.

Modern readings of this minutely-documented trial are based around Cooper's outrageous alter-ego, but there are valuable insights to be gleaned from the reception the news of male prostitution garnered in the Piccadilly pub: the two men who had detained Gordon were unfazed, but told Cooper that if he were proved a liar and if it was simply a sex transaction gone wrong, then he would be liable for their time. Cooper agreed to reimburse them if he was not successful in prosecuting Gordon. From the quality of his clothing, and his confident demeanor, Cooper was neither poor nor ignorant, and was certainly not fazed by the threat of being outed, even if he was aware that his temporary employees were not quite on his side, as they would later trip him when Gordon escaped.

The case came to trial, and both stuck to their stories. Such tales were not uncommon in the 18thC, but it was a rare for them to have their day in court, and those present watched avidly as an odd tale unfolded. The keeper of the Piccadilly alehouse testified that the men arrived in his establishment and argued about the loose change that had been in the pockets of the clothes they had exchanged, and drunk at least four pints of beer together. Edward Pocock, who had stumbled upon the pair at their 'secret place' in Chelsea Fields testified that the two were putting on their clothing when he chanced across them, and behaved very 'loving'. He also begged some forgiveness for his accuracy as he had been drinking and was so drunk upon returning home that he fell asleep in his clothes. Well, it had been a public holiday after all.

Tom Gordon was widely acknowledged by the witnesses as a bad lot, and this is probably why he ended up at trial. John Cooper was a fixer for the richer members of Gay London when they desired an assignation: when they fancied a drummer boy, or a market labourer, Cooper was the man to 'smooth the way', with fine words and the soft clink of a guinea or two. I think there is little doubt he was homosexual, although his gender-specific behaviour is more interesting in context. Jane Jones the laundress came to the witness box, and casually referred to Cooper, the prosecutor, as 'Princess Serafina'. The adoption of female names was not unusual in the gay subculture of Georgian London. Jones agreed with the general opinion of Gordon as a bad lot, but was sad that a simple case of 'Sodomity, what ever that is' had to come to court.

On a different note, Mary Holder was the proprietress of the alehouse where the two men drank together, and Mary Poplet was the landlady of the Two Sugar-loaves in Drury Lane where they finally ended up after their quarrel. Poplet, who was a neighbour to John Cooper and his official employers, the Tulls, gave this account of his character:

I have known her Highness a pretty while, she us'd to come to my House from Mr. Tull, to enquire after some Gentlemen of no very good Character; I have seen her several times in Women's Cloaths, she commonly us'd to wear a white Gown, and a scarlet Cloak, with her Hair frizzled and curl'd all round her Forehead; and then she would so flutter her Fan, and make such fine Curt'sies, that you would not have known her from a Woman: She takes great Delight in Balls and Masquerades, and always chuses to appear at them in a Female Dress, that she may have the Satisfation of dancing with fine Gentlemen. Her Highness lives with Mr. Tull in Eagle-Court in the Strand, and calls him her Master, because she was Nurse to him and his Wife when they were both in a Salivation (salivation was a mercurial cure for syphilis); but the Princess is rather Mr. Tull's Friend, than his domestick Servant. I never heard that she had any other Name than the Princess Seraphina.

Three more women of the neighbourhood were to give evidence, and all knew John Cooper as Princess Seraphina, and all knew he had fallen out with Tom Gordon. It seems little more than an argument about sex that got out of hand, so to speak. Tom Gordon was known to turn a trick or two, and the Princess was known to enjoy the company of a gentleman, or two. The case is quite unique in terms of the 18thC, and one can only imagine the sniggering upon the sidelines. There are however, some facts that stand out in this case, and are worth serious consideration in terms of 18thC attitudes towards transgender individuals. The female witnesses uniformly refer to the Princess as 'she'. John Cooper earned his official living as a nurse, an exclusively (as far as history is concerned) female occupation. He regularly wore women's clothes, and was clearly tolerated, if not wholly accepted within his home community. He was certainly sufficiently at ease in female clothing to sally forth in such to balls and social events, where he hoped to meet the 'fine gentlemen'.

Tom Gordon was acquitted, but I think this is more to do with the fact that it was almost certainly a sexual engagement that had ended in a quarrel. That John Cooper felt secure enough within his own environment, and the justice system, to pursue a conviction is telling. He may well have felt forced into a corner, but I think it unlikely he would have taken the case to court over a suit of clothes if he had felt his life were at risk. After the trial, John Cooper drops out of sight, something for which I think he was probably very grateful. Apparently he was fond of the masked balls in Vauxhall Gardens, where it was the rage for the men to dress as women and vice versa, and that's where I like to think of him, with her curls and her fan, taking a break from his day job of nursing London's sick.

p.s. I would advise anyone interested in the primary texts of 18thC LGBT history and its scholarship to visit http://rictornorton.co.uk/ as a valuable and free online resource for the study of history and sexuality. More details on the things going on this month to raise awareness can be found at www.lgbthistorymonth.org

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December 17, 2009

Early Policing and the Bow Street Runners

In medieval and early modern London, the policing was done in a feudal fashion. Older men who had fallen on hard times and had little hope of employment were given positions as night-watchmen. They had to tramp the streets between dusk and dawn, taking any offenders to the 'round-houses' positioned in each parish. Round-houses were the size of a small greenhouse and usually sat against the corner of a church yard or on the edge of the road (they weren't always round either).

Around the clock or at least on call, there were the parish constables who came at a few minutes notice to aid the night-watchmen. Every able-bodied, coherent man in the parish had to serve as a constable for a set term when his time came, although it was possible to pay a fine to avoid the duty. If someone had to be put in the round-house, a constable would have to check on the offender and confirm the decision of the watch. Imprisonment in the round-house was literally overnight, but prisoners were usually fed and watered.

Next up, Justices of the Peace oversaw their district. Out in the parishes, they would have been familiar with the worst trouble makers and dealt with them accordingly; within London they frequently bought their positions and then traded favours and bribes. The Justices could choose to turn a blind eye, but they could also try minor offences and dole out whippings, fines, pillories and so forth. If a case was too grave for them to handle, they would commit the case to trial at the Old Bailey.

Outside local control, there were thief-takers who operated much like modern private-detectives, on a case-by-case basis. They took a fee from the victim to track down the perpetrator of a crime and bring them in for punishment. In many ways, they worked like a modern bounty-hunter, but frequently operated on both sides of the law. More on famous thief-takers in another post.

In 1749, Henry Fielding was made chief magistrate in Westminster, sitting at the Bow Street Magistrates' Court. Fielding was a writer and a gentleman, but more importantly he was an Old Etonian and friend of William Pitt the Elder. He had many other influential friends and between them, they had managed to establish a central, government fund that would pay for a body of men to enforce the consequences of crime. As incredible as it seems, the idea of a 'policed state' was as feared in the mid 17thC as it is now. The populace found the idea of a life controlled by central government abhorrent, and were very likely to protest if they felt such a thing were being forced upon them. Instead, the early 'runners' at the Bow Street Magistrates' Court were tagged as gophers who delivered court summons and picked up those who had defied being bound over. Outwardly, they were a cross between a barristers clerk and thief-taker. They worked out of No. 4 Bow Street, but wore no uniform (I know, disappointing for the Robin Redbreast theorists). They did however, travel across Britain to catch their man, and were very successful.

By 1754, Henry Fielding's health was failing and he 'gifted' his position to his blind half-brother John Fielding, who could apparently tell a liar from the sound of their voice. This, I am not entirely sure about, but it cannot be discounted, and John Fielding had no small success during his tenure at Bow Street.

The Runners tended to be London born and bred; they knew the people, the ghettos, the pubs and brothels where people could be found. They didn't flinch from serving notices, warrants or summons and they were effective in solving crime. Although the government support for their activities was covert, it was present and it worked. In the 19th century, policing would go from strength to strength, and by then John Townsend, one of the early Runners had become 'friendly' with George IIIrd and promenaded with him, telling the King risqué stories. Townsend was reputed to wear a handkerchief between his head and hat, and he raised the hat any time someone (including himself) mentioned the Royal family: clearly a character.

More on individual Runners, cases and the evolution of the London Metropolitan Police another time.

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November 26, 2009

Children in the Old Bailey

The stereotypical image of the Georgian law courts is that of a fat judge donning the black silk to pass the death sentence on some poor soul whose desperation for a crust of bread led them to steal a lace handkerchief. The records of the Central Criminal Court show a rather more complex set of values.

It was difficult to be a child witness: you had to testify in court, but your testimony was not necessarily taken into account. If your testimony was deemed 'notable', it would no doubt influence the jurors, but it would not secure a conviction if there was not substantial evidence to back it up. The main crimes committed against children are murder and manslaughter (no testimony from the child) and rape. The first two are pretty clear cut, with only niceties dividing them in some cases, but the latter is a quagmire, and one that will require a strong stomach to investigate, or read, further. I judge you forewarned.

Infanticide has long been deemed one of the foulest crimes. Mothers who kill their children are deemed 'unnatural' and the usual punishment was death. A typical scenario, of which I have found more than twenty between 1674 and 1700 was of a serving girl, who finds herself pregnant, delivers the baby in secret and whether it is alive or dead, disposes of it in the 'House of Office'. How many babies perished in cess-pits is hard to say, but the routine nature of the court reports mean it was no uncommon occurrence. Little accommodation was made for the mother: failing to make another aware of your labour and delivering in secret was illegal (presumably to avoid baby-swapping/smothering). A case of 1674, in which the Ordinary, or court reporter recorded the reactions of those present, and the complexities of the law which led to a guilty verdict:

The next seemed to be an object of Compassion to most people present, a poor young Wench lodging about Thames street, betrayed (apparently the father of her child had promised to marry her) and getting her with Child, which being perceived by the Woman that she lodged with...this etous woman...cruelly turned her out of doors, and set her in another Parish, and there left her in pains, telling her than now the said Parish were bound to provide for her. In this sad condition in the street, and without any help was this poor Creature delivered, and being found lying as one half dead by the watch, and her condition perceived; a midwife was called, who found the Child dead, but not separated from her Body, when she came to her; who asking her if it were still-born, the Prisoner both then and now said, it was not, for she heard it, cry, but denied that she intended or used any wilful means to make away the Life of it nor did there any signs of Violence appear save only some little spots or marks of a Bruse or Pinch on the Throat, which some conceive might be occasion'd Involuntarily in struggling to Promote its Birth; by an ignorant Woman in her circumstances: however being a Bastard Child, and the law makeing it death in that case for any woman to be delivered alone without calling help, she was thereupon found Guilty (and sentenced to death).

A fairly grim example of 17thC justice, although report makes it clear that neither the observers or the recorder were happy about it. Not every court was so unsympathetic, and more than one case brings to light the recognition of post natal depression.

The fact upon the Evidence given into the Court appeared to be thus; this woman had (not long before the fact) been delivered of the Child...she was observed for some time before to be some what discomposed and distempered in her mind;...The day whereon this tragedy was acted, this unnatural Mother Orders her Nurse to make her a Sea-Coal fire in her Chamber, and to blow it up well pretending she was cold; this being done, she sends the aforesaid Nurse upon some arrand out of doores; and then takes her little Infant in her hands...she cruelly thrust the poor Innocent into it, and then threw the Coals upon it, where it was burned to Death; A little while after the Nurse returning and perceiving some of the Child cloths upon the fire, snatching to take them off, caught hold of some part of the Child that was not then consumed, whereupon Surprized with the horror of the sight, she shreikt out and askt who had done it, which the Cruel Mother presently confessed to be her self, and was thereupon taken into the hands of Justice, and at this Sessions tryed for her Life, as I have before told you, she was at last Cleared by the Jury who judged her not to be of sound mind before, and at the time of doing the fact, and therefore brought her in not Guilty (with a verdict of non compos mentis).

The potentially dangerous nature of life on the unregulated London thoroughfare is attested to by the many children killed by carriages and stagecoaches. One particularly horrific incident involves a little girl's face 'being ground against a post' until dreadful things happened, but what follows is an account of a typical accident in 1732, and a typical punishment: branding.

Joshua Floyd was indicted on the Coroner's Inquisition, for feloniously in the parish of St Paul's of Covent-garden John Urly, aged 9 Years, by driving 2 Horses, Harness'd to a loaded Dray, whereby the said John receiv'd one mortal Bruise in the Head, of which he instantly dy'd, the 28th of April last. The Child was sitting at a Bench, when the Prisoner came along with a Dray, which he drove close to the Houses, that the Off-wheel broke down the Bench, and wedged the Child's Head up against an Iron-Grate; the Blood gush'd from his Neck, his Nose, and Eyes, and he dy'd on the Spot. Guilty.

Of course, accidents and murder weren't the only thing that happened to children: almost all the cases of rape that appear at the Old Bailey at the turn of the 17thC concern the rape of children. It was illegal to have sex with a child under ten years old, no argument. If it could be proven that a child had been penetrated by an adult male, then he would be hanged, no excuses. To establish said penetration, the girl would have to be examined by a midwife, or often two, and a surgeon. Modesty played no part in the court proceedings, and the state of the victims injuries were put before the jury in graphic terms. Indeed, one Philip Roberts was judged innocent of 'ravishing' Jane Harris in 1683, because of mother and daughter's 'over-much modesty'. It was very common for proof of rape to include the testimony that the child had contracted venereal disease as a result of the rape. This is more likely to have been a physical result of the damage done by abuse, rather than disease, but that cannot now be verified. In one extraordinary case of 1678, various witnesses attested to the fact that 8 year old Elizabeth Hopkins 'took pleasure in' being raped by Stephen Arrowsmith (it appears from their testimonies that they had been bribed), but the jury had none of it, and he hanged.

One final case sad account of a child in court is the case in 1678 of two young Westminster boys:

Another unhappy Murther haypened at Westminster by the discord of two young Lads, who quarrel'd about cutting their Apron-strings, being Shoomakers, the younger not knowing how to revenge himself, took a three peny Knife and stabb'd the other, who run out of the Shop with his Bowels in his hands, cri'd, Lord have mercie upon my Soul, Daniel has kill'd me. The Lord Chief Baron after he had heard the Evidence, wish'd the Jury to consider whether the boy understood what he had done or not, he being but thirteen years and a month old, the Jury afterwards brought him in guilty of Man's Slaughter.

There is no record of any punishment for the boy, but I suspect what he had done marked him as clearly any brand.

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November 16, 2009

The Birth of the Surveillance Society

Morals reformed - health preserved - industry invigorated, instruction diffused - public burthens lightened - Economy seated, as it were, upon a rock - the gordian knot of the Poor-Laws are not cut, but untied - all by a simple idea in Architecture!

Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon

Jeremy Bentham was, without doubt, a genius. Born in Spitalfields in 1748 to a Tory family, he began his formal education at the age of 3 after showing remarkable precocity. He went on to promote equal rights for women (and also animal rights), recommend the decriminalization of homosexuality, the hanging of pederasts, experimentation with bestiality and the banning of masturbation. A mixed bag then.

He was a Utilitarian, which is an excellent idea in theory, but results in the sort of inflexibility that left him unmarried despite desiring greatly to acquire a wife. His emphasis upon purpose and utility, plus his experience of the law led him to create the Panopticon, a new kind of prison. Prisons at the time were usually either older buildings, adapted with varying degrees of success, or purpose-built hulks interested only in segregation and secure confinement. Bentham's proposals for the Panopticon, produced in 1787, read very reasonably and there is much to recommend, but along the way it becomes something far more than the sum of its parts: a monster. A circular prison whose capacity was limited only by the contemporary inability to build much above four stories, cells were ranged about a central observation tower. In the tower, a hidden warder was able to watch each barred cell without the inmates knowing if he was even there or not. They could not rely on a warder's inattention, even for a moment, but nor could they assume their actions, or lack of said were even noted. Now, we are used to the omniscience of CCTV, and some even find being watched throughout their day reassuring. At the end of the 18thC, this was a seriously disturbing concept and not one readily adopted by prison planners (although many other of Bentham's recommendations, such as central heating for prisoners were adopted in new prisons). Whilst they were keen on the idea of being able to leave prisoners unfettered, and on the economies allowed by dramatically reducing warder to prisoner ratio, the idea of being watched by a faceless entity was viewed as deeply sinister, a fact that slipped past Bentham completely:

A building circular... The prisoners in their cells, occupying the circumference—The officers in the centre. By blinds and other contrivances, the Inspectors concealed... from the observation of the prisoners: hence the sentiment of a sort of omnipresence—The whole circuit reviewable with little, or... without any, change of place. One station in the inspection part affording the most perfect view of every cell.

The Panopticon has gone on the fire the imagination of almost every philosopher, not to mention science-fiction writer since (1984 anyone?). For reasons I cannot quite place, it is one of the most disturbing ideas ever concocted for honest, humanitarian reasons. The only true Panopticons ever built were in North America, to Bentham's model. (Pentonville prison is often incorrectly cited as an example.) There's tons I could write on Bentham, but instead I shall let you consider the Panopticon through the gallery.

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November 12, 2009

A detestable crime-

Before the Great Fire there were many complaints over the centuries about how Old St Paul's cathedral had become overtaken by the populace as a place to stand and gossip (as you can see from the gallery), and even do business due to the close proximity of the City merchants. The commerce was of every nature, and increasingly, complaints were made about the prostitutes who plied their trade in the many shadows of the church. By the Great Fire, it had become commonplace for suitably inclined apprentices to spend their Sunday afternoons there, where they might be propositioned by an interested gentleman, and make a little money to add to their wages. Needless to say, the authorities were less than happy with the situation, but it was so well-established there wasn't that much they could do about it, besides moan. When the new cathedral was built, the traders were banished to the Royal Exchange and the prostitutes chased out by wardens. However, it remained a place to make new friends, paid or unpaid.

On the 4th of December, 1730 the Old Bailey trial records contain the following case:

William Hollywell and William Huggins, were indicted, the former for an Assault, with an Intent to commit the detestable Crime of Buggery upon the latter, and he for consenting and submitting to the same.

John Rowden depos'd, That it had been for many Years his Business to show the upper part of the Cathedral of St. Paul's; that the 19th of November , betwixt 12 and 1 o'Clock, he was going to Dinner, and having heard the old Man's Door shut, he afterwards heard some Persons that seem'd to be coming up softly, he hearken'd, but heard no Voices, that suspecting something more than usual, he look'd through the Light of the Newel Stairs, he being about 30 or 40 Steps from the Prisoners, and did discover the Prisoners in very indecent Postures, whereupon he made haste to them, and surpriz'd them in the following Posture; Huggins's Breeches were down, he stooping very low, so that he could not see his Head, his Shirt was turn'd up on his Back, and his Back-side was bare; Hollywell was standing close by, with his fore Parts to the other's Posteriors, and his Body in Motion, but his fore Parts he could not then see, his Back being towards him, this Evidence: That having thus surpriz'd them, Huggins was busy'd in putting up his Breeches, and Hollywell struggled with him to have got from him, and to have gone off, and tore his Turnover, but he having disengag'd himself, Hollywell got to the Church Door, but could not get out, it being Lock'd, and he having the Key in his Pocket, so he Lock'd them into the Side-Isle , and went to get the Clerk of the Works to go with him to acquaint the Dean with the Matter; that when he came again, Hollywell was got out of the Place where he left him, and could not be found for a considerable time, but at last was found hidden in a Gallery adjoining to the Organ-Loft ; and when they were before the Justice, Hollywell's Shirt was examin'd , and there appear'd plain Tokens of Emission.

The Prisoner Huggins call'd a great many of his Neighbours, who gave him the Character of an industrious Man in his Calling (which was that of a Waterman) of a loving Husband to his Wife, of a tender Father to his Children, of an honest Man in his Dealings , and of a religious Man that kept to his Church constantly on Sundays, and one of the last Men they should have suspected as to such Practices, and should more readily have credited his Familiarity with Women, he commonly associating himself with Women more than Men, but this Character did not avail him against positive and credible Evidence; and Hollywell not calling one single Evidence to his Character, and the Fact being plainly prov'd, the Jury found them both Guilty of the Indictment.

Gay subculture in Georgian London has been explored very thoroughly (no pun intended) by various writers, although often their reading is from a 20thC point of view and too keen to see both homosexuality and homophobia lurking in every shady corner. There are plenty of records that lend themselves to the study of what appears to be a flourishing and diverse set of people, from the cross-dressing, effeminate 'mollys', to the 'rough trade' cruising Moorfields (the term 'rough trade' comes from the fact that many of these men were from the rougher trades, such as blacksmithing, the watermen, etc). Apprentices occasionally complained to their guilds about being used in a fashion not mentioned in their contracts, but the matter was always sorted out privately. There are records of homosexuals, particularly aristocrats living openly. Exclusive homosexuality seems to have been relatively rare, and many men who had long term male lovers were also married and had children. At the end of the 17thC, the Society for the Reformation of Manners (as in morals) got underway to root out sodomitical practices. Quite why they thought this was necessary is a bit bizarre, and they used attractive young men to entrap the 'sodomites', which is unfair to say the least. In rare cases, the punishment was hanging. The delight court recorders took in detailing the minutiae of the clothing and 'fore Parts' and so on is extraordinary for a crime so 'detestable'.

This case is exceptional, not just for the location: they were clearly guilty and had entrapped themselves. Furthermore it is indicative of a culture of casual sex between consenting male adults, rather than the exploitative relationships between younger boys and older men made so much of in the recent studies of the subject. Huggins attempted to have his punishment lessened by demonstrating good character (or rank hypocrisy), but Hollywell didn't bother. It is also worth noting that Huggins got a worse punishment that Hollywell, as he was the receiver, rather than the giver, which carried a greater stigma. Both men were pilloried, then imprisoned. Being pilloried was no joke. I have included an image in the gallery of the Charing Cross pillory to give an idea. It was typical to stand for no more than an hour, but an account of your crimes was posted up next to you and St Pauls was a well-known place for sodomites to be exhibited. During the hour, whatever happened to you was bad luck, although in theory, no one was allowed on the raised platform along with you. Kickings and beatings are recorded, but more usual was to be pelted with refuse, excrement and even dead cats and dogs. No doubt the unfortunate Mrs Huggins was at the very front of the crowd for this one, with a big handful of something truly disgusting.

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November 5, 2009

Whipping Tom, The Crack's Terror

In my search for obscure references and bits of information on London immigrants, often from unlikely sources, I came across the story of Whipping Tom, the 'Tall Black Man' of Fleet Street during the late 1670s. As it turns out, he probably wasn't Black, but dressed all in black and covered his face with a black cloth. The idea that he was an immigrant is cast into even further improbability by his peculiarly English perversion: spanking. Yes, Tom would wait in dark alleys for unsuspecting ladies out and about at night, grab them, lift up their skirts and beat 'an Alarum' upon 'their Tobies' with his bare hand as he cried out 'Spanko!'.

Tom's speed and skill led him to be described 'as nimble as an Eel' in the execution of his work, and made him impossible to resist, or to catch. He often assaulted prostitutes, or 'Cracks', but any lady walking alone at night could be his target. His attacks went no further than a harsh spanking, but a contemporary account recorded that one one occasion 'he so swinged her tail, that tis thought, she will not be capable of her Trade for some time.' It is clear from the records involving Tom that he was seen as something of a joke. He was clearly a pervert who gained sexual gratification from his activities, but there is no record of him doing anything other than spanking, which the pamphlet pictured above describes in great detail. Especially detailed is the tale of the poor, stunned pease-pudding seller:

Another time the Woman that cries hot Gray Pease about the Streets, coming up Ram Alley in Fleet Street … a cold hand was lay’d upon her, and up flew her heels, and down fell the Pease Tub, when (as she has farther related) her sences were so charmed, that she lost all power of Resistance, and left him to Tyranize over her Posteriors at pleasure, the which when he had done, he left her to scrape up her ware as well as she could, for the use of such longing Ladies as are affected with such Diet.

Such anecdotes are amusing, but the relish with which it was reported places some culpability upon the victim, who must have enjoyed the attention in some way to be so acquiescent. Whipping Tom achieved no small fame, and Aphra Behn hit the nail on the head in her 1682 play The City Heiress when one of her characters chastises the other for his drunken moaning on women:

I shall have you whining when you are sober again, traversing your Chamber with Arms across, railing on Love and Women, and at last defeated, turn whipping Tom, to revenge your self on the whole Sex.

The belief was that Tom's victims were out and about alone at night (although the pease-pudding seller had every reason to be), and therefore deserved a spanking: Tom was an agent of social and sexual justice. He disappeared as quickly as he had come, perhaps leaving London, perhaps dying, but his legend lived on. Whipping Tom had passed so far into the London sub-conscious that in 1751, a Thomas Wallis was named Whipping Tom in the press after a sex-crime spree in, wait for it...yes, it's Hackney! Even better, our faithful Hackney Nightwatch came to the rescue. Thomas Wallis was a dangerous deviant whose attacks began with a spanking, but soon evolved into serious sexual assault. In 1751, Mr Hawkins had the trial and details printed up as a pamphlet to satisfy the popular curiosity. As always in the popular press at this time, coy wording and especial attention to the rude bits go hand in hand:

Mary Sutten the Milkmaid of Hackney also deposed that when the Prisener whipt'd her Backside in a Ditch near Shoulder of Mutten Fields, to prevent her Crying out, he stuff'd his Handkerchief into her Mouth, and wuld have thrust something else into another place, had not the Watchmen come happely to her assistance.

Thomas Wallis was dealt with in the appropriate 18thC manner for rapists: hanging. His namesake never quite fell out of the minds of Londoners walking the streets at night, but he was followed by more unpleasant attackers such as the piquerisitic London Monster (more on him another time). The reporting of Whipping Tom's attacks is uniquely English and a great illustration of the humour of the time. His assaults were viewed as terrifying for the victims, but ultimately harmless and with heavy comic potential. Poor Robin even implied in his Intelligence of 1677 that women walked the night-time streets of London in anticipation of having their 'Butt ends' made to cry 'Spanko!' Come on ladies, own up, you know you want it really....

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October 28, 2009

A Georgian Burglar Alarm and The Hackney Vigilantes-

This entry from October 1736 in the ever-interesting Gentlemen's Magazine records one man's attempt to protect his business (sadly, this one was a real 'fail'):

Mr Jones, a Florist near Kent-Street, Turn

Pike: He having been several Times Robb'd

of Valuable Flowers-Roots, had provided a

Gun with Several Wires to the Trigger that

when touch'd would go off, which unawares

doing himself, it shatter'd his Shoulder to Pieces.

Poor Mr Jones was suffering from one of the many notorious Hackney crime waves. What made Hackney quite such a hot-bed of nefarious activity is unclear. It was after all, a pretty little suburb at the time, but by 1617 there was a company of 16 nightwatchmen or constables patrolling the area. By 1657 a 'cage' had been built in the corner of St Leonard's church yard (I think it can be seen in the engraving in the gallery) to imprison offenders caught by the Hackney watch. In 1686, the constables were prosecuted for not keeping a proper watch. By 1740, the beats were well-defined and the constables patrolled in pairs between the Turnpike and Cambridge Heath, where their watch house was located. The little map section in the gallery shows the territory quite clearly (the turnpike is at the bottom). In 1756, four more watch houses were ordered, to be paid for by parish funds and the subscriptions of residents. Offenders were no longer kept in the cage at the church, but put under lock and key at various public houses until morning. In 1763, the landlords of the Mermaid and the Bird in Hand protested about having to keep the prisoners and refused to take any more. The watch was a serious business: each constable was equipped with a gun and bayonet and keen to use them.

Just north of the turnpike, you can see Mad Ho., or the Mad House, actually called Brooke House (the grand house in the gallery). It was purchased in 1759 to be converted into an asylum and continued on until 1940, when it was badly damaged by a bomb. Hackney was associated with private asylums, as was Hoxton and later, Bethnal Green. The inmates were not always as well-contained as they might be, and in 1755 a Hoxton girl was found with a knife through her skull after being assaulted by an escapee. He was caught and confessed immediately.

In 1763, Hackney raised enough money for street lighting on the worst section of the road. Night-time robberies, of both people and premises seem to have been the big problem, but by May 1828, the parish declared itself free of night-time crime. By this time there were 30 constables patrolling every evening after nightfall. Hackney even petitioned against the Metropolitan Police Act of 1829, and provided evidence of over a century of efforts to control their own crime. They also said they had driven all the criminals into lawless Tottenham.

Click here to download:

A_Georgian_Burglar_Alarm_and_T.zip (944 KB)

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October 19, 2009

Messrs. Drummond Goldsmith Bankers, and a Remarkable Advertisement-

Flicking through the Gentleman's Magazine, I came upon this remarkable little advertisement:

April 26th 1731. Lost or mislaid, One

Pair of large Brilliant Diamond Ear

Rings, with Drops of the first Water and

one odd Night Ear-Ring, with three Bril-

liant Diamonds: three large Bars for the

Breast, set of Rose Diamonds.

If offer'd to be sold, pawn'd or valued,

pray stop them and the *PARTY, and give

Notice to Mr. Drummond, Goldsmith at

Charing Cross, and you shall receive Two

Hundred Guineas Reward for the same.

--------------------------------------

*Especially if it be a young Lady.

This advertisement is extraordinary for two reasons: the first being its mention of Andrew Drummond, the Goldsmith Banker, and further for the remarkable sum offered in reward. Two hundred guineas is around £36,000 in modern money. That isn't the worth of the diamonds, it is the reward only. The young lady in question would no doubt have been sought high and low, and there is clearly more to this story than meets the eye. Who was the lady thief and where did she find such spoils?

Andrew Drummond was one of an emerging class of 'gentlemen' goldsmith bankers during the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Goldsmiths had fortified premises and/or workshops to protect their stock, bullion and takings. They employed round the clock security and spent time and money establishing relationships with their clients. They took in large sums, and so had money to lend. By 1696, Huguenot goldsmith David Willaume is recorded as 'running cashes' at his shop near the Savoy Chapel (more on him in another post). Running cashes meant taking in money or silver/gold/jewellery and issuing a 'cash note' to the client. The cash note was of course, no more than a piece of paper, like a receipt quoting figures, so it was imperative that the goldsmith was a man of impeccable integrity. Early bankers were upstanding members of their own communities, in possession of enormous cash stocks and the respect of influential (and sometimes but not always, hard-up) aristocrats and also the middle-classes who preferred to have their money kept safe.

Messrs Drummond went on to become part of the Royal Bank of Scotland, an event that no doubt has Andrew Drummond twisting in his grave. His portrait, by Johann Zoffany is one of the 2,200 estimated works of art belonging to the Royal Bank of Scotland (which is, of course, 70% owned by the tax-payer). The bank no longer employs a curator (which would cost a paltry sum in the scheme of the massive financial balls-up of RBS) and there are worries parts of the collection may have been lost, or damaged, or that the bank simply may not know where the pictures are. They are currently refusing to disclose a full list of what is in their possession, although the collection is said to contain at least 46 works of historical importance. I think this is very naughty indeed.

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September 27, 2009

Suffer the Little Children

The Armory vs. Delamirie blog of yesterday leads onto two further posts: one on the reality of life as a 'climbing boy' in Georgian London, and one on the life of Paul de Lamerie. The children get to go first.

So how did a child end up as a sweep, or an apprentice maid? To be born very poor in London was no joke. At the bottom of the working ladder there was a reasonably sized population of piecemeal workers living in lodgings, often situated around the Holborn 'rookeries' (old Tudor courtyards surviving the fire, but too rickety and infested for anyone else to want to live there). The men took casual labour, and the women made cheap cotton lace, ran errands or sorted rags, often turning to prostitution when things got very tough. Gin gave cheap recourse to temporary insensibility, but it didn't prevent pregnancy. These people didn't need the added burden of children. Neither did the unwed serving girl who ended up pregnant with her lover's, or her master's child. I'm not a fan of the theory that all Georgian gentlemen molested the servants, but Samuel Pepys's constant pestering of the beleaguered Mercer shows it took strength of character to prevent wandering hands. A look through the Old Bailey records of the time reveals too many incidences of infanticide committed by unmarried women. Typically: servant girl takes to her bed, pleading fever. Gets up two days later and visits outside privy. Returns to work. Household suspicious. Investigates privy (!). Finds dead baby in mire. I am sure only a small proportion of these cases came to court, and would depend upon the bond of affection between servant and household. How many prostitutes came to term in poor lodgings and ditched the baby without detection?

In an attempt to both understand and prevent poor parents doing away with, or mistreating their children, Thomas Coram set up the Foundling Hospital in Brunswick Square, opening in 1741. Coram was a sea captain, who returned to London and became distressed by the state of the children of the poor. William Hogarth painted a series of pictures for the hospital. He also set up a wet-nurse system near his house at Chiswick and acted as 'Inspector of Nurses'. He was supposed examine the quality of their character and dwelling, but I imagine this job had some perquisites. George Frederick Handel donated an organ to the hospital and gave performances to benefit the charity. Originally, a basket hung outside the gate of the hospital in which babies might be placed anonymously, with a token from their former life (it was intended for newborns, of less than two months). The capacity of 400 was soon reached, and in desperation Coram introduced an interview system, where mothers had to present themselves and explain their situation. At the end of the interview, they were presented with a small painted ball. A white ball meant their child had been accepted. A red ball meant they had made the waiting list. A black ball meant no, giving rise to the modern meaning of 'black-balled.'

Children taken into the Foundling Hospital were sent out to Hogarth's Chiswick until they were four or five, when they returned to Brunswick Square where in theory, they received the rudiments of an education before they were 'apprenticed', at fourteen for the boys and sixteen for the girls. The reality of the Foundling Hospital, noble though its aims were, was that it hired out the children as day labour. A fact testified to by illustrations and cartoons of the time (such as the one in the gallery below, with the sweep leaving the hospital for his day's labour). Of the fifteen thousand children presented to the hospital in its first four years, less than a third survived to adolescence. A shameful statistic, and one Coram was disillusioned by. Poor families who managed to keep hold of their children fared little better, and it was not uncommon for people in desperate straits, or poorhouses to sell children into the service of the 'master-sweeps'.

Master-sweeps were rough men who patrolled the streets of London with their climbing boys and sometimes climbing girls, waiting to be accosted by housekeepers and footmen. Reliance on coal fires for heat and cooking meant London was a smoky place, full of labyrinthine chimneys connecting rooms and even different houses. Soot collected on brick ledges and double-backs. A lot of soot meant fire, and no one in London liked the word fire. The extendable brushes still used today would not make it around the corners of Georgian London's chimneys. Only small children were agile enough to scramble up and brush the soot down, with a hand-held brush. After pushing the child up the chimney, the master-sweep would gain the roof and wait for the child to reach the top of the chimney, thus proving they had done the job properly. Often, the fireplace and chimney were still hot, particularly in kitchens where a constant fire was necessary.

It is necessary to avoid sentimentality when researching the lot of these children, but it is hard not to be affected by the tales of their woes. In 1817, the account of the death of Thomas Pitts was recounted before a Parliamentary Committee, in an attempt by humanitarians to have something done about the lot of the climbing children.

'On Monday morning, 29 March 1813, a chimney sweeper of the name of Griggs attended to sweep a small chimney in the brewhouse of Messrs Calvert and Co. in Upper Thames Street; he was accompanied by one of his boys, a lad of about eight years of age, of the name of Thomas Pitt.'

The fire was still lit at the brewhouse, so Griggs extinguished it and sent the boy down from the top. Inside the chimney was an iron pipe, perhaps carrying hot water. It remained scalding hot, and Thomas Pitt became lodged against it immediately. When ordered to come out, he apparently responded with a pathetic cry of, 'I cannot come up, master, I must die here.’ The alarm was raised and a bricklayer working nearby came and broke the boy out of the chimney, but he was dead. The report of the surgeon attending was thus:

'On inspecting the body, various burns appeared; the fleshy part of the legs and a great part of the feet more particularly were injured; those parts too by which climbing boys most effectually ascend or descend chimneys, viz. the elbows and knees, seemed burnt to the bone; from which it must be evident that the unhappy sufferer made some attempts to return as soon as the horrors of his situation became apparent.'

Should any of these boys survive to adolescence, they were prone to the serious malady 'soot-warts'. For decades it was believed to be a venereal disease resulting from sooty love-making, probably because it arrived at the same time as puberty. It was Percivall Pott, in 1775, who recognised it as the first occupational cancer in his treatise Chirurgical observations Relative to the Cataract, the Polypus of the Nose, the Cancer of the Scrotum. Pott's treatise is not for the faint-hearted or for anyone in possession of a scrotum, so I content myself with the following extract.

'The fate of these people seems singularly hard; in their early infancy, they are most frequently treated with great brutality, and almost starved with cold and hunger; they are thrust up narrow, and sometimes hot chimnies, where they are bruised, burned, and almost suffocated; and when they get to puberty, become peculiarly liable to a most noisome, painful, and fatal disease.'

Just in case you thought the girls got away with it, they didn't. There were a few incidences of climbing girls, but mostly they were put out to do 'a woman's work'. This included helping midwives such as Elizabeth Browrigg. Brownrigg was a respected midwife in Fetter Lane. She took girls from the Foundling Hospital and used them as maids to help her during births. A girl named Mary Jones ran back to the Foundling Hospital in 1765, crying cruelty. The hospital investigated and warned James Brownrigg to keep his wife under stricter control. The neighbours complained again, but nothing was done. By the 4th of August 1767, the Browrigg's had murdered a girl in their care.

Mary Clifford was fifteen, and came to the Foundling Hospital as the result of a broken home. Upon the death of her mother, her father had married another woman, also Mary. Four years later, he left her. Unable to support a young girl, Mary had left her with the Foundling Hospital and 'gone into Cambridgeshire'. Mary Clifford was put into service with Elizabeth Brownrigg with another girl, Mary Mitchell, who was to testify at the Brownrigg's trial for Clifford's murder.

Mary Clifford had the misfortune to be a bed-wetter, giving Brownrigg an excuse to shave her head, strip her naked, make her work naked, and beat her while she hung from a hook, naked. They then locked her up for the weekends when they went to Hertfordshire, without food or water. Brownrigg and her son, John, were clearly unrestrained sexual sadists. Georgian courts refrain from discussing sexual abuse (although they delight in the minute mechanics of sodomy), but the full transcript of the case in the Old Bailey records dwells repeatedly upon Mary's near-constant nakedness and the injuries inflicted upon her whilst naked, inferring sexual intention on the part of both Brownrigg and her son. She was beaten, chained, and starved. James Brownrigg, the husband, sometimes attempted to restrain his wife, by hiding her whips and sticks, but he wasn't very good at it. John Brownrigg sounds a disgusting little article in late adolescence, who liked administering beatings to a naked girl who was quite possibly of slow wit.

In midsummer 1767 Mrs Clifford returned to London and sought out her step-daughter in Fetter Lane. She was turned from the door, John Brownrigg telling her that Mary did not want to see her. The real reason was that he and his mother had beat Mary into insensibility. However, before we condemn Georgian London as a hell-hole without mercy, we see the testimony of William Clipson, apprentice baker to Mr Deacon next door. Clipson was upstairs in his master's house and happened to look into the Brownrigg's yard. There he saw Mary Clifford, lying in the filth with the Brownrigg's pig, and crawled out of a sky-light in order to get a proper look at her.

'I spoke to her two or three times, but could get no answer; I tossed down two or three pieces of mortar, and the third piece fell upon her head; then she looked up in my face, I saw her eyes black, and her face very much swelled;...I went down and told my mistress what I had seen, and what a shocking condition the girl was in; then a watchmaker's wife, that lives opposite to us, went and found out the girl's mother-in-law (he means step-mother), and she came to our house; we told her what I had seen, and what a condition the girl was in; she cried...'

The parish overseers and a Constable were called to the house. The Brownriggs denied the girl was within the house, but the neighbours, Mrs Clifford refused to leave until she was produced. In the end, James Brownrigg was threatened with Newgate, and they produced both Mitchell, and Mary Clifford. Mrs Clifford was distressed by the state of her step-daughter.

'She was in a sad condition indeed, her face was swelled as big as two, her mouth was so swelled she could not shut it, and she was cut all under her throat, as if it had been with a cane, she could not speak; all her shoulders had sores all in one....I suppose they were cut by whips or sticks...her head was cut, she had a great many wounds upon it, and cuts all about her back and her legs; when I pulled her shoes and stockings off at the workhouse, I found her legs cut cross and cross, as if done with a thin end of a whip, and her back worse than her legs, and a very bad wound upon one of her hips.'

Mary Clifford died later that day. Elizabeth Brownrigg was found guilty and hanged at Tyburn the Monday following her trial. James and John Brownrigg spent six months in Newgate and were bound over for seven years. Such was the public approbation for John Brownrigg that he shortened his name to Brown and moved further west, somewhere near Oxford Circus.

The feral desperation of abject poverty is nowhere more depressing, and well-illustrated than in Georgian London, nor the cruelties it allowed those who came to be in a position to mete them out. It also draws a clear distinction between people who mistreated children because of their own poor state, and people who abused children because it was in their nature to do so. Such niceties of distinction are still with us today. Tyburn is not.