Haymarket, and whom we have described as the most abandoned of their
sex, who go about cadging and occasionally prostituting themselves to
boys and degraded labouring men. They live in the lowest neighbourhoods
in the east end of the metropolis, such as Lower Whitecross Street,
Wentworth Street, and the low by-streets in Spitalfields, and in the
lowest slums and by-streets about the New Cut, Drury Lane, Westminster,
and other low localities, with dirty, low fellows, dock-labourers,
bricklayers’ labourers, and labourers at the workyards and wharfs.
They are in general too ugly to come out during the day with their
unwashed slatternly dress, and in the evenings are often seen prowling
as cadgers about the streets, and even in the dead of night waylaying
and plundering drunken men; sometimes sneaking about alone, at other
times two in company, and occasionally with a young simple girl by
their side to screen their villainy.
They often resort to prostitution in the dark by-streets and courts
with the boys and men who resort to them, which is seldom or never done
by the younger girls, except by a few outcast or debased creatures
among them, who might justly be comprised in the lowest class.
We now have to notice the “picking-up” women, who generally cohabit
with pickpockets, burglars, clerks, shopmen, and others. Their
object is to get liquor and money from persons as though they were
prostitutes, without resorting to prostitution. For example, we see
two well-dressed young women in the attire of milliners or dressmakers
proceeding along the City Road in the direction of the Angel tavern,
Islington. They see a gentleman pass, and cast a wistful look at him.
He returns the glance. They walk on a short distance, and look round.
The gentleman in many cases turns round likewise. He will then get a
nod or bow from one of them. They will walk slowly, and look round
again. On his going up to them, they will enter into conversation.
They ask the gentleman to treat them, if he should not first offer
to do so. They will then proceed to a gin-palace, where he will give
them possibly a glass of wine. He will ask one of them where she
lives. She will perhaps reply: “I am afraid to tell you. If you were
to come to my house, it might come to the knowledge of my husband, and
he would nearly kill me;” adding “I don’t mind seeing you again, and
we will then get better acquainted!” Ultimately it may be arranged
to go to some place which she has chanced to know, for the purpose of
prostitution, leaving the other young woman to wait for her outside.
The gentleman will then possibly give a sum of money. She will either
say it is not sufficient, and will not allow him to have connection
with her, or she may say she cannot allow him for certain reasons;
or she may make an excuse that she requires to go down-stairs on a
pressing errand for a moment, or to speak to the landlady, when she
decamps. Sometimes robbing him of his watch, or purse, in addition to
the sum he gave her.
If he should raise an alarm the occupier of the house will request him
to give her a sum of money for the use of the room, and if there is any
objection made to pay it, he receives ill-treatment and is turned into
the street.
On other occasions a young woman will pretend she is unmarried, and
will, in a similar ingenious way, endeavour to get money from parties
she meets in the street, and try to escape in a similar way, without
allowing him to have connection with her. She frequently manages to
steal his watch and to rifle his pockets while he may be off his guard.
The object of these women is to get the wages of prostitution and an
opportunity of stealing, without incurring the anger of their paramour
by prostituting their bodies to other men. It happens occasionally they
are outwitted, as their schemes are beginning to be pretty well known.
Their pretexts are sometimes evaded, and cases occur where they yield
to prostitution rather than give back the money they have received,
which classes them among prostitutes and thieves. Some women resort to
this as a shift in case of necessity, while others pursue it as a mode
of livelihood in different localities of London.
These persons are to be found over the chief districts of the
metropolis; miserable, poorly-dressed females, as well as
respectable-looking young women. Some of the poorer sort are to be
found about Shoreditch, Whitechapel, Lambeth, and the Borough. Others
of the better sort, in appearance, are to be met with in the City Road,
New North Road, King’s Cross, and Paddington.
* * * * *
_Hired Prostitutes._--There are a number of female prostitutes kept by
Jewesses and English women of low character. These girls are dressed
in good style, in silks and light muslin and cotton dresses, with
their hair put up in ringlets or in fancy nets. They are mostly from
seventeen to twenty-two years of age, some younger and others older,
some with false hair and ringlets. The brothels we refer to are chiefly
about the West-end. There is often a cigar-shop attached to them, and
the best looking girls are generally found standing by the doors, or
ogling through the windows to decoy the passers-by into their infamous
dens. Some of these girls have been prostitutes from their girlhood,
and belong to the lowest class in society, their mothers having been
prostitutes before them. Several have been in these houses for a
considerable number of years, who have kept their appearance better
than other prostitutes who have had a more changeable and precarious
mode of livelihood. Strange to say, some look nearly as young and as
fresh as they did ten years ago.
You seldom see the old execrable hags who keep these houses loitering
about the doors or standing at the windows. They generally keep out
of sight, but are sometimes to be seen peering through the edge of
the window-blinds, which are generally drawn down, in the first floor
above; or you may occasionally see them in the back parlour, skulking
about. They are often very stout, and look like matrons in the maturity
of life. They take gentlemen into their houses during the day as well
as during the evening, but mostly in the evening.
The girls are then dressed in gaudy finery, with shining head-dresses
and jewellery glittering on their breast over their light dresses. Yet
there is a low vulgarity in their appearance which repels and disgusts;
they look, in many cases, so sensual and debased. They use no art to
conceal the life they are leading, as some other prostitutes do, who
try so far to screen the baseness of their profligacy.
They generally keep old female servants they call “slaveys” to do the
drudgery work of the house. These degraded women live in the house
with them, wash their clothes, get their meals ready, clean their
boots, brush their clothes, run errands for them out of doors, and show
gentlemen into the bed-rooms.
There is often a man in these brothels, a paramour of the old bawd,
who is a loafer about the house, and is occasionally employed to act
as a bully. These men are in general rough-looking men, dressed in
black shabby clothes, and in many cases look more degraded than common
thieves. Some are dissipated and pale, others are bloated, their faces
covered with pimples and blotches.
As we pass along Wych Street, Strand, in the dark evenings, we see
several of the brothels we refer to. There the cigar shops are lit up,
and the girls are arrayed in their best attire, and beaming their most
inviting smiles to entrap the unwary. We may see brilliant lights in
the rooms on the flat above through chinks in the shutters and blinds,
where orgies are nightly transacted too gross and disgusting to mention.
Brothels of the same kind are to be found in Exeter Street and Chandos
Street, Strand, and other localities of the metropolis.
These girls occasionally walk the Strand and Holborn to decoy gentlemen
into their dwellings. They generally belong to the third class of
prostitutes and the lowest class of society. Some may have come down
through dissipation from the second class, and have formerly been in
better positions. They do not steal from persons when sober, as they
could be so easily detected, and as this would injure the brothel; but
they occasionally pilfer from drunken men, where they are able to do it
with impunity. Some of them occasionally get as much money as many of
the more genteel girls in the Haymarket.
They never take clothes from the gentlemen who enter their houses,
but occasionally give him rough treatment should he enter their house
without plenty of money in his purse.
They chiefly confine their pilfering depredations to drunken men. As
they walk in the evenings along the crowded thoroughfares lighted up by
the street lamps, and the bright illumination of the shop windows, the
“slaveys” walk frequently at a short distance behind them, to see that
they do not receive gentlemen without the knowledge of the keepers of
the brothel, and to watch that they do not run away with the clothes.
The slaveys are paid something additional for every gentleman the girls
go with, which stimulates them to look better after them, and promotes
the selfish ends of the execrable old bawd who hires them.
* * * * *
_Park Women._--There are three kinds of women who usually resort to the
parks. We find numbers of kept women of the highest class maintained by
persons in high life, such as have been governesses, ladies-maids, and
the daughters of respectable tradesmen and others, promenading in Hyde
Park. They live in fashionable style at Brompton and other localities.
In summer they come to the park about half-past five or six in the
afternoon. There are not so many in the winter time, when the season
is cold, and the landscape faded. While gentlemen and ladies are taking
their evening’s ride, these ladies often walk along Rotten Row as far
as Kensington Gardens, and frequently have a little pet dog, with a
ribbon or string attached to it.
These females are dressed in the most fashionable and expensive style,
in silk and satin dresses, with expensive shawls, mantles, or paletots,
and have light muslin dresses in summer. On such occasions there are
great numbers of fashionable gentlemen riding on horseback and walking
along the side of the drive.
There are a great many seats placed on the grass at Rotten Row in
the summer, where these ladies sit and talk with gentlemen. They are
generally from eighteen to twenty-four years of age, in the full bloom
of life and beauty. The gentlemen consist of blooming youths and old
tottering gallants of sixty, civilians and military, professional men,
gentry, and nobility.
These ladies sit chatting together with hundreds of people seated
around them in this gay promenade. Many assignations are thus made
as to when and where to meet. They are sometimes seated close by the
Serpentine under the trees in the dusk of the summer evenings, and
middle-aged gentlemen--sometimes elderly--often come and meet them, and
sit and converse beside them under the starlit gloom of the park, with
few persons near them.
There is another class of females who visit the parks, consisting of
servants and the daughters of labouring men and poor mechanics. In
general, they are poorly educated, but respectably dressed, and belong,
according to our classification, to the third class of prostitutes.
They generally come out in the evening for the purpose of prostitution.
Many of them are fresh-looking, averaging in age from fifteen to
twenty-five, and are to be found all over the park, chiefly from
Stanhope Gate to Victoria Gate, where they sit on the seats with men
of respectable appearance--tradesmen and others. These females often
use indecent liberties with gentlemen without having connexion with
them. This is done in the evening from dusk up to the time of shutting
the park, and during this sensual excitement robberies are frequently
effected by the women of purses, watches, pins, and other property.
Information is sometimes given to the police, but these felonies
are often concealed by the persons plundered, as they are ashamed
to make it known. Many of these dupes are married men, who would be
sadly disgraced were the news to come to the ears of their wives and
families.
A third class of females who attend the parks are the lowest old
prostitutes, dissipated, debased wretches, from twenty-five to fifty
year’s of age. They generally frequent the Lovers’ Walk, from Grosvenor
Gate to the statue of Achilles, and are to be seen in other parts of
the park near the Marble Arch.
They are miserably dressed, many of them having barely rags to cover
their wretchedness. They are utterly shameless in their habits. We
find them dressed in a dirty cotton gown, nearly black, an old faded
ragged shawl and tattered old boots, with scarcely a sole to them. Some
are blotched in appearance; others are pale, shrivelled, and haggard,
miserable spectacles.
They may sometimes be seen sitting on the settles in the parks from
dusk till the time of closing the gates of the park. These women
indulge in the same obscene practices as the girls we have already
mentioned, with a lower class of people, such as gentlemen’s servants,
labouring men, and low mechanics, and sometimes have connexion with
them in the park. On such occasions, these filthy hags are busy rifling
the pockets of their victims.
* * * * *
_Soldiers’ Women._--There is only one class of prostitutes termed
soldiers’ women, who live in Westminster. They chiefly reside in the
courts leading out of Orchard Street, St. Ann Street, Old Pye Street,
New Pye Street, Castle Lane, Gardener’s Lane, York Street, and Blue
Anchor Yard. They are from sixteen to thirty years of age, and several
even older. Some have been in the streets for seventeen years and
upwards. They live in the greatest poverty, covered with rags and
filth, and many of them covered with horrid sores, and eruptions on
their body, arms, and legs, presenting in many cases a revolting
appearance. Many of them have not the delicacy of females, and live
as pigs in a sty. This is not exaggeration. On the officers of police
entering their houses, they often find them in a state of nudity. They
have no feeling of shame, and conduct themselves with the greatest
indifference. Two of them generally occupy a room. They often take two
other lodgers into their room, and lie on the floor. Their furniture
consists of an old deal table, one or two old rickety chairs, a few
broken cups and saucers, a wooden table, a wash-hand basin and chamber
utensil, and an old shattered bedstead with scarcely any bedding.
These rooms--generally about ten feet square--are let under the name
of furnished apartments, and there is generally a deputy employed to
collect the rents of the house. These girls pay on an average 3_s._
6_d._ or 4_s._ of weekly rent. Many of them pay 8_d._ or 10_d._ for the
room per day, as the landladies do not trust them a week’s rent. They
often come home drunk about twelve or one o’clock at midnight.
They generally get up in the morning about eight or nine o’clock. If
they have any coppers they get in something to eat. Food is seldom
seen in their cupboards, as they generally have only enough for the
occasion. After they have had their breakfast--a cup of tea or coffee
and bread--they chat with each other over the past night’s adventures,
and pass the time till evening.
In the middle of the day they sometimes wash their skirt, the only
decent garment many of them have--their under clothing being a tissue
of rags--starch and iron it, and get it ready towards the evening, when
they wash themselves and sally forth again.
In the evening, most of them go to some low public-house, and sit in
company with soldiers, who drink and carouse with them. The soldiers
who sit with them generally belong to the Foot Guards, Scots Fusileers,
Coldstream, and Grenadier Guards.
The Life Guardsmen do not generally associate with this class. If a
stray soldier of the line in other regiments should happen to come on a
furlough to this district, some of the prostitutes decoy him to their
house, and get money from him professedly for prostitution. They slip
out of the room while he is asleep in bed, and spend the money they
have got with the Foot Guards. Sometimes they bring one of the Foot
Guards to bully him out of the room. They treat civilians in a similar
manner.
Some of them dress and go out and walk with the soldiers during the
day, but this is seldom. In general they do not go out till the evening
at dusk.
In some instances the soldiers remain absent in the evening, and manage
to avoid the patrols, and stop carousing with these girls till the
public-houses close at four o’clock in the morning, when they go with
these prostitutes to their dens, and often remain the whole of next
day--sometimes remaining for a fortnight with them.
Some of these females are young, strong, healthy girls. When they
have been for some years in this mode of life, they become dissipated
in appearance, and their constitution is often broken up by their
irregular wild life. The younger girls keep themselves more reserved
for a time, but the bad example of the others very soon induces them to
abandon themselves to all kinds of dissipation.
If a young woman is so unfortunate as to come among them and to keep
herself reserved, the others bully her out of it, unless she go to the
same excess of dissipation as themselves.
Their mode of stealing is to get people to their houses, where they
plunder them. A sober man seldom thinks of going to their infamous
abodes. In most cases the persons who go are the worse for liquor. On
their way home they go into a public-house with the girls, after which
they accompany them to their room, where they get some more liquor.
The companions of a girl may see her coming home with a man, and may
suppose him, from his appearance, to have money. They come into the
house, and get a portion of the drink. In some instances the drunken
person gives the woman money to go out for drink, when she decamps, and
gets some of the prostitutes in the adjoining room to bully him out of
the place. In other instances the girls wait their time till he goes to
sleep, when they plunder him.
There are seldom fastenings on their doors, which are never locked.
There is an understanding between parties in the same house, and some
persons in the adjoining rooms enter while the man is in bed, and carry
away his clothes and money. He cannot accuse the girl in the room, as
she is lying in bed beside him.
In some cases the girl disappears during the night, and leaves the man
naked in the room. She may remove to some other neighbourhood if the
booty is of value, and live in some other part of Westminster. The dupe
is seldom or never able to identify her, as he may have been much the
worse for liquor while in her company.
These prostitutes chiefly look out for drunken men, whom they decoy
to their houses, and afterwards plunder. They prowl along Parliament
Street and Whitehall Place, and other streets in the vicinity. A great
number of them go as far as Knightsbridge, where there are concert
rooms. They loiter about these localities till these places close, and
are to be seen about the doors of those public-houses where persons
resort after leaving the concert rooms. When they pick up a drunken man
they bring him home in the manner already described.
Many of these girls come from different parts of the country, and have
formerly been servants in town. A good number have been orphans left
without friends, and have been basely seduced. The relatives of some
have taken them home into the provinces, but they have come back again
to London.
The police constables often find as many as four girls in one small
room at night--two lying on a miserable bed, and two lying on the hard
floor, with scarcely any covering but their petticoat thrown over them.
Two soldiers are frequently found lying in the room with them, or one
is seen lying between two girls.
It is surprising that any soldiers, however poor, who have an ordinary
regard to decency, should lie down among such heaps of filthy rags; far
less should we expect such base and unmanly conduct from the Queen’s
Foot Guards, when we look to the fine appearance and manly bearing of
many of them on parade. It kindles our indignation when we learn that
not a few of those poor degraded females were formerly in the service
of respectable families, and were there seduced and driven to open
prostitution by some of these unprincipled soldiers, who still add to
their villainy the despicable crime of basely plundering the poor girls
they have ruined of the wretched earnings of their dishonour and crime.
To the honour of the regiments of Foot Guards, we are happy to say
there are many noble and excellent men in their ranks, who reflect
high credit on our army by their exemplary character, and who are as
benevolent in heart as they are brave on the battle-field. Some of
these go to the other side of the street to avoid meeting with their
fellow-soldiers when associated with degraded women. The others we
refer to are heartless ruffians in their conduct, and a disgrace to the
British service.
* * * * *
_Sailors’ Women._--There are two classes of prostitutes termed sailors’
women to be found in Ratcliff Highway, near the London Docks, at the
east end of the metropolis. These belong to the third and fourth
classes in our classification of the prostitutes of London.
The better of the two classes are generally composed of younger
and more respectable-looking girls, most of them residing in the
neighbourhood, others coming from a distance. The generality of them
reside in the Highway and in Palmer’s Folly, Albert Square, Albert
Street, Seven Star Alley, and other adjacent streets and alleys. A few
strange girls come occasionally from the Surrey side, such as Kent
Street and other localities in the Borough, and remain for a few
days only, as they may have committed some depredation in their own
district, and wish to be away for a short time from the surveillance
of the police. In like manner some of the girls residing in the
neighbourhood of Ratcliff Highway, when they have plundered a sailor,
leave the locality for a short time, till the ship to which he belonged
has set sail, when they return again. There are a number of very
good-looking girls of this class, most of them Irish cockneys. There
are also a few German and Dutch prostitutes who frequent the Highway
who live in Albert Street. These foreign girls do not have bullies
or fancy men. Some of them are good looking, and some are not. They
generally frequent the German and Dutch music and dancing saloons in
Ratcliff Highway. Both of them attend the public-house with the Swedish
flag. This class of girls frequents the various saloons in the Highway.
They do not generally steal money or watches when they are well paid,
and but few steal the sailor’s clothes.
They dress tolerably well, in silk and merino gowns with crinolines,
and bonnets gaily attired with flowers and ribbons. Many of them have
velvet stripes across the breast and back of their gowns, and large
brooches with the portrait of a sailor encased in them. They generally
lay their hair back in front in the French style.
Some of them have fancy men, and others have not. Their fancy men in
many cases are watermen, but being lazy in inclination they hang about
as loafers, and live on the prostitution and crime of the girls they
cohabit with. These females take their dupes to their own houses or
into low coffee-houses and brothels, or other houses of accommodation.
Some of them allow the sailors to have connexion with them; others who
cohabit with watermen and others, pretend to be prostitutes, and allow
men to take indecent liberties with them, but seldom or never allow
them to proceed farther.
There is another class of prostitutes to be found in Ratcliff Highway,
more dissipated and abandoned than those we have noticed. They reside
in or near Bluegate Fields, Angel Gardens, and other streets and lanes
in that neighbourhood. Many of them have a robust, coarse, masculine
frame, some of them with great protruding breasts. A few of the same
class come from a distance, followed by a low, brutal man. The latter
are termed “cross-girls.” They pick up a sailor, take him into some
dark by-street as if for the purpose of prostitution, get all the money
they can from him, and seldom allow carnal connexion. If possible, so
soon as they have effected their purpose, they run away; this is termed
“bilking.”