In Bed with the Georgians

by Rendell, Mike;

  Brothels were always to be found in the areas of London where housing was cheap and over-crowded – such as the dockland area to the east of London, with its high population of sailors. During the previous century, what was known as the Ratcliffe Highway – the area lying immediately to the north of the waterfront at Wapping – became notorious for its brothels catering to the needs of sailors returning from long voyages overseas and, as Britain’s merchant navy tripled in size during the eighteenth century, the demand for prostitutes similarly multiplied. The area of St Giles, situated on the road between Holborn and Tyburn, had originally been a small village, but numbers swelled throughout the Georgian era so that by 1830 some 30,000 people were living in the parish, often with as many as fifty inhabitants to a four-bedroom property. St Giles became notorious, with perhaps the worst slums to be found anywhere in London, and caricaturists often made the point that this was where the rougher end of the spectrum of harlotry was to be found. Better-dressed prostitutes may have favoured newly popular places such as Bagnigge Wells, in St Pancras. Others operated from the myriad of run-down and overcrowded lodgings in Southwark known as rookeries. St James was always popular with prostitutes in Westminster, but all of these places paled into insignificance compared to the epicentre of whoredom, Covent Garden.

  Covent Garden, with its close link to the London theatres, was where the vice trade really flourished. Here, dozens of bagnios or Turkish baths jostled for trade alongside the taverns, the jelly houses and the brothels. The magistrate Sir John Fielding called Covent Garden ‘the great square of Venus’, saying: ‘One would imagine that all the prostitutes in the kingdom had picked upon the rendezvous’. Cartoonists loved to show the scene, as in Image 23 where a young man (‘a lobby flesh-monger’) negotiates terms for ‘a prime piece’. It has the sub-title Buying fruit at Covent Garden Market for an evening’s entertainment.

  There were, of course, brothels employing prostitutes, some of whom lived on the premises. Others were drafted in as the occasion required. These brothels were run by a Madam – a bawd who had laid out the expense of furnishing rooms with basic furniture, and of clothing her whores (sometimes known as ‘molls’) in fine silks. In practice, ‘moll’ was a word which started off as a diminutive form of the name ‘Mary’, developed into a generic name for a girl, and ended up as a nick-name for a prostitute. The molls were required to sign promissory notes for the use of the clothing, at hugely inflated prices. Any effort to leave without repaying the loan would have meant the Debtors Prison, and many of the brothels employed bully boys to ensure that both the whores and their customers behaved themselves. There were frequent outbreaks of violence, such as the riots in London on 1 July 1749. Three sailors from ‘The Grafton’ had visited a brothel in The Strand and had their possessions stolen, including their watches and a considerable quantity of money. They vowed revenge, and headed for Wapping to get reinforcements. They returned later that night with forty sailors and thoroughly trashed the brothel, setting it on fire. They were careful not to steal any items – they simply destroyed the prostitutes’ furniture and belongings. Imbued with euphoria caused by their instant popularity (the neighbours gathered to cheer the destruction of the brothel) the sailors returned over the following nights to continue their crusade against neighbouring bawdy-houses, bringing with them a number of enthusiastic if drunken followers. One of these was the unfortunate Bosavern Penlez, a young apprentice who had spent most of the day getting thoroughly inebriated. Encountering the rioters, he seized upon the confusion to help himself to a bundle of linen from the house of one Peter Wood. Penlez was caught, tried and hanged at Tyburn in October 1749 – even though he was not one of the main architects of the rioting.

  The German writer von Archenholz described the hammams which proliferated around Covent Garden as:

  … a certain kind of house, called bagnios, which are supposed to be baths; their real purpose, however, is to provide persons of both sexes with pleasure. These houses are well, and often richly, furnished, and every device for exciting the senses is either at hand or can be provided. Girls do not live there but are fetched in chairs when required… A girl who is sent for and does not please receives no gratuity, the chair alone being paid for.

  Something of the raucous, chaotic, world which was Covent Garden in the 1770s is shown in the comments by William Hickey in his ‘Memoirs’, written in the first decade of the nineteenth century but not published until 1925. He was not bragging, but nor was he embarrassed in painting a picture of what it was like, with the brothels cheek-by-jowl. He describes how a rowdy group of friends usually:

  …adjourned to Bow Street, Covent Garden, in which street there were then three most notorious bawdy houses. The first was kept by a woman whose name I have forgotten; it was at the corner of a passage that led to the theatre. The second was at the top of the street in a little corner or nook, and was kept by an old Irish woman, named Hamilton, with whom I was upon remarkable good terms of which she gave me most convincing proof in many times offering me money…. I however did not scruple turning her partiality towards me … by enjoying any particularly smart or handsome new piece, upon them becoming inmates with her, and she never failed giving me due notice when such was to be the case….The third brothel was kept by Mother Cocksedge, for all the Lady Abbesses were dignified with the respectable title of Mother. In those days of wonderful propriety and general morality, it will scarcely be credited that Mother Cocksedge’s house was actually next, of course under the very nose of that vigilant and upright magistrate Sir John Fielding who, from the riotous proceedings I have been witness to at his worthy neighbour, must have been deaf as well as blind, or at least, well paid for affecting to be so.

  Hickey goes on to explain that:

  In these houses we usually spent from three to four hours, drinking…. and romping and playing all sorts of tricks with the girls. At a late, or rather, early hour in the morning, we separated, retiring to the private respective lodgings of some of the girls, there being only two that resided in the house, or to our homes, as fancy led, or according to the state of finances. My pocket being generally well-stocked, I often went to Nancy Harris’s, or some other fresher and therefore more attractive female.

  That then was Covent Garden – close to the theatres and therefore a popular haunt of young blades eager to pick up one of the large number of aspiring actresses ‘waiting for a new part to come along.’ Few of the whores lived in and a riotous time was had by all. An example of the exuberance of life, and its consequences, is shown in the 1739 print by Louis Philippe Boitard entitled The Covent Garden Morning Frolick – see Image 24.

  It shows Betty Careless, one of the most famous whores of the 1720s and 30s, being carried home in a sedan chair after a night on the town with Captain ‘Mad Jack’ Montague. Mad Jack was a sea-farer, eccentric to the point of insanity, and he is shown sitting on the roof of the chair, with his sword broken, and being accompanied by a group of ne’eer-do-wells including Betty’s own personal link-boy Laurence Casey, otherwise known as Little Cazey. The job of the link-boy was to carry a flaming torch ahead of the sedan chair, lighting the way. Typically paid a farthing for his trouble, link-boys were also notorious for causing trouble. Little Cazey was no exception and ended up being transported to America for stealing a gold watch from a gentleman. Betty Careless ended up in the Poor House, and Mad Jack, younger brother of the Earl of Sandwich, died at the distinctly young age of 37 after a somewhat chequered career in the Royal Navy.

  Not all of the houses frequented by the whores and their customers were brothels. There were also the meeting places where sexual activity did not actually take place, but where the throngs emerging from the theatres and other places of entertainment would gather to drink, and make their choice for their late-evening’s entertainment. An example of this was the notorious Coffee House run by Tom and Molly King in Drury Lane. It flourished for twenty years from 1725, frequented by bawds and their ‘nymphs’ as well as by m
en from all ranks of society. It opened when most of the taverns were closing, and entertained its customers until day-break, or until the last of the customers had been partnered off, or had passed out. Tom King died in 1739 having amassed a large fortune which had enabled him to buy an estate near Hampstead, but his widow preferred the more convivial life of the city to the peace and quiet of the country. By now a bloated alcoholic, and frequently in trouble with the law, she kept going until her death in 1747 at the age of 51.

  Another famous bawd was Elizabeth Keep, aka Fawkland. She managed three brothels, next door to each other in St James’s Street, each with a dozen girls. The younger ones, aged between 12 and 16, occupied the Temple of Aurora. As they grew older the girls progressed to the luxurious Temple of Flora. In time the older girls moved through to the third, known as the Temple of Mystery, where they practised all manner of perversions and catered to even the most jaded appetites. Flagellation and sado-masochism were all available – at a price to make the eyes water.

  It was this layer of high class brothels and seraglios (where very considerable expense was taken to provide a convivial atmosphere) which marked out the eighteenth century. In Hogarth’s Harlot’s Progress, shown as Image 8, the pox-ridden Elizabeth Needham is seen in the process of ensnaring the young Moll Hackabout, recently come up from the country. Hogarth shows Mother Needham as a rather ugly woman, badly marked by the pox, but in writing about her he used the description ‘a handsome old Procuress … well dressed in silk’. She was ruthless, and harsh – once ensnared, her girls could never escape her clutches. Equally, when illness or old age caught up with them, Mother Needham had no further use for her girls and would throw them out on the street. Her brothel, in Park Place, St James was a most exclusive and fashionable address, and she enjoyed great popularity and success. Fate intervened in 1724 when her premises were raided. Two gentleman of distinction were found having sex with two of the girls, and although the men were bound over to keep the peace, Mother Needham was sentenced to hard labour at Tothill Fields Bridewell. As the Daily Journal of 21 July 1724 recorded at the time ‘This being the first time Mrs Needham ever received publick correction, since her being at the head of venal affairs in this town, ‘tis thought will be the ruin of her household’. In practice she bounced back for a while, but pressure from the Society for the Reformation of Manners led to her premises being raided again in 1731. This time she was fined one shilling for keeping a disorderly house, but in addition was sentenced to stand in the pillory on two separate occasions. Despite paying for ‘protectors’ to save her from the indignation of the mob, she was pelted so hard that she suffered injuries from which she died a few days later. Her demise gave rise to a derogatory rhyme in the Grub Street Journal:

  Ye Ladies of Drury, now weep

  Your voices in howling now raise

  For Old Mother Needham’s laid deep

  And bitter will be all your Days.

  She who drest you in Sattins so fine

  Who trained you up for the Game

  Who Bail, on occasion would find

  And keep you from Dolly and Shame

  Now is laid low in her Grave.

  (‘Dolly’ was a cant word for hemp – in other words Mother Needham would pay to protect her girls from being sent to prison to beat hemp).

  Mother Needham was not of course the first bawd to try and move ‘up market’. Before her there had been Mother Wisebourne, who had a reputation for running the most expensive brothel in London. Her ‘star attraction’ was the renowned harlot Sally Salisbury, born Sarah Pridden in 1699. Sally attracted the likes of the Prince of Wales (later, George II), Viscount Bolingbroke, and the Dukes of Buckingham, Richmond and St Albans. Mother Wisebourne was especially adept at ‘re-virginising’ her girls so that she could charge a hefty premium on their services. When Mother Wisebourne died, Sally transferred her business to the house of Mother Needham – or at least until Sally was jailed for stabbing one of her lovers, ending up in prison and dying of syphilis in 1724.

  Mother Needham’s role as chief procuress was eventually filled by a woman known as Mother Douglas. Edinburgh born, she had become a prostitute when young, and quickly found herself entertaining men of wealth and fame. No doubt they helped her acquire premises in Covent Garden when she was in her mid-thirties. The house she bought in the Little Piazza, Covent Garden had previously belonged to Betty Careless. Betty had tried her hand at running a brothel (rather than being a harlot) but she had no head for business, and drink had taken its toll, so she sold up and retired. When Jane Douglas bought it, she immediately redecorated it in the latest style. She prospered in her opulent surroundings, and in 1741 moved to larger premises at the nearby Kings Head. These too were richly refurbished, and stuffed with fine furniture and fabrics. Her clientele were decidedly up-market – princes and peers, as well as Army officers – and she revelled in her notoriety. But being at the top of one’s profession was never a secure position, and the clientele proved fickle. Five years on and she was no longer pre-eminent. Drink had taken its toll, and eventually the lease of the house was transferred to a relative in 1759. She died, bloated and in much pain, in 1761 and is remembered as one of the inspirations for the bawd called Mother Cole, created by John Cleland in the notorious Fanny Hill.

  It became fashionable to display conspicuous wealth – a fashion picked up on by procuresses like Jane Goadby, who ran one of the ‘Kings Place Nunneries’ at St James’s Place. Not for her a back-street and somewhat anonymous knocking shop – rather an upmarket Town House, beautifully decorated and furnished, in which her male customers could find a home-from-home. Here, men could be wined and dined, and benefit from convivial conversation in elegant surroundings. They could relax and escape family pressures, before availing themselves of the company of their chosen partner. Jane Goadby had been inspired by a visit to the high-end brothels of Paris, and she sought to replicate the luxurious, sensuous surroundings in her own establishment. Her house was no hole-in-the-corner dive; it was where the most fashionable courtesans of the day could be enjoyed by the most wealthy. The young Elizabeth Armistead was one of the Goadby protegées – and she quickly became the lover of the Duke of Ancaster, the Earl of Derby, Viscount Bolingbroke, the unbelievably wealthy General Sir Richard Smith and later, the Prince of Wales.

  Elizabeth Armistead may also have been associated with another notorious madam by the name of Elizabeth Mitchell – and certainly when Sir Joshua Reynolds painted Elizabeth in 1771, his daybook describes his sitter as Mrs. Armistead at Mrs. Mitchell’s, Upper John Street, Soho Square. Mrs Mitchell had originally run a brothel in Berkeley Street, and later went on to acquire an establishment in King’s Place which had been set up by the bawd Charlotte Hayes. Of all the madams who helped establish the demimonde as the ‘Toast of the Town’, it was Charlotte who came nearest to achieving respectability. She had been a child prostitute, born around 1725, and had followed the usual path of wildly fluctuating fortunes, flush with money one minute, and destitute in a Debtor’s Prison the next. But it was while she was incarcerated for debt that she had the good fortune to meet an Irish con-man and horse-racing aficionado called Dennis O’Kelly. Together they went into partnership, with Charlotte providing the business nous and acumen. O’Kelly, through his racing connections, had friends in high places and he introduced his friends to the brothel which Charlotte opened in Great Marlborough Street. Soon her girls were entertaining Dukes and Earls, and the Hayes-O’Kelly partnership became extremely profitable. O’Kelly went on to acquire the country’s leading race horse, by the name of Eclipse. The horse won every single race for which it was entered, not just by a narrow margin but by such a huge distance that after eighteen races it was retired in 1770 because no-one would bet against it. Instead, O’Kelly put Eclipse to stud, charging fifty guineas a time, and the poor horse ended up being carted about to different stables around the land in the country’s first horse box until it expired, exhausted, after nineteen years ‘on the ro
ad’. The experience of the poor horse was echoed by many of Charlotte Hayes’ girls – they too charged fifty guineas for their services, and they too were lucky if they lived to see old age.

  Charlotte’s skill lay in grooming her girls so that they could entertain her wealthy customers not just by their good looks and sexual allure, but with their wit and conversation. In his memoirs William Hickey writes about a girl called Emily Warren, who was being kept in high keeping by his friend Bob Potts. Potts had gone to India, leaving Emily behind, and Hickey lost no time in seducing her. He describes how he first met the girl in 1776:

  then an unripe and awkward girl, but with features of exquisite beauty. That experienced old matron Charlotte Hayes, who then kept a house of celebrity in King’s Place, where I often visited, had just got hold of her as an advantageous prize, and I have frequently seen the little sylph, Emily, under the tuition of the ancient dame learning to walk, a qualification Madam Hayes considered of importance, and in which her pupil certainly excelled, Emily’s movements and air being Grace personified.

  Hickey goes on to explain that Sir Joshua Reynolds ‘whom all the world allowed to be a competent judge’ had painted Emily’s portrait many times, declaring that ‘every limb of hers was perfect in symmetry, and altogether he had never seen so faultless and finely formed a human figure’. Hickey describes how Emily lent him her distinctive yellow vis-à-vis, and how he was stopped several times by:

  fashionable people who, knowing the carriage and liveries, halload the coachman to draw to the side, concluding the much-admired Emily was within, instead of which they found an ugly male stranger. Amongst these disappointed heroes were his Grace of Queensbury, Lord Carlisle, Charles Wyndham, Harry Greville and Colonel Fitzpatrick, against whom my fair friend afterwards had a hearty laugh.