Check it Out: Sex and scandal in historical London
Investigative journalism and the
Interrobang don't exactly go hand in
hand. I credit this partly to our excellent
food services, which reliably
produce identifiable meals — and
believe me, if you've been to a ‘real'
cafeteria before, this is a huge
accomplishment. The other half of
the credit probably goes to the stupidity
of social media posts, which
generally makes most investigation
unnecessary (think YouTube,
Twitter and the Fleming Riot). If any
dark and dirty mischief remains at
the school after that, well, Campus
Security susses it out in two seconds.
Still, I think every wannabe journalist — and their idle readers — has a secret craving for a real scandal, and the acme of journalism has long carried vague associations with political pressure, social change and selfless skulduggery. We all want to be Peter Parker, with his camera in one hand and Spidey suit in the other, handing in hot news to our hardnosed editor just before the deadline, and then rushing off to save Manhattan.
Unfortunately, no radioactive spiders have been sighted at Fanshawe, however these expectations do have a foundation in history. They begin with The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon, a hard-hitting documentary on child prostitution in Victorian England during the 1880s by the dedicated reformist W.T. Stead.
The age of consent in Britain at the time was 12, meaning that a 45 year old could stop by the grade school down the road, offer to buy a grade seven girl an iPod in exchange for sex, and then legally have intercourse with her. The law itself was made to protect wealthy heiresses from being seduced by shysters out to marry for money. It certainly had nothing to do with helping the thousands of child prostitutes in Victorian England, which was why an anti-vice campaigner co-opted Stead in forcing a bill to raise the age of consent.
Stead was an on-again/off-again alcoholic, probably bipolar and one of the most aggressively decent men who have ever lived. He co-opted Josephine Butler, the foremost feminist of the day, and her son, to pose as a madam and her pimp procuring children for brothels in France. They received dozens of offers of children for sale, which is probably better than you can do with modern-day eBay.
Not content with this evidence, Stead decided to prove his ability to buy a child under the eyes of the law for sale abroad. He commissioned a reformed prostitute to aid him in finding a family willing to ‘sell him a girl to work as a maid for a rich gentleman.' Whether or not the mother knew this was a euphemism for the sex trade would be left to the jury later; if nothing else, this was one of many instances of white slavery long after Abolition. The girl herself was the eight-year-old Eliza Armstrong.
For the somewhat unnecessary and vaguely repulsive purposes of making the experiment as realistic as possible, Stead first took the girl to a local midwife and abortionist, who confirmed she was a virgin. He then purchased chloroform (not a prescription drug) from the same midwife. Jeez. I mean, chloroform was a powerful anesthetic used for innocuous purposes like relieving pain in childbirth. And the midwife hands it over without comment?
What a freaking skank.
He then rented a soundproof room in one of the local shanties, dragged in the drugged and unconscious girl, and swigged a bottle of champagne to achieve the proper ‘red-eyed and lechery' look. Picture your boyfriend waking up from a hangover, and you can guess why the girl screamed when she woke up.
No one came. So much for Scotland Yard.
Stead, taking lack of response to her screaming as proof that he could have ‘had his way with her,' handed the girl off to a woman from the Salvation Army who then brought her to a family overseas, and he thus gained the proof for the most sensational story to date in British journalism.
His Saturday paper on July 4, 1885 was prefaced with a warning to “all those who are squeamish, and all those who are prudish, and all those who would prefer to live in a fool's paradise of imaginary innocence and purity, selfishly oblivious to the horrible realities which torment those whose lives are passed in the London inferno” not to read the paper. Of course, that just ensured everyone read the paper. The Pall Mall Gazette, the newspaper in which the exposé was published, sold out for the whole week, and used papers were sold at 12 times their purchasing cost.
Damn. If I could do that, goodbye student loans, hel-lo, night life.
Telegrams came across the Atlantic about the scandal. Volunteers from the Salvation Army passed the news by word of mouth and picketers staked out Parliament. William Harcourt, the home secretary, actually begged Stead to stop the press, to which Stead cheerfully explained that he couldn't until the age of consent was raised to 16 in a new bill.
Hordes of youths dressed in white flooded downtown London to harass politicians, and a month later, in the interests of preserving their repute as upstanding citizens and dissolving the public hubbub, they passed the bill. But they were not content to let Stead go after he'd blown them the metaphorical raspberry.
After Stead's involvement in The Eliza Armstrong Case became investigated by other papers looking to cash in on the news, the courts had him jailed for three months — which was probably far less than Parliament would have liked after he single-handedly pressured them into passing the bill. Of course, being the clever and upbeat gentleman that he was, he simply published accounts of life in prison, to the fury of his prosecutors and delight of his friends. He was a great man.
Regrettably, it was cut short. The most famous man who died on the Titanic was not Leonardo Di Caprio. Stead was there, and he helped women and children onto the lifeboats and defended them as they launched before retiring to the reading room. It seems fitting that he died with the same obscene decency as he lived. If his composure seemed to understate the great upheavals that accompanied him, it can only be because to a great man, great things are routine, and he never noticed his life was out of the ordinary.
Perhaps our little London isn't quite as scandalous (Fleming notwithstanding) as its historical forebear, and for that, we have to thank Stead. Of course (no thanks to him) his articles are probably more interesting than my little column, so check him out!
Still, I think every wannabe journalist — and their idle readers — has a secret craving for a real scandal, and the acme of journalism has long carried vague associations with political pressure, social change and selfless skulduggery. We all want to be Peter Parker, with his camera in one hand and Spidey suit in the other, handing in hot news to our hardnosed editor just before the deadline, and then rushing off to save Manhattan.
Unfortunately, no radioactive spiders have been sighted at Fanshawe, however these expectations do have a foundation in history. They begin with The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon, a hard-hitting documentary on child prostitution in Victorian England during the 1880s by the dedicated reformist W.T. Stead.
The age of consent in Britain at the time was 12, meaning that a 45 year old could stop by the grade school down the road, offer to buy a grade seven girl an iPod in exchange for sex, and then legally have intercourse with her. The law itself was made to protect wealthy heiresses from being seduced by shysters out to marry for money. It certainly had nothing to do with helping the thousands of child prostitutes in Victorian England, which was why an anti-vice campaigner co-opted Stead in forcing a bill to raise the age of consent.
Stead was an on-again/off-again alcoholic, probably bipolar and one of the most aggressively decent men who have ever lived. He co-opted Josephine Butler, the foremost feminist of the day, and her son, to pose as a madam and her pimp procuring children for brothels in France. They received dozens of offers of children for sale, which is probably better than you can do with modern-day eBay.
Not content with this evidence, Stead decided to prove his ability to buy a child under the eyes of the law for sale abroad. He commissioned a reformed prostitute to aid him in finding a family willing to ‘sell him a girl to work as a maid for a rich gentleman.' Whether or not the mother knew this was a euphemism for the sex trade would be left to the jury later; if nothing else, this was one of many instances of white slavery long after Abolition. The girl herself was the eight-year-old Eliza Armstrong.
For the somewhat unnecessary and vaguely repulsive purposes of making the experiment as realistic as possible, Stead first took the girl to a local midwife and abortionist, who confirmed she was a virgin. He then purchased chloroform (not a prescription drug) from the same midwife. Jeez. I mean, chloroform was a powerful anesthetic used for innocuous purposes like relieving pain in childbirth. And the midwife hands it over without comment?
What a freaking skank.
He then rented a soundproof room in one of the local shanties, dragged in the drugged and unconscious girl, and swigged a bottle of champagne to achieve the proper ‘red-eyed and lechery' look. Picture your boyfriend waking up from a hangover, and you can guess why the girl screamed when she woke up.
No one came. So much for Scotland Yard.
Stead, taking lack of response to her screaming as proof that he could have ‘had his way with her,' handed the girl off to a woman from the Salvation Army who then brought her to a family overseas, and he thus gained the proof for the most sensational story to date in British journalism.
His Saturday paper on July 4, 1885 was prefaced with a warning to “all those who are squeamish, and all those who are prudish, and all those who would prefer to live in a fool's paradise of imaginary innocence and purity, selfishly oblivious to the horrible realities which torment those whose lives are passed in the London inferno” not to read the paper. Of course, that just ensured everyone read the paper. The Pall Mall Gazette, the newspaper in which the exposé was published, sold out for the whole week, and used papers were sold at 12 times their purchasing cost.
Damn. If I could do that, goodbye student loans, hel-lo, night life.
Telegrams came across the Atlantic about the scandal. Volunteers from the Salvation Army passed the news by word of mouth and picketers staked out Parliament. William Harcourt, the home secretary, actually begged Stead to stop the press, to which Stead cheerfully explained that he couldn't until the age of consent was raised to 16 in a new bill.
Hordes of youths dressed in white flooded downtown London to harass politicians, and a month later, in the interests of preserving their repute as upstanding citizens and dissolving the public hubbub, they passed the bill. But they were not content to let Stead go after he'd blown them the metaphorical raspberry.
After Stead's involvement in The Eliza Armstrong Case became investigated by other papers looking to cash in on the news, the courts had him jailed for three months — which was probably far less than Parliament would have liked after he single-handedly pressured them into passing the bill. Of course, being the clever and upbeat gentleman that he was, he simply published accounts of life in prison, to the fury of his prosecutors and delight of his friends. He was a great man.
Regrettably, it was cut short. The most famous man who died on the Titanic was not Leonardo Di Caprio. Stead was there, and he helped women and children onto the lifeboats and defended them as they launched before retiring to the reading room. It seems fitting that he died with the same obscene decency as he lived. If his composure seemed to understate the great upheavals that accompanied him, it can only be because to a great man, great things are routine, and he never noticed his life was out of the ordinary.
Perhaps our little London isn't quite as scandalous (Fleming notwithstanding) as its historical forebear, and for that, we have to thank Stead. Of course (no thanks to him) his articles are probably more interesting than my little column, so check him out!
