Cleveland Street scandal
I found out about this late 19th century sensation for the first time from a knowledgeable friend in Edinburgh last weekend, and was intrigued as it all took place a short walk from my home.
As first reported in the North London Press in September 1889, the police uncovered a male brothel on Cleveland Street in the West End in which telegraph boys had been recruited to have sex for money with aristocrats and other well-connected men.
The then second in line to the throne, Prince Eddy, was among those implicated, and there were rumours (some confirmed in ensuing court cases) that certain individuals had been allowed to leave the country so as not to expose those higher up the Victorian pecking order.
It's considered to have been one of the factors behind the moral backlash that ultimately led to the conviction of Oscar Wilde for 'gross indecency' in 1895, at the height of the naughty nineties.
As first reported in the North London Press in September 1889, the police uncovered a male brothel on Cleveland Street in the West End in which telegraph boys had been recruited to have sex for money with aristocrats and other well-connected men.
The then second in line to the throne, Prince Eddy, was among those implicated, and there were rumours (some confirmed in ensuing court cases) that certain individuals had been allowed to leave the country so as not to expose those higher up the Victorian pecking order.
It's considered to have been one of the factors behind the moral backlash that ultimately led to the conviction of Oscar Wilde for 'gross indecency' in 1895, at the height of the naughty nineties.
posted by Kuvera at
08:58
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