History 364-0-01: Gender and Sexuality in Victorian Britain; Northwestern University, Fall 2014

The Maiden Tribute and the Child Prostitution Scandal

1. What cultural attitudes about women, virginity, and sexual purity led privileged men to normalize child prostitution and fetishize virginity?
2. How did the prostitutes’ nationality or socioeconomic status affect their value as a commodity?
3. How does W. T. Stead portray each of the social classes in his Maiden Tribute?
4. In Chapter 5, Fishman writes that men from the West End favored female prostitutes from the East End. What are the multiple layers of injustice, class dichotomy, and gender politics underlined in this assertion?
5. Who do you think was ultimately held accountable for child prostitution by Victorian society after the exposé was published?
6. What role do you think the lack of sexual education played in this scandal and so-called sex trade?
7. Do you think that raising the age of consent from 13 to 16 might influence the trade in virginity?
8. What are some of the rhetorical and literary techniques Stead uses to gain the support of his readers?
9. What does the different treatment of Stead and Rebecca Jarrett in the aftermath of the scandal tell us about class and gender during the Victorian period?
10. Did W. T. Stead’s means justify the ends?

Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885

• The Criminal Law Amendment Act was finally passed on August 14, 1885
  • It raised the age of consent from 13 to 16 years of age
  • It made it a criminal offense to procure girls for prostitution by administering drugs, intimidation or fraud
  • It punished householders who would permit aunderage sex on their premises
  • It made it a criminal offense to abduct a girl under 18 for purposes of carnal knowledge (sexual intercourse)
  • It gave magistrates the power to issue search warrants to find missing females
  • It gave power to the court to remove a girl from her legal guardians if they condoned her seduction
  • It provided for summary proceedings to be taken against brothels (“disorderly houses” and “houses of ill repute”)
• The Labouchere Amendment to the 1885 Act extended the old sodomy (“buggery”) laws to include “any act of gross indecency” committed by “any male person” (construed as any kind of sexual activity between males)
  • This amendment was slipped in at the last minute and has nothing to do with the age of consent
  • The old sodomy laws are vastly expanded – sodomy is still considered to be a criminal offense, but now includes “any act of gross indecency,” which is not clearly defined

History 364-0-01: Gender and Sexuality in Victorian Britain; Northwestern University, Fall 2014 Prostitution and the Child Prostitution Scandal, Day 1

• Rape is the forced penetration of the female sex organ by a male sex organ, but in Victorian times, the female must prove that she physically struggled throughout the event
  • This is why there was some form of chloroform or opiate involved – because she can’t physically struggle (it wasn’t only to protect them)
  • It was nearly impossible for a woman to accuse her husband of rape because, in Victorian language, it is assumed that a woman gives consent through marriage
• The age of consent is the age at which a woman can legally consent to sexual activity; in the 1880s, the age of consent in Victorian Britain is 13
  • Stead refers to 13-year-olds as children and wants to increase this age to 16; he and his allies are furious because this legislation has been dormant

• “Victorians Uncovered,” a British docu-drama
  • There were brothels that specifically catered to men who liked children
  • It was a sexual fantasy to take a virgin, and it was considered safe from diseases (some believed the myth that it would cure the man of other diseases)
  • The aristocratic members of the parliament declined increasing the age of consent because they thought male privilege was being challenged
  • Children were kidnapped off the streets and imprisoned in brothels
  • Stead believed the wealthy were being abusive because wealth is power and poverty is weakness
  • Those who engaged in child prostitution believed that it wasn’t rape, it was a contractual exchange of a child’s virginity in return for cash
  • Stead required more evidence, so he decided he needed to go into the underground, where people saw as the place corruption festered
  • Stead posed as an aristocratic libertine with an interest in children in order to research; at first he was uncomfortable, but became more accustomed to the environment
  • Stead was fully committed to exposing all the details of the exchange, but in the process, became more drawn to the exchange
  • A warning was included in the newspaper letting people know that they should not read the newspaper if they are not ready to get shocked, and advised men to keep it away from their wives and children; this warning only increased the value of the sensation
  • The publication enraged members of the establishment and they tried to cover up what was revealed
  • A lot of people included in the publication disliked how they were portrayed in the article
  • One person who was particularly insulted was the mother of the girl that Stead had purchased for 5 pounds, and he underestimated how far she would go to protect her reputation
  • Although Stead followed through with the entire purchase process of the girl, he did not engage in sex; he did this to demonstrate the entire process that is done
  • Stead returned the girl he had purchased for the publication, but that didn’t stop people from wanting him prosecuted; he was convicted of assaulting the girl and sentenced to 3 months in prison
  • He was treated as a class-war prisoner
  • Five years later, he discovered he was a spiritualist; radical journalism and spiritualism don’t go well together
  • Stead thought the end was near, and it happened on the Titanic; he helped others get onto rescue boats, but didn’t try to help himself as he accepted his death that he had anticipated