Category Archives: Sexuality

1785: Mrs Errington gropes servants, trims pubic hair

In 1785, the London press became fascinated by the antics of Harriet Errington, uncovered at divorce proceedings instigated by her wealthy businessman husband. Mrs Errington was accused of numerous counts of adultery. Among those listed as her lovers were “Augustus Murray Smith, Captain Buckley, Captain Southby, Thomas Walker, and many others”.

In one whimsical account of the testimony, Mrs Errington was visited for dinner by Captain Southby, but according to maidservant Molly Mitchell, the Captain and Mrs Errington abandoned their food and went upstairs:

“We cannot absolutely say how she was engaged while the repast was cooling… The Captain and she, it is supposed, were taking a wet and relish together; or he might probably be instructing her in… the modern methods of attack and defence. She is a woman who thirsted after knowledge and if the Captain had anything new to communicate, she was sure to pump it out of him… Molly Mitchell supposes the Captain discharged his musket, for though she did not hear the report, she smelt the powder…”

Even more shocking to London society was Mrs Errington’s lewd dealings with working class men and servants. Simon Orchard, a teenage footman, testified that while asleep in his bed:

“..he was waked by the bedclothes being stripped off him, and upon looking he observed the said Harriet Errington, in her shift only… and Phebe Lush, a fellow servant, by his bedside. And the said Harriet Errington pulled up his shirt and caught hold of his private parts, and pulled him out of bed by the same, and said she would pull him down the stairs… This deponent struggled a good deal with her to get away.”

Mrs Errington’s approaches continued the following night, when she ordered Simon to hide under the bed of a female servant, in order to spy her undressing. On the third day, Orchard walked in on Mrs Errington trimming her pubic hair, before a small crowd of onlookers:

“As this deponent was going into the kitchen, this deponent saw the said Harriet Errington standing before the fire, with her petticoats as high as her knees… Phebe Lush and Mary Mitchell and her master’s son, a boy about five years old, were with her… Seeing some small pieces of hair laying upon paper, [Orchard] asked what it was, and the little boy told him, that Mrs Errington had been cutting it off under her petticoats…”

The London court granted George Errington a divorce without hesitation. In 1795 George was murdered by one of his own spurned lovers, Miss Ann Broderick, who shot him through the heart. The fate of the former Mrs Errington is unknown.

Source: Various, inc. Randall, The Trial of Mrs Harriet Errington, London, 1785. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1657: Scot keeps masturbation diary

William Drummond was a Scottish gentleman of the 17th century. He was the son of William Drummond of Hawthornden, a prominent poet, historian and royal propagandist.

While Drummond lacked his father’s flair for writing, his diary entries from 1657 onwards offer terse but informative glimpses into his private life. No less than 38 of Drummond’s entries in that year record instances of masturbation, using the code word “fattall”. Some of the more interesting entries, complete with Drummond’s original spelling, include:

January 4th: I stayed at hom from church and red the Cyprian Grove… fattall.

January 28th: Solitaire, fattall.

February 4th: Solitaire, but yet fattall. Lay in my bed all day.

February 26th: All night fattall.

March 12th: Fattall thrice.

March 28th: Fattall fowre times.

April 15th: Solitaire, fattall most grivously.

May 8th: Began first to ride that book which is so much estim’d of, Arcadia, out of a curiositie, becawse everyon was perswaded that it cowld not be but I had red it before twentie times. Fattall twise.

July 13th: Fattall fowre times.

Drummond’s diary also reports sexual liaisons with an unnamed mistress (“Z”) and the consummation of his marriage on December 17th 1657. Understandably, his diary mentions masturbating much less frequently after this – however on February 7th 1659 he admits to “fattall” again while his wife was away in Pendrike.

Source: Diary of Sir William Drummond of Hawthorden, 1657-59. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1641: One-eyed man hanged for fathering deformed piglet

In 1641, the people of New Haven, Connecticut, heard news that a monstrous piglet with human-like features had been delivered by a sow owned by Mrs Wakeman. Shocked local elders, convinced that the stillborn piglet had been conceived through an act of bestiality, asked locals to view it:

“The monster was come to the full growth as other pigs, but brought forth dead. It had no hair on the whole body, the skin was very tender and of a white colour, like a child’s; the head was most strange, it had one eye, in the bottom of the forehead, which was like a child’s… a thing of flesh grew forth and hung down, it was hollow and like a man’s instrument of generation. A nose, mouth and chin deformed but no much unlike a child’s, the neck and ears also had such a resemblance…”

Several were of the view that George Spencer, a local man with one glass eye, was responsible for the deformed piglet:

“A strange impression was also upon many that saw the monster (guided by the near resemblance of the eye) that one George Spencer… had been an actor in unnatural and abominable filthiness with the sow.”

New Haven leaders ordered the arrest of Spencer, who was often in trouble and was probably simple-minded. At first, he admitted to “forcing himself” on the sow, though this confession was later retracted.

Spencer was put on trial for living a life of “profane, atheistical carriage”. Witnesses testified that Spencer was deceitful, had bad manners, sometimes mocked religious holy days and often failed to pray. He was found guilty of bestiality with the pig, despite a lack of witnesses, and hanged in April 1642.

Source: Records of the Colony and Plantation of New Haven, 1641. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1619: Homophobe wears buttock basket, fight ensues

Writing in 1619, Pedro de Leon reports a recent incident in Madrid. City authorities there had broken up a fistfight between a local student and a barber, arresting both men. Under questioning, it was soon discovered the student had entered the barber’s shop with “a large basket tightly fitted to his buttocks”. When the barber asked the reason for this, the student replied:

“These are dangerous times, what with the city full of Italian sodomites. I find it prudent to wear the basket as a preventative measure.”

The barber, who was Italian, naturally took umbrage at this provocation and threw the first punch. De Leon reports that both men escaped punishment – and when the student was released, he was “still wearing his defence”.

Source: Pedro de Leon, Compendio, 1619. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1879: Lewis Carroll seeks permission to photograph nude children

In 1879, Charles L. Dodgson was better known to the world as Lewis Carroll. His book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland had enjoyed critical praise and commercial success when published 14 years before.

Carroll was also an avid photographer at a time when amateur photography was both difficult and very expensive. The majority of Carroll’s surviving photographs feature young girls. In May 1879, he wrote to Mr and Mrs Mayhew, asking permission to photograph their daughters Ruth (aged 13), Ethel (aged 11) and Janet (aged six).

These extracts reveal Carroll’s persistent coaxing, as he seeks Mayhew’s permission to photograph the girls in various states of undress:

“Now your Ethel is beautiful, both in face and form; and is also a perfectly simple-minded child of Nature… So my humble petition is, that you will bring the three girls, and that you will allow me to try some groupings of Ethel and Janet (I fear there is no use naming Ruth as well, at her age, though I should have no objection!) without any drapery or suggestion of it.

If I did not believe I could take such pictures without any lower motive than a pure love of art, I would not ask of it…”

Mrs Mayhew responded to Dodgson’s letter, agreeing to some of his requests, though her reply has not survived. A follow-up letter, written by Dodgson to Mr Mayhew, is extant:

“I am heartily obliged to Mrs Mayhew for her kind note. It gives more than I had ventured to hope for, and does not extinguish the hope that I may yet get ALL I asked…

The permission to go as far as bathing drawers is very charming… I can make some charming groups of Ethel and Janet in bathing drawers, though I cannot exaggerate how much better they would look without.”

Source: Letter from Charles Dodgson to Mrs Mayhew, May 26th; letter to Mr Mayhew, May 27th 1879. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1574: Treviso sodomites to be nailed in the private male members

In 1574, the city leaders of Treviso, a few miles north of Venice, initiated a crackdown on sodomy. These campaigns were not uncommon in Renaissance Italy, though the Treviso statutes were unusual in that they also targeted women:

“If any person has sexual relations with another – that is, a man with another man (if they are 14 years old or more) or a woman with another woman (if they are 12 years old or more) then they have committed the vice of sodomy…”

As might be expected, the punishments were severe. The 1574 edicts ordered that female sodomites (fregatores, or ‘friggers’) be tied naked to a stake in Treviso’s Street of Locusts. After a full day and night they were to be taken down and burned alive beyond the city walls.

For males (buzerones, or ‘buggerers’) the punishment was similar, though with a painful addition:

“[He] must be stripped of all clothing and fastened to a stake in the Street of Locusts, with a nail or rivet driven through his private male member. There he shall remain all day and all night, under guard, and the following day be burned outside the city.”

Source: Statuta prouisionesque dudes civitatis Tarvisii, 1574. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

c.79AD: Man self-pleasures and stains statute

Ancient writers like Pliny the Elder often waxed lyrical about the statue of Aphrodite on the island of Knidos (now in south-east Turkey). Crafted in the 4th century BC by the Athenian sculptor Praxiteles, the Aphrodite of Knidos depicted the goddess of love fully naked and preparing to bathe – but demurely covering her genitals with one hand.

Historians believe that Praxiteles’ Aphrodite might be one of the most influential sculptures of ancient times, shaping later and more famous works like the Venus de Milo. But in its own time, the perfect form and erotic beauty of the Knidos Aphrodite was legendary, drawing crowds of people each day.

According to Pliny, one man was so besotted by the Aphrodite that he purposefully remained with the statute overnight, using it for his own pleasure – and leaving his mark:

“There is a story that a man once fell in love with [the Aphrodite] and, hiding by night, embraced it, and that a stain betrays this lustful act.”

Source: Pliny, Natural History XXXVI.iv.21, c.79AD. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1903: Army officer confesses to fornicating with fruit

Havelock Ellis (1859-1939) was a London-born physician and author who specialised in research into human sexuality, particularly sexual behaviours that departed from what was considered normal, at least in Ellis’ time. His interest and specialisation in sexuality was ironic, given that Ellis’ own marriage (to suffragist and women’s rights campaigner Edith Lees, an open lesbian) was largely sexless.

Writing in 1903, Ellis detailed his interviews with “GR”, an unnamed officer who had served with the Indian colonial army. “GR” admitted to an active bisexual sex life: from interaction with other boys at school, to encounters with a host of foreign prostitutes, to affairs with his fellow military officers.

Much more peculiarly, when partners were unavailable and “GR” turned to self pleasure, he confessed to making “carnal use” of fruit, specifically, melons and papaya. According to “GR”, masturbating with tropical fruit was “most satisfactory”.

In the same work, Ellis also details his discussions with Captain Kenneth Searight, a notorious pederast who was also stationed in India. Searight kept a diary listing his sexual liaisons with no less than 129 local boys, describing their ages, appearance and the number of orgasms with each.

Source: Havelock Ellis, Studies in the Psychology of Sex, 1903. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.

1913: Marie Stopes claims ignorance of sex

Marie Stopes (1880-1958) was a Scottish-born botanist and author. She became famous for promoting sex education for women and awareness of female contraception, opening the first birth control clinic in Britain.

Stopes graduated with a bachelor’s degree in botany from University College in London before her 21st birthday. Within two years she had also earned a science doctorate and a PhD. In 1911, she married Reginald Ruggles Gates, a Canadian scientist, but within a year their political differences and personal incompatibility had taken a toll on their relationship.

In 1913 Stopes sought the dissolution of her marriage to Gates. When seeking annulment, Stopes made some astonishing claims. She swore that the marriage had not been consummated, mainly because Stopes was unaware what sexual intercourse actually was. She claimed to have discovered the reality of her situation after visiting the museum and reading an anatomical text.

Stopes was medically tested and discovered to be virgina intacta. She was granted a divorce in 1916. Two years later she penned her controversial but groundbreaking sexual guide, Married Love.

Stopes regularly asserted that her motive for educating married women was to spare them the misery of sexual ignorance that she had endured. Some historians and biographers, however, view Stopes’ claims of marital ignorance with scepticism.

Source: Various, including William Garrett, Marie Stopes: Feminist, Eroticist, Eugenicist, 2008. Content on this page is © Alpha History 2019-23. Content may not be republished without our express permission. For more information please refer to our Terms of Use or contact Alpha History.