Mary No-Nose: Cardiff Prostitute Nicknames

Cranky & Bristol Ann have a fight in 1841.

Nicknames were common throughout Wales as lots of people had the same first names or surnames. For the same reason they were also used a lot among the criminal fraternity, although perhaps their use also hid real names from the ears of authority. This post looks at the nicknames of Cardiff prostitutes working on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane in the 1840's to the 1860's.
There's no doubt they were in common use among the inhabitants as they are often recounted in witness statements. They were definitely not given by officials or outsiders. They were used so much that people would be unaware of their real names, like this example from 1847 on Whitmore Lane:

Geography

Many of the nicknames just identified the women by where they came from:

Kitty Pen Bont: Catherine Williams was from Bridgend (Penybont). She's the earliest reference to a working girl and was arrested at Mr Barnes pub in 1833 after stealing a watch from a punter with her bully.

Chepstow Mary: Eliza Davies worked on Charlotte Street in 1841.

Swansea Sue: Living on King Street, Swansea in 1841, Susan Davies moved to work on Charlotte Street and the Lane in 1848. In 1851 she was working in Ned Llewellyn's brothel on Whitmore Lane:

She worked as a prostitute until the early 1860's.

Welsh Kate: Also sometimes 'Welsh Kit'. Catherine Thomas worked on Whitmore Lane from 1841 to 1846. She hung around with Catherine Atkins- see below- so the nickname was handy to differentiate between the two Catherines, although Catherine Atkins was Welsh too!

Welsh Meg: Though not sure why Louisa Winstone was called Meg but she was obviously Welsh! Active on Whitmore Lane in 1852. 

The Great Westerns: I think this is a geographical reference. Mary Williams and Eliza Thomas were the Great Westerns in 1842.
Irish Kate: Charlotte Thompson in an unusually late reference to a nickname in 1871.
Irish Mary Ann: Mary Ann Hill in 1842. 

Irish Joanna: Joanna Mahoney worked the Lane from 1842 to 1844.

Irish Meg: Margaret Sullivan/John worked on Charlotte Street and the Lane for at least 23 years from 1851 until 1874. Not to be confused with Irish Mag who was Margaret Keyhole. At times Meg was a very successful thief:

She's one of the people in my Notorious book.

Bristol Ann: Ann Daniels worked on Whitmore Lane 1841-4.
Bristol Annie: Ann Daw stabbed a sailor she was co-habiting with in 1861 on Frederica Street.

Bristol Eliza: See the blogpost 'The Whore and the Mayoress' to read about Bristol Eliza.

Blackwood: Blackwood is a town in the county of Caerphilly. Ann Thomas worked the Lane from around 1846-7 and she was friends with Catherine Atkins (see below).

Abergavenny Poll: Hannah Goodwin, from Abergavenny, was active 1850-8 until she got seven years for a brothel theft and ended up in Brixton prison. She flitted between Cardiff and the China slum in Merthyr.

Ann Pendarren: From either Penderyn near Merthyr Tydfil or Penydarren in Merthyr Tydfil Ann Llewellyn hit it big at the lodging house of William Pimm in 1861:

Plymouth Eliza: I've not traced her real name, nickname is only known from a police court witness statement from January 1848.

Plymouth Ann: Mary Ann Jones ran a brothel for many years on Mill Lane and dies in April 1853.
Bristol Lizzy: Again, not traced her real name, one mention in a police report from The Royal Standard pub on Bute Street in 1859. Not the same as Bristol Eliza above as she died in 1851.
English Mary: Not many of the prostitutes were English so Mary stood out in this way. Evidence again comes from The Royal Standard Police report. It could be Mary Ann Huntley or Mary Ann Bailey for example, there's a few to choose from who were picked up from this time.
Nailsey Poll: Nailsea is a town southwest of Bristol. Real name unknown as it's in a list of prostitutes found in a Bute Street pub in 1861.

Physical Descriptions

Big Jane: Jane Thomas worked on Whitmore Lane in 1841 and was in the China slum in Merthyr by 1847. She wasn't too big to be threatened with the stocks in 1841:

Mary Fat: Mary Jones worked on Whitmore Lane in 1844-1846.
Betsey Bounce: I assume this is a physical characteristic, it could also refer to stealing. She assaulted Jane Thomas, probably 'Jane Fine-Talk' in 1842 with another prostitute and her real name is not given.

Mary the Cripple: Though always a brothel keeper rather than a prostitute Mary the Cripple was disabled since birth and started off in Newport. Read more about her Newport life here. Her sister Catherine Hughes was known as 'Long Kit' or 'Katty', her daughter Elizabeth Jenkins was known as 'Bets the Cripple', 'Betty Yarwood' and 'Cripple Junior' and her other daughter Ann Yarwood was 'The Young Cripple', though the name is not reported after she moved to Cardiff in 1853.

Rosy: Ann Lucas who came to Cardiff from Bideford in 1852 was rosy. 

Kitty Pigs Eyes: Catherine Atkins from Cardiff had this rather unfortunate nickname. She worked from 1844 to 1853. Here she is ashaming policemen. Kitty is one of my Notorious people.

Sarah Nips: Sarah Clarke was a prostitute working in the China area of Merthyr until the autumn of 1849 when she came to Charlotte Street. She stayed working in the sex-trade there for the next twenty years, running brothels and pubs. She was running the brothel that Kitty Pigs' Eyes was working in by 1851. Her nickname was not reported in the papers in Cardiff so she perhaps left it behind in Merthyr (though there were very close links between China and Whitmore Lane). The Nips nickname could be sexual or from 'nipper' a term for someone small.

Curley: Probably refers to the hair of Sophia Evans, active in 1852. 

Gummy: or Gummay was the nickname of Eliza Cartwright active in both China and Whitmore Lane 1847-1853. 

Carrots: The probably ginger-haired Ann Moore started prostitution in Newport in 1852 when she was aged just 14. She moved to Charlotte Street at the start of 1854 and was working in Jenny Piano's brothel at 16 Whitmore Lane in 1861. You can read more about her on the blog about Jenny Piano.

Little Jenny: She was listed as one of the women in The Argyle Rooms on Bute Road in 1861. 

Characteristics

Cranky: Mary Rees was obviously a bit moody! She worked on Whitmore Lane in 1841-8.
Mary No-Nose: Maybe Cranky had an accident as Mary No-Nose was a Mary Rees too in 1842.
Betsy Fine-Talk: Elizabeth Lewis obviously had the gift of the gab in 1842.
Jane Fine-Talk: Jane Thomas also had the gift of the gab in 1842.

Miss Molly Crankey: Mary Brewer was also moody in the early 1840's!
Mrs Fillpots: Maria Meyrick moved to Charlotte Street from the Friar's Fields area of Newport in 1845 after she was severely assaulted by her pimp. Mrs Fillpots was a character in a 1837 comedy play 'Women's Whims' which may have been shown at Newport. Mrs Fillpots is the landlady of a pub in the play. It obviously refers to Maria's heavy drinking.

The Grenadier: Mary Lawson was from Cheshire and tall and heavily built, Grenadiers in the army had to be tall- hence the nickname. She worked Whitmore Lane from 1846 until 1856 and appears in the book.

The Little Punch: Ann Owens was five foot and a half inch tall. She also had a mean punch by the sounds of it. She started her life in prostitution aged just 12 in Swansea and moved to Charlotte Street and the Lane in 1850. in 1851 she was working for Mrs Prothero in her brothel along with the Grenadier:

More about The Little Punch can be found in my blog about prostitute tattoes here.
Nicknames were sometimes reported in official prison records, like in Millbank Prison in 1865 where Ann Morgan is alias Owens alias Punch:

Random

Cockatoo: Mary Ann Jones was a prostitute and brothel keeper who started in Newport in 1843 and moved to Charlotte Street in 1851. She worked there until she got a 14 year sentence for theft. God only knows how she got the nickname of Cockatoo, perhaps a sexual reference.

Jenny Piano: Jane Roberts was active on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane 1848 until 1864. There's a blog post about her life here. I think the most obvious reason for the nickname is she played the piano in the pubs.

Topsy: The nickname of Gwenllian Hughes, active around 1853 on Charlotte Street. I'm not sure why!

All for Love: Eliza Thomas was obviously committed to her job in 1847.

Sancta Maria: This is the only example I have of a woman's nickname changing over time. In Newport Bridget Kelly worked the Friar's Fields area from 1839 and was known as Sancta Maria, I thought she was an Irish Roman Catholic but she was a Protestant, so I'm unsure of why the nickname stuck.  When she moved to Cardiff in 1846 she became known as Sandy Maria and then Saucy Maria, references to her hair colour and her occupation! 

The historian is chained by their sources. It's a sad fact for this book that the Newport and Merthyr press were more likely to give nicknames in their newspaper reports of criminal trials than the Cardiff press. Cardiff was slow to report it's court cases and there are hundreds of newspapers from the 1840's that give a paragraph of court cases from places like Neath, Merthyr and Swansea but nothing at all from Cardiff. The reporting of nicknames was more common in the 1840's, declined through the 1850's and was rare in the 1860's. Newport papers in the 1840's obviously sent a reporter to the courts who often gave highly descriptive reports of it's criminals and their speech, like this one of 'Mrs Fillpots' from 1843:

I love the 'And thank ye, sir' at the end.
Sandy Maria, Kitty Pigs' Eyes, Irish Meg, The Little Punch, Mary the Cripple, Mrs Fillpots, Sarah Nips and The Grenadier are all main people in my upcoming book 'Notorious:Cardiff' about thirty years on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane 1841-1870.

References available. 
Article is copyright Anthony Rhys 2017.

'Swaggering Gait': Pimps of Victorian Cardiff

'Has a swaggering gait, blotched face and dimpled chin' so reads the description of Lemuel Anderson, a bully of Charlotte Street in 1850. This post looks at the role of the bully, or pimp, in Cardiff from 1839-1851.
Lemuel was typical of the Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane bully (the older term for pimp). He was a 21 year old, born in Bristol where he had already been flogged in gaol as a child. As a teenager he had several minor scrapes with the law linked with his poverty, including washing naked in the canal feeder and stealing a goose and a bucket.

Early teenage crime was a feature of most bullies lives. Lemuel was also involved in petty crime with other young men on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. In 1849 he was out breaking lamps with his brother, James Loynes (who had grown up in a brothel) and Dan Ryan (who went on to be a bully and a thief for the next fifteen years).
When these lads were rounded up and put into the police cells they turned on the police station windows: 

1849 December 22nd Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.4.

In 1851 Lemuel was the bully of Mary Ann Powell, a prostitute from Newport. He had her name tattooed on his arm and she had his name tattooed on hers. These young lovers both robbed a man at the notorious Noah's Ark brothel by hitting him over the head with a poker while he slept:

1850 August 8th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.2.

They both got hefty transportation sentences for this attack.
The bully was a staple figure on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. They were tough men with a propensity for violence like 19 year old Daniel Beddoe:

1849 September 8th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.4.

The worst bullies were not linked to a single prostitute and instead terrorised any woman who had earned money like John Thomas:

1847 March 27th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.2.

Ann Anthony, the woman he kicked and threw the pint glass at was pregnant.
Many of the bullies of Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane were also boatmen on the Glamorganshire Canal that went past Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. See my separate post about the criminal uses of the canal here. The dual tasks of boatman and bully seemed to suit these men- I suppose the odd hours they did on the boats meant they could bully when they were not barging.

1846 October 10th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.3.

The bully also mirrored the prostitutes in terms of age and longevity of service in the role, most lasting a few years, generally from 18-25 years of age, before they either moved into less stressful and more settled occupations (one of them became a fishmonger!) or were imprisoned for long terms (such as Punch who died on a prison hulk in 1854).
There are exceptions to this rule such as William Bennett was still bullying on Whitmore Lane in 1848 at the age of 43. Like Lemuel usually the bullies were partnered with specific prostitutes and lived with them:

1856 March 15th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.8.

The bully was not always just a delinquent however. Some bullies had relationships with prostitutes that lasted many years and some gravitated towards more of a gangster role.
Davey Rees and Ann Green first worked together in the China slum of Merthyr Tydfil in 1851. They came to Cardiff soon after and ran The Cornish Arms at 38 Charlotte Street, staying together until 1856. This was a step-up from the bully/prostitute role as Davey and Ann could now get rent money from the other girls in the house, have a base to fence stolen goods and also sell beer. A similar arrangement existed with Harry Kickup and Rachel Holiday who ran The King's Head at 30 Charlotte Street. Rachel had been a prostitute for years and their relationship, though starting as a bully/prostitute role, lasted for eleven years until she died.

The bullies were often the primary thieves in the partnership, the woman brought in the victim so the bully could steal their money and valuables. Here a man picks up 17 year old Kesiah Jones from the doorway of Mrs Prothero's brothel in 1839 and they go 'to talk' down the street. In the shadows there's a surprise waiting in the form of Liverpool Dick:

1839 March 9th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.2. 'Maria' Jones is an error.

Richard Edwards alias 'Liverpool Dick' got 15 years transportation for this theft, Kesiah was released. This was what usually ended the bullies career-  they stole the money so they did the time.
The bully shadowed the girls on the streets and inside the brothels and beerhouses. Here Frank Clark helps one of his girls Ann Lewis take a purse from a ship master in 1851:

1851 October 25th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.2.

The bully would also intimidate the victim after the theft like here where Mary Tremain and Catherine Atkins alias 'Kitty Pig Eyes' robbed a mark:

1849 November 2nd The Principality p.5.

The beerhouses and brothels on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane often had resident bullies that were hired by the landlady or brothel keeper- they did all of the above jobs for all the women in the house, sort of a bouncer role. Bill Jones is house bully here at the Noah's Ark on Charlotte Street in 1851:

HO107/2455 F537 p.26

William Evans was house bully at Cora Clark's brothel on Whitmore Lane in 1851 and one of her girls was Kitty Pig's Eyes (also see above):

HO107/2455 F257 p.2.

Mary Prothero's brothel has her grandson James Loynes (erroneously written as Thomas Loynes here) as her bully:


HO107/2455 F267 p.23.

Where the brothel owners were men, as in the case of the brothers Bill and Ned Llewellyn, they also acted as bully for the women in their house.

1846 August 8th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.2.

Ned would stand outside his brothel door smoking and keeping an eye out for his women most nights, or patrol the streets looking out for them. When he saw they were in trouble- it didn't matter if the girls were getting aggro from drunken seamen or being taken in by the police- he'd pounce:

1851 August 2nd Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.3.

This was by no means the rule however and some brothels such as Mary Wright's (The Quiet Brothel), which was in business for over 15 years, is never recorded as having a bully. Not all of the prostitutes kept bullies either, they often worked for themselves or from the safety of an established brothel but the bully was often hard to avoid:

1850 October 5th Cardiff Merthyr Guardian p.3.

Given the bullies propensity for extreme violence it is worth pointing out that only two people died from bully assaults, in 1847 and 1851. Of course there were plenty more broken bones, popped out eyeballs, cracked ribs and bruises but cholera, smallpox, consumption and other diseases linked with poverty were the main killers on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. You were more in danger from the water and the air around you than you were from any bully.

The life stories of Ned Llewellyn, Davey Rees, Ann Green, Kitty Pigs Eyes, Kesiah Jones, Cora Clark, and Mrs Prothero are all in my upcoming book Notorious, about thirty years on these two streets. To read about the book see here.

All images are from the excellent Welsh Newspapers Online site run by the National Library of Wales. This article in its current form is copyright Anthony Rhys 2017.

Jenny Piano: Nymph and Brothel Keeper

The mark of Jenny Piano in 1853.

For those new to this blog it follows the lives of the inhabitants of two streets in Victorian Cardiff. Charlotte Street is now under the Marriott hotel by Cardiff central library and Whitmore Lane is now Custom House Street- turn right out of Cardiff central train station (where the Golden Cross pub still stands).

Jenny Piano was the nickname of Jane Roberts, a prostitute who worked in Cardiff and Merthyr, during the 1850's and 1860's. She's one woman that hasn't made it into my book 'Notorious' in full but her life story is typical of the Victorian sex-workers that spent most of their working lives on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. The background to these streets can be found here.

Jenny's own story starts in the China slum of Merthyr. China was already a well established area for brothels by the 1850's, a 'sink hole of iniquity'. On the 1851 census she is a 'dress-maker' and living with her 14 year old sister Sarah and a boatman. One of the oft-ignored aspects of the history of the Glamorganshire Canal, which ran direct from China to Whitmore Lane, was the habit of the boatmen to also be pimps, or bullies.

Jenny had already been working China for two years, in 1848 she takes a mark for five shillings after meeting him in a notorious pub:

She got off this charge but was caught again in 1850 stealing handkerchiefs with her bully Oliver. He got seven years transportation but Jenny was lucky and only got a month in prison.

It didn't put her off stealing from clients however as in August she was back in court:

Jenny moved to Charlotte Street in Cardiff after 1851 and was working in very notorious beerhouse and brothel 'The Cornish Arms' when she was picked up drunk and incapable by the gas works at the end of Whitmore Lane in March 1853.
She was working in The Cornish Arms when the landlady and madam Mrs Barnes died in June 1853, she was probably at her bedside when she died as she recorded her death. Jenny then moved to another brothel on Charlotte Street in the next few months where she charged a fellow prostitute with stealing her shawl from a chair.

She continued to work on Charlotte Street keeping her nose clean until she got into a fight with another prostitute Ann Moore alias 'Carrots' in June 1857:

Jenny wasn't long out of that month stretch before she was picked up for robbing a watch from a mark in August 1857.

Then it starts getting confusing as another prostitute, five years younger and also called Jane Roberts, alias 'Kitty', started to work on the Lane too. It could be either of these two Jane's that was picked up for fighting with fellow prostitutes in January and August 1858, I've got a feeling it was the younger Jane.

In October 1858 Jenny Piano was definitely running the brothel next door to The Ship Hotel at the canal end of Charlotte Street where she assisted in stripping a client of his watch and cash:

Jane Shoreland and the men were released but poor Jenny got nine months for her part in the robbery, the first two days of each month in solitary confinement.

Luckily (for me as a researcher) while Jenny is in gaol for this the other Jane Roberts got sent down for four years for a Charlotte Street brothel theft herself so she's out of the picture!

Jenny Piano didn't get reformed by her stay in gaol and in July 1860 she's up for another robbery again with John Maloney. John was one of the men involved in the 1858 robbery and her bully:

The 1861 census sees Jenny running a brothel at 16 Whitmore Lane, three doors down from Mary the Cripple's beerhouse. She'd obviously buried the hatchet with Carrots as Ann Moore is working in her brothel:



Jenny's brothel next to The Ship Hotel marked in blue, 16 Whitmore Lane marked in yellow, GRO

On the census Jenny has a one-eyed bully, William Williams, living with them. William was a boatman from Merthyr with a long history on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane.

Her girls, Hannah Davies and Ann Moore, were experienced prostitutes. Hannah had been working on Charlotte Street and the Lane since 1853 and like Jenny was from Merthyr:

1855 October 13th CMG p.5.

Ann Moore alias 'Carrots' had been working on Charlotte Street since 1854 and was very active as these two reports from 1856 show:

1856 February 2nd Cardiff and Merthyr Guardian, p.6.

1856 November 15th CMG p.8.

In fact Ann Moore had only been out of gaol for a fortnight when the census was taken as she'd been send down for a month on the 22nd March 1861 for assaulting a man:

1861 March 2nd CMG p.8.

Jenny Piano's brothel, with three women and a bully, was typical of the set up on Whitmore Lane at this time.
And guess who is living next door to Jane Roberts' brothel at 15 Whitmore Lane? John Maloney. He's running a lodging house and has a two year old 'daughter' listed with him called Elizabeth Davies, he's either romantically linked with Hannah Davies or is just looking after her child.

After 1861 Jenny Piano was put into the brothel at 31 Charlotte Street by Irish Meg in January 1863- see my previous blog post about 31 Charlotte Street.

1863 January 31t CMG p.6.

A little while later Jenny Piano marries John Maloney in March 1863 and after this there's no mention of her.
Jenny died in January 1870 aged 36. She is buried at Cathays Cemetary. By 1871 her husband John Maloney is living at 15 Charlotte Street with a new girl Ellen.

What we can infer from these records is that Jenny was an experienced working girl who was generally sober- it's these women that were successful at running the brothels on Charlotte Street and The Lane.
Her main crime is of theft from her customers, which was a perk of the job, and she was obviously quite good at this having avoided any long prison sentences throughout her fifteen years of active work.

Why was Jane Roberts called Jenny Piano? There's the obvious need to differentiate herself from the other Jane 'Kitty' Roberts and I think the nickname comes from her ability to play the piano well in the beerhouses of Charlotte Street (many employed fiddlers and even harpists).


References available 

Newspaper images are all courtesy of the excellent Wales Newspapers Online site run by the National Library of Wales. This article in its current form is copyright Anthony Rhys 2017. 

The Whore and the Mayoress: The Death of Bristol Eliza.

The Golden Cross: Whitmore Lane on the left c.1890. Image National Library of Wales.

The Whore and the Mayoress: The Death of Bristol Eliza

I am currently writing a book on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane in Cardiff, two streets notorious for prostitution, drink, violence and theft. From 1840-1870 it was a community unique in Cardiff's history and one that is currently quite unknown. See my earlier post on the general background of the book for more information on the growing art and narrative history project.

One of the most interesting events in my research so far has been the case of Eliza Wells. This is the text from my book.

Monday April 15th 1850

Merry Meyrick is woken up at Ann Llewellyn’s brothel. She gets the message that Bristol Eliza wants her because she is dying. Eliza used to be a servant from Bristol and worked on the Lane with Merry when she came to Cardiff. For the last three years she’s been going in and out of the workhouse with her injuries, big open sores on her legs that she got from a bully kicking three years ago. Wounds that just won’t heal. Syphilis has ravaged her body, there are weeping sores on her hands and feet, massive lesions and growths all over. To dull the pain Eliza’s been taking an ounce of laudanum a day for years, Merry often gets the laudanum for her and she takes half an ounce at a time from a small phial and then a drop of water. Recently it's got so bad that if she tries to speak or move too much she’s soon asleep.  

Merry walks down Whitmore Lane to Mrs Prothero’s brothel where Eliza has been lodging for years. Eliza is in a very bad state, weak, haggard and withered. She looks about 50 years old but has only lived 23 short years. She quietly tells Merry that she is dying and that she has seen it coming in her dreams. Merry doesn’t really know what to say so she talks to her of praying to God for solace. They say a prayer together and sit for a while. In the afternoon Eliza says she wants someone to read the bible to her. Merry can read and write a little but she knows her words will be slow and stumbling so Mrs Prothero sends for one of the few well educated people that they have had contact with. 

Mrs Vachell, the mayoress, who knows the girls from the courts and the streets comes within the half hour. She reads to Eliza and prays with her. Eliza asks to be turned from one side to another to ease the pain on her sore body and then she dies. When they try to move her body for the coroner blood gushes out of her mouth and nostrils. The inquest says that she died by the visitation of God.

So why does this sad event interest me so much? It gives an extremely rare behind the scenes insight into the human relationships of the many brothels on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane. It is also  evidence of the camaraderie and community that I hoped existed in this much maligned community. Here's some background information on the main people:

Mrs Prothero ran a brothel on Whitmore Lane from at least 1839 until her death aged 84 in 1857. It was in a commanding position at number 44 Whitmore Lane, right next door to the Custom House where the sailors were paid their wages. It also operated in conjunction with a pub on Charlotte Street that was called 'The Navigators Arms' 1841-1849, 'The Lame Chicken' up until 1851 and then 'Noah's Ark' until 1855. This notorious beer house was run by Mrs Prothero's daughter and son-in-law and it supplied drunken customers for the brothel and also out of hours beer.

Mrs Prothero's brothel or 'lodging house' at 44 Whitmore Lane, 1851. All five women listed were active prostitutes, 'girls of ill fame' has been written down by the census taker then later crossed out.

Merry Meyrick is Maria Meyrick, a Cardiff born girl who turned to prostitution in the Friar's Fields area of Newport around 1841 at the age of 19.  She returned to Cardiff in 1845 after she was severely beaten by her bully and almost killed. At first Maria worked mainly out of the Gloucester Arms beerhouse at 28 Charlotte Street but like most other girls she moved from pub to pub and brothel to brothel. She could be vicious and was an accessory in the murder of a man in 1847 when she assaulted his landlady Peggy the Sweep for bringing a light out to her own door. She was transported to Van Dieman's Land in 1851 for a brothel theft at the Noah's Ark. (Her nickname Merry comes from a report in a Hobart newspaper- Maria liked to wear pink dresses.)

1841 census record for Eliza Wells, aged 15.

Maria Meyrick showed another side of her character though with Bristol Eliza (place name nicknames were common in these streets, Liverpool Dick, Swansea Dan, Swansea Sue and Gloucester Bill were all living on Charlotte Street and Whitmore Lane). Eliza Wells was indeed from Bristol and was a house servant for a skilled working class family on Lawrence Hill in 1841. When she moved to Cardiff is unknown as she seemed to stay out of trouble with the authorities but by February 1847 she was very unwell. She entered the Cardiff Union Workhouse as a destitute prostitute and with 'wounds on legs'. She seems to have admitted herself voluntarily for medical help for short periods and discharged herself on the 16th February, 15th April and 24th July 1847. 

Cardiff Union Workhouse admissions register 1847 listing Eliza Wells

The inquest says that the wounds on her legs were originally caused by kicks from a bully (pimp). There was endemic violence towards prostitutes from their bullies right through the Victorian era and kicking was as popular as punching. Why the wounds did not heal though is due to the syphilis she had contracted. The inquest does not say this explicitly, preferring to call it 'the disease to which unfortunate women are peculiarly liable' and 'a certain disease'. Eliza was obviously in the latter stages of syphilis and her body would have been a mass of painful sores. She would have also probably suffered from growths around her vagina and anus, hair loss, swollen glands, tiredness, headaches and joint pains. As she worsened further she would have had vision and heart problems, numbness, loss of co-ordination and she died from either a laudanum overdose, meningitis, strokes or dementia like symptoms as her brain rotted.

The inquest also says that laudanum, a flavoured medicine of 10% opium and 90% alcohol, was easily accessible from the chemist and that it was low cost and commonly used by the prostitutes. It was a cheaper way of getting wasted than alcohol and was also an effective pain reliever. Laudanum misuse was a massively under reported problem in Cardiff and I have only come across one other reference to it in this time period when Ann Llewellyn, who Maria Meyrick was lodging with, took an overdose in January 1857. This was probably a suicide attempt as she was about to be given a four year sentence for a robbery.

What interests me with all this information is that Mrs Prothero, Maria Meyrick and others obviously took care of Eliza Wells over a three year period. I think a common assumption with a case like this is that Eliza would have been forced out of the brothel as she was no longer economically viable and would have died in the workhouse. The opposite seems true here however as she died in bed surrounded by friends. There was no way she could have paid any rent or bought laudanum by her own means especially in the latter years or months of her life yet this is what happened. The relevant records for the workhouse do not survive for this period but I doubt if she was a candidate for outdoor relief from the Poor Law authorities so what we have is a brothel owner and a working prostitute looking after one of their own and caring for them.

The mayoresses' involvement is also interesting. Mrs Vachell probably came into contact with Mrs Prothero and her girls either through the police courts and magistrates or through some civic charitable cause, although I have found no charity involvement recorded this early- all of the 'homes for fallen women' and church work seemed to have started in the 1860's. I find it very consoling that a 'lady of the pave' could go out on a Monday morning to the mayors house and ask her to come and read to a dying syphilitic. 

Eliza Wells was buried April 17th 1850 at St Mary the Virgin Cardiff aged 23 and I like to think that her funeral was well attended by her friends. I am glad that she was looked after. 

St Mary the Virgin Church Burial Record for Eliza Wells, 1850.

References available. 

Article in it's current form is copyright Anthony Rhys 2017.