Mary Frances Jeffries (1819 – 1891) was a madam and procuror in London's

underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underwor ...

during the late 19th century. Jeffries was born in 1819 in

Brompton, Kent Brompton is a village near the town of Chatham in Medway, Kent, England. Its name means "a farmstead where broom grows" broom is a small yellow flowering shrub. Today, Brompton is a suburban village and is located between Chatham Dockyard and ...

, England. During the 1870s, she ran one of the few brothels in Victorian-era London which catered exclusively to many of the city's elite including the prominent businessmen and politicians including at least one member of the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...

and a titled Guards officer as well as aristocrats such as Leopold II. She was also involved in sexual slavery (known then as "white slavery") and child prostitution, often arranging the abduction of children by offering to watch children while parents went to collect luggage or purchase train tickets. Among her brothels in Church Street and Kensington as well as a

flagellation Flagellation (Latin , 'whip'), flogging or whipping is the act of beating the human body with special implements such as whips, rods, switches, the cat o' nine tails, the sjambok, the knout, etc. Typically, flogging has been imposed on ...

house in Hampstead, included a " chamber of horrors" in

Gray's Inn Road Gray's Inn Road (or Grays Inn Road) is an important road in the Bloomsbury district of Central London, in the London Borough of Camden. The road begins at the City of London boundary, where it bisects High Holborn, and ends at King's Cross and ...

where a room was designed for the purposes of

sado-masochism Sadomasochism ( ) is the giving and receiving of pleasure from acts involving the receipt or infliction of pain or humiliation. Practitioners of sadomasochism may seek sexual pleasure from their acts. While the terms sadist and masochist refer ...

as described by journalist

William Thomas Stead William Thomas Stead (5 July 184915 April 1912) was a British newspaper editor who, as a pioneer of investigative journalism, became a controversial figure of the Victorian era. Stead published a series of hugely influential campaigns whilst e ...

in a series of articles for the ''

Pall Mall Gazette ''The Pall Mall Gazette'' was an evening newspaper founded in London on 7 February 1865 by George Murray Smith; its first editor was Frederick Greenwood. In 1921, '' The Globe'' merged into ''The Pall Mall Gazette'', which itself was absorbed in ...

'' exposing prostitution in the city during the

Eliza Armstrong case The Eliza Armstrong case was a major scandal in the United Kingdom involving a child supposedly bought for prostitution for the purpose of exposing the evils of white slavery. While it achieved its purpose of helping to enable the passage of the ...

. Although never proven, she may have operated a white slave house along the river near

Kew Kew () is a district in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. Its population at the 2011 census was 11,436. Kew is the location of the Royal Botanic Gardens ("Kew Gardens"), now a World Heritage Site, which includes Kew Palace. Kew is a ...

, from which women were abducted and smuggled to foreign countries (see sexual slavery and human trafficking). In 1884, Alfred Dyer's London Committee obtained evidence of a high class

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

brothel operated by Jeffries. An investigation by a former police inspector, who had resigned from the Metropolitan Police when senior officials refused to prosecute her, had been amassing evidence against Jeffries during the year until the London Commission began a

private prosecution A private prosecution is a criminal proceeding initiated by an individual private citizen or private organisation (such as a prosecution association) instead of by a public prosecutor who represents the state. Private prosecutions are allowed in ma ...

in March 1885. This investigation included many witnesses from the brothels, including Lola Shropshire, Leona Noman, and Agnes Moris. These witnesses unfortunately had no clear evidence and were soon dismissed. Although unable to charge Jeffries with any serious offence apart from keeping a

disorderly house In English criminal law a disorderly house is a house in which the conduct of its inhabitants is such as to become a public nuisance, or outrages public decency, or tends to corrupt or deprave, or injures the public interest; or a house where pe ...

, the Commission expected much publicity from the case when presenting their evidence. For example, a former housemaid testified that she witnessed an assault on a 13-year-old girl who had been whipped by a belt and raped by a customer. Appearing in court on May 5, accompanied by several wealthy army officers, Jeffries paid a fine of £200 after arranging with the court to plead guilty in order to have the evidence against her remain undisclosed. As she left the courthouse, a guard of honour was formed around her by her young escorts.

References

External links

Mary Jeffries
at Probert Encyclopedia {{DEFAULTSORT:Jeffries, Mary 1820 births 1907 deaths English brothel owners and madams English criminals BDSM people 19th-century English businesspeople 19th-century English businesswomen