This article uses a variety of archival material to produce the first critical study of the lives of prostitutes in interwar London. The first section examines the social characteristics that linked many of the women involved in prostitution in the West End.
As will be seen, prostitution was, in most cases, a conscious choice by working-class women to improve their lot. Section two builds upon the labour history framework, and explores the social world of the prostitute.
The final section investigates employment conditions involved in prostitution. A version of this paper was presented to the Social History Society conference, Rotterdam, 29 March Any errors in fact or interpretation are entirely my own. A gruesome sight greeted the police: Smith had been strangled with a length of copper insulated wire. Severe head wounds had also been inflicted with the use of a rusty flat iron; that her skull was fractured was obvious by the visible brain matter.
She had been killed at her most vulnerable: lying on her back with her clothes arranged for the purpose of sexual intercourse.
There was no sign of a struggle. First, a murder offers the rare opportunity to trace the life history of a prostitute. Smith was born in , the illegitimate daughter of Kathleen Hind in East Ham. She married Robert Smith in , though the union was not a success.
