Eve & the New Jerusalem : Socialism and Feminism in the Nineteenth Century (9780349007281) by Taylor Barbara

Author:Taylor, Barbara
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780349007281
Publisher: Hachette Book Group USA

Since these same men were usually unwilling to live a celibate existence, however, the position of women became increasingly insecure, particularly after the introduction of the Bastardy Clauses. This was a major problem in cities like London to which large numbers of girls were drawn, away from their families and communities, in search of employment. Here the transferral of traditional modes of sexual behaviour, particularly sex during courting, into an environment in which community and state sanctions no longer existed to enforce fatherly responsibilities, led to a high rate of desertion and illegitimacy. Consensual unions were common, but they were also unstable and often very shortlived. ‘I’m often out of work, and the last fortnight . . . I’ve nothing to do,’ as one needlewoman working in the London slop-trade told Henry Mayhew, ‘I’ve got no husband, but am compelled to live with a man to support me, for the sake of my child . . .’70 Many other needlewomen told of being in a similar position, often with tailors as their cohabitees. Relationships frequently ended when the man had to move to another part of the city to find work, or when cycles of economic depression made the prospect of growing family responsibilities too frightening. Ann Westmoreland and William Richey lived together in the Barbican district while he worked as a journeyman tailor in 1809. He was called away to the militia, and returned to find Ann expecting a child. He had other financial responsibilities, and trade had just suffered a collapse, so all he felt he could do was write to apologize and leave her to her own resources: ‘For I am very Short at Present and any Business is Extremly [sic] Dead’.71

Sometimes the women themselves terminated the relationship, usually for fear of additional pregnancies. One needlewoman who had ‘found it impossible to get on’ by herself accepted the proposition of a man lodging in the same house:

. . . the result was that I was in the family way . . . The man did his part as well he could, but the work he got was so little . . . that I told the man that he and I must part; for I had seen nothing but starvation with him.72

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