Adrian Shan
HIS 200
Final Paper
The Sudden Regard for Homosexuality
The number of historical scholars who agree that eighteenth-century Europe experienced
a sexual revolution runs the gamut. One such historian, Karen Harvey, has gone so far as to
proclaim “this is the century of sex and the body.” 1 Connotations ascribed to revolutions of any
sort typically evoke notions of progress. However, this cannot be said of England’s sexual
revolution. Instead, the era saw a conservative transformation in its sexual social order. Even
more confounding, this change was, in part, the product of Enlightenment attitudes and corporeal
aspects of the Scientific Revolution. Together, these forces may have counterintuitively created a
society whose male members perceived a threat to its collective dominance over the female half.
To mitigate this supposed risk, standards of acceptable male sexuality would dramatically
narrow. In examination of these new standards around male sexuality, we can use records in the
Old Bailey to trace patterns of change in societal disposition toward homosexual sodomy. This
investigation sheds light on not just when and how these transformations occurred, but why.
Thoms Laqueur’s profound work, Making Sex; Body and Gender from the Greeks to
Freud, examines the interplay of human biology and political hierarchy throughout history. He
particularly investigates this topic in eighteenth-century Europe.2 It is in this place and era that
Laqueur examines a shift in the collective perception of gender. “Where the boundaries between
Karen Harvey, “The Century of Sex? Gender, Bodies, and Sexuality in the Long Eighteenth Century,” The
Historical Journal 45, no. 4 (December 2002): 899–916, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0018246X02002728. 899.
2
Laqueur, Thomas, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1992).
1
male and female [were once] of degree and not kind”3, Laqueur came to find that the inverse had
occurred. Harvey points out that in Making Sex, Laqueur denies the correlation between the
timing of the Scientific Revolution and the novel interpretation of human genders as opposites.4
However, she does state that there had been a general recognition of the reordering of
qualitatively distinct sexes. This shift in perception lead to the more modern notion of gender as
a “cultural category”.5 Before this, categorization of gender was ontologically absent because the
sameness of hierarchical sex fashioned one gender. Harvey and Laqueur both agree that “Science
mediated a political debate over people’s rights, demonstrating that there were indissoluble
differences within the human race which justified inequitable access to power.” 6 If science was
not the catalyst for a change in societal consciousness around gender, its rhetoric was
nonetheless used to justify the perpetuation of male domination. Harvey assesses a significant
historiography of sexual models; wherein competing theories interpreted the ejaculation of
women as being either necessary or unnecessary to conception. Respectively, these were coined
the “two-seed theory”, which required female ejaculation, and “one-seed theory”, which did not.
“During the eighteenth century…two seed theories were undermined, and ultimately women’s
sexual pleasure…was regarded as dispensable to conception.” 7 Eighteenth-century discourse of
female sexuality, especially scientific language, increasingly positioned female sexuality as
different from and opposite to male sexuality. Further, it diminished the necessity, and by that
extension, the validity of female sexuality. Conversely, this implied that male sexuality was more
superior than ever. Resultantly, it would be put into the spotlight for examination.
3
Laqueur, Thomas. Making Sex. 25.
Harvey, “The Century of Sex?”. 906.
5
Harvey. 901.
6
Harvey. 902.
7
Harvey. 903.
4
This sharp dichotomization of male and female produced a requirement for updated
lenses of sexual interpretation. It would not be until 1711 that we see the first printed use of the
phrase “opposite sex.” 8 Again, Harvey and Laqueur would suggest the Scientific Revolution did
not cause the shifting identification of gender. But this new phrase is another example of its
influence on the discourse of the topic. Before the eighteenth-century, the perception of the
vagina was something like an “interior penis, the labia as foreskin, the uterus as scrotum, and the
ovaries as testicles.”9 Altogether, the concept of female sexual organs had been considered an
inferior counterpart to male sexual organs. This bodily understanding coalesced with the rest of
the patriarchy, squarely placing the physical nature of women beneath that of men. The Scientific
Revolution, wrapping up in the late seventeenth century, provided challenging innovative ideas
of human anatomy for society to wrestle with.10 Laymen Europeans, several decades downstream
from the completion of the Scientific Revolution, could have certainly appreciated a more exact
understanding of the difference in female anatomical structure. But, if we are to acquiesce that
this shift in science did not affect mass sexual consciousness outside of its practical discourse,
we may turn to Laqueur’s origin theory of gendered opposites; “that it was produced through
endless micro-confrontations over power in the public and private spheres.”11
These confrontations would, paradoxically, largely stem from the Enlightenment. The
theoretical rhetoric of this movement called for liberty and equality to be collectively distributed.
However, the clash these ideas created when opposing traditional values established a European
Oxford English Dictionary, “opposite, n., Adj., Adv., and Prep.”. (Oxford University Press, n.d.),
https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/131986?redirectedFrom=opposite+sex.
9
Laqueur. Making Sex. 4.
10
For an overview on how the relationship between the Scientific Revolution and medicine has been
historiographically represented, see Harold J. Cook, “The History of Medicine and the Scientific Revolution,” Isis
102, no. 1 (2011): 102–8, https://doi.org/10.1086/658659.
11
Laqueur. 195.
8
society that, in some ways, liberally degraded. The eighteenth-century sexual revolution may be
one example of this. On paper, the Enlightenment should have expanded sexuality. However, it
came along just as Europe began grappling with the breakdown of sexual hierarchies and the
invention of gender. The combination of new liberalism and unconventional sexual schemas
proved too radical for dominant groups. Threatening to displace European patriarchy, gender
required taming. One means of subduing the sexual movement was with liberal elements of the
Enlightenment itself. The ancient philosophy of social contract theory, the “view that persons’
moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a[n]…agreement among them to form the
society in which they live.”, was called upon by patriarchal surmounters. 12 Of social contract
theory, Laqueur posited that it “postulated a [human] body that, if not sexless, is undifferentiated
in its desires…its capacity to reason.”13 In opposition to gendering language, patriarchal actors
used this liberal aspect of the theory to suggest that there was no vertical or horizontal hierarchy
involving gender. There are only people with coincidental biological characteristics. In doing so,
they felt justified in drawing upon other elements of the theory. Namely, that in a state of nature,
social contract theory positioned “women…subordinate to men. Therefore, the social contract
could be created between men only”.14 Though this was tactically manipulative and used as a
blatantly false equivalency, the excuse was nonetheless good enough to mitigate women’s
positional or sexual progress. 15 If anything, this more concretely subjected them to their
positionality, creating an even starker contrast between the sexual notions of man and woman. Of
course, alongside the advent of new anatomy, the belief that no gender existed could not stick,
“Social Contract Theory | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy,” accessed November 18, 2021,
https://iep.utm.edu/soc-cont/.
13
Laqueur. Making Sex. 196.
14
Laqueur. 197.
15
For more on the legacy of Social Contract Theory, see David G. Ritchie, “Contributions to the History of the
Social Contract Theory,” Political Science Quarterly 6, no. 4 (1891): 656–76, https://doi.org/10.2307/2139203.
12
but the reinforcement of women as hierarchically lesser in society was possibly worsened. And,
where female anatomy had once been on a lower rung of the same ladder, it was now considered
an altogether different but inferior bodily system.
In degrading the sexuality of women, discourses of both the Scientific Revolution and the
Enlightenment would turn a spotlight to male sexuality. Michael McKeon discusses the shift of
English society’s observation of same-sex male relationships in “The Seventeenth- and
Eighteenth-Century Sex Hypothesis”.16 Before the eighteenth-century, these relationships were
considered a means by which a dominant individual, always an older male, would display power
and status through pederasty, most often with a boy. This kind of relationship was viewed
similarly to the dominance of men in male-female relationships. However, as the century moved
forward, pederastic relationships were beginning to be seen as “desire-based…not power based.”
The emergence of novel sexual perceptions highlighted the now more robust difference between
“normal” sexual relations of men and women, and the comparatively abnormal relations between
two men. This would supply new grounds for English society to more strongly otherize
homosexuality than it once had. This otherization, a product of the dichotomization of gender, is
crucial in understanding the alteration in society’s treatment of homosexuality.17 According to
McKeon, “In early eighteenth-century London, what came to be called a molly subculture
coalesced alongside the biologization of the male and female genders…a sort of third gender
composed exclusively of male sodomites.”18 This subculture, prime for societal otherization,
would be cause for mass anxiety amongst men, heterosexual or otherwise. Randolph Trumbach’s
Michael McKeon, “The Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Sexuality Hypothesis,” Signs: Journal of Women in
Culture and Society 37, no. 4 (June 2012): 791–801, https://doi.org/10.1086/664465.
17
For a contemporary examination of otherization and its effects on whichever society it influences, see Cara
Cunningham Warren, “Outing Otherization: A Means to Enable Cooperation in a Post-Truth Era Washburn Law
Journal Symposium: Law in the Post-Truth Era,” Washburn Law Journal 58, no. 3 (2019): 609–36.
18
McKeon, “The Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century Sexuality Hypothesis.”
16
work, Sex and the Gender Revolution explores the growing anxiety for men to prove their
heterosexuality in the early seventeen-hundreds.19 This is reflected in the increasing rates of
arrests for prostitution and sodomy, which was exasperated by the efforts of the Societies for the
Reformation of Manners from 1710-1738.20 This was a Christian organization which sought to
eliminate sodomitical practices in London by helping bring those accused of the crime to court.
In reaction to the growing pressures of London’s anti-sodomite tendencies, men began to go out
of their way to prove their heterosexuality. For example, masters and journeymen would
coordinate encounters between their apprentices and prostitutes, thus effectively establishing a
public reputation for the apprentice’s heterosexuality.21 Trumbach shows us that rates of arrests
made for prostitution increased significantly because of practices like this.22 This phenomenon
implies evidence that the public cared far more for preserving their reputation per the evolving
demands of patriarchy and Christianity than maintaining distance from legal convictions.
McKeon’s “third gender” was the categorization that Londoners had to shape around
sodomites in their changing understanding of homosexuality. One segment of London culture,
Christianity, had long considered sodomy a sin. But, due to the reinterpretations of gender and its
resultant eschewing of gender as a spectrum, sodomy was increasingly associated with
homosexuality exclusively, as opposed to sodomy in the more general sense. I.e., nonprocreative sex. Like every other European institution, Christianity was forced to contemporize
gender, homosexuality, and sodomy. Specifically, Christianity had to measure exactly how sinful
homosexuality was. Because religion acted as the moral basis for jurisprudence, we can observe
19
Trumbach, Randolph, Sex and the Gender Revolution: Heterosexuality and the Third Gender in Enlightenment
London, vol. One, The Chicago Series on Sexuality, History, and Society (The University of Chicago: The
University of Chicago Press, 1998). 90-111.
20
Trumbach. Sex and the Gender Revolution. 90.
21
Trumbach. 101.
22
Trumbach. 91-100.
trends in the Old Bailey’s documents that reflect London’s changing patterns on this matter.
From 1677 to 1710, only seven cases of sodomy are to be found in its accounts.23 Almost all of
them are befitting of a sense of sodomy that predates English preoccupation with homosexuality.
Of these seven, three are supposedly committed between a human and an animal. Two are
between men and unknown participants. And one, taking place in 1694, is between a man and a
boy, wherein the man is found guilty and sentenced to death.24 Despite the homosexual nature of
this case, it also fits the era’s more traditional sense of sodomy. The man, Mustapha
Pochowachett, being a Turk, was unaccustomed with the English language. The court required a
translator for communication with him. This fact alone indicates that he was not necessarily
ranked as a significant social superior to the boy whom he committed sodomy against. Had
Pochowachett fit the bill of English aristocrat or the boys labor master, no crime would have
been considered to exist. As such, this case was viewed as immoral because it was more
evocative non-procreative sex than it was of homosexual sodomy.
The transition of London’s legal perspectives on sodomy are shown in three of the Old
Bailey’s records, from 1715 to 1721.25 All of the cases prior to these three, as previously
described, embodied the old interpretation of sodomy. I.e., that it was a sinful act of nonprocreative sex, irrespective of concerns for gender. Regard for gender in these cases were absent
because the societal desire to dichotomize male from female had not yet occurred. But London
was now making use of the discourse around gender created by the Scientific Revolution. And,
the Enlightenment, one of the causes of homosexual anxieties, was just ramping up. As the
23
Old Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 8.0, 01 December 2021), Searched for all
offences of sodomy between 1674 and 1725.
24
Old Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 8.0, 01 December 2021), May 1694, trial of
Mustapha Pochowachett (t16940524-20).
25
OBP, Searched for all offences of sodomy between 1711 and 1725.
appetite to separate the sexes grew, and as men fearfully began to guard their heterosexual
reputations, the nature of Old Bailey proceedings regarding sodomy started to change rapidly.
This is reflected by the growing pains observed in the three Cases of Transition26. Each of them
also displays the uneasy footing with which Londoners attempt to navigate their developing
disdain for homosexuality. First, in 1715, forty-one years after the earliest records found in the
Old Bailey, we witness a case of sodomy committed between two men for the first time.27
William Mayly was “indicted for attempting to commit the detestable Sin of Sodomy
upon…David Thomas : But Thomas resisting to be sworn to give Evidence…Mayly was
acquitted.”28 We cannot know why Thomas recanted his accusations against Mayly. However,
we do know for certain that it was the original proceeding definitively confronting homosexual
sodomy, even though the Old Bailey could have been persecuting homosexual sodomites for
decades. Further, we can ascertain that it is possible that Thomas chose to repudiate his charge in
an unsured attempt to protect his reputation. His back-and-forth demeanor could have been due
to his pioneering of legally confronting homosexual sodomy. He would have been without
precedent to determine how his reputation would be affected for being involved in the matter.
Thomas then additionally represents the first record of an Old Bailey participant hoping to
protect their heterosexual reputation.
The second case, involving John Bowes and Hugh Ryly in 1718, exhibits more evidence
of London’s amateur but maturing mindsets toward homosexuality.29 The prisoners were
discovered in a public space by two passerby’s, Gerard Fitzgerald and William Burridge. These
For the reader’s convenience, I will refer to the cases of sodomy found in the Old Bailey, between 1715-1721 as
the “Cases of Transition”.
27
OBP, January 1715, William Mayly alias, Mayberry (t17150114-14).
28
OBP, January 1715, William Mayly alias, Mayberry (t17150114-14).
29
OBP, December 1718, John Bowes & Hugh Ryly (t17181205-24).
26
pedestrians were so unfamiliar with the mere concept of homosexual sodomy taking place in a
public space that they assumed “a Man [was] kissing a Woman against the Church rails”.
Further, it was said that Bowes, one of the prisoners, was similarly unfamiliar with the potential
consequences of such actions. Upon receiving admonishment from Burridge, Bowes replied
“what’s that to you, can’t I make use of my own Body? I have done nothing but what I will do
again.” In effect, he was admitting to a crime that would have been considered closer to a
misdemeanor, or more likely, completely overlooked just years previously. Ryly, the other
prisoner, was a bit more adept to the situation. He attempted to bribe the two onlookers with “10
1” to forget what had happened. Their reaction could not have been more befitting of the London
ambiguity around dealing with homosexuality.
“being unexperienc’d and not thinking of delivering them up at the Round-House, [we]
did go with them to a Womans House…two Pots were call’d for, which the Prisoners
neither of them having money there…from thence they went to Mr. Vickers a
Constable…where there was some offers to make it up, and…Burridge…did Hearken to
their Proposals…but being dubious in his mind, did not…that there being an offer of 10
1. Riley call’d for Pen Ink and Paper, and began to draw a Note, but in about half an
Hours time they were carried away…the next morning before a Justice, who not caring to
Act in the Case without assistance of some of his Brother Justices order’d them to be kept
till the Morrow, when several Justices…were committed.”30
The passerby’s claimed to have been so inexperienced with encountering homosexuality, that
upon finding it, they never even contemplated alerting authorities of the fact. Additionally, they
30
OBP, December 1718, John Bowes & Hugh Ryly (t17181205-24).
simply went to drink with the people they believed to be sodomites. The prisoners could produce
no money after having drank with Burridge and Fitzgerald. The prosecuting pair felt they were
not obligated to pay for the drinks either, as they were expecting 10 1 as a bribe from the
prisoners. As such, no money was produced from any party. A constable was called for because
of this, who was eventually responsible for taking the prisoners for sodomy. Upon their
apprehension, the justice system itself could not readily decide how to deal with the two.
Multiple judges had to confer on how to handle the case. Every party in this unprecedented
indictment exhibited the fledgling but changing mindset around homosexuality. The fact that the
court was beginning to acknowledge situations of homosexual sodomy is evidence that attitudes
toward it were transforming. But inexperience of London’s dealing with it is shown in Bowe’s
explicit statement that he felt he was doing no wrong, in Fitzgerald and Burridge’s almost naïve
commiserating with the prisoners, and in the requirement for multiple judges to consult with
each other on the matter.
Finally, the case of George Duffus in 1721 marks the last instance of transition in the Old
Bailey’s dealings with homosexuality.31 The prosecuting individual, Nicholas Leader, accused
Duffus of “thrust[ing] his Tongue in his Mouth…and got on his Back…the Prosecutor resisting,
threw him off 3 or 4 times…The prisoner then seizing the Prosecutor by the Throat…turned him
on his Face, and forcibly entered his Body…but the Prosecutor still strugling, threw off the
prisoner once more, and prevented the prisoner from making an Emissio Seminis in his Body”.32
Thoug Duffus would later admit to a constable that this had taken place, the public was unsure of
how to handle it. “The Spermatick Injection not being proved, the Court directed the Jury to
31
32
OBP, December 1721, George Duffus (t17211206-20).
OBP, December 1721, George Duffus (t17211206-20).
bring in their Verdict Special .”33 This would be the only moment in the Old Bailey’s history in
which a special verdict would be used to delay the judgement of a case of sodomy.34 Again, this
indicates London’s ambiguity on the matter. But more importantly, this initial ruling would come
to cement the case as the turning point in London’s legal dealings with homosexuality. Despite
that it was lawfully “necessary to prove that both penetration and ejaculation had occurred, and
two witnesses were required to prove the crime”, the special verdict was used to delay the matter
and congregate multiple judges to confer on the illegality of Duffus’ actions.35 According to
these standards, Duffus had not committed sodomy. However, London’s growing disdain for
homosexuality could not simply accept this loophole. The following year, Duffus’ special verdict
led to the Old Bailey’s first conviction of assault with sodomitical intent. 36 It should be noted
that while the case of George Duffus is a landmark in how eighteenth-century London delt with
homosexual sodomites, there was still room for evolution. Duffus’ sentencing was to be “Fin'd
20 Marks, a Months Imprisonment, and to stand upon the Pillory”.37 Compared to some of the
following cases, we shall see that Duffus got off lightly. Relative to the two preceding Cases of
Transition, his sentencing was novel. But, the Cases of Transition plainly depicted the trajectory
of London’s anti-sodomitical tendencies. Homosexuality, as characterized by sodomy between
two men, was now, like women, far more otherized than it had been previously.
These three cases qualitatively characterised the course that London was about to embark
on. But it is doubtful that anyone could have predicted the quantitative vehemence against
homosexual sodomites that occurred from 1726 to 1730. In totality, from 1674 to 1800, the Old
33
OBP, December 1721, George Duffus (t17211206-20).
OBP. Searched for all offences of sodomy containing a special verdict.
35
Clive Emsley, Tim Hitchcock and Robert Shoemaker, "Crime and Justice - Crimes Tried at the Old Bailey", Old
Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 8.0, 01 December 2021)
36
OBP, Searched for all offences of assault with sodomitical intent containing a guilty verdict.
37
OBP, December 1721, George Duffus (t17211206-20).
34
Bailey recorded sixty cases of sodomy.38 Prior to 1726, ten cases occurred, at a rate of 0.20 cases
per year. After 1730, thirty-four cases occurred, at a rate of 0.5 cases per year. During the Four
Years, sixteen cases occurred, at a staggering rate of 4.0 cases per year.39 These sixteen cases
encompass more than a quarter of all cases measured up to 1800. Unlike the vast majority of
sodomitical hearings occurring before the Cases of Transition, every case during the Four Years
was of a homosexual nature. 1726 was the worst year for those involved in these incidents.
Seven of the sixteen Four Years cases were heard in this timeframe, with five rulings of guilt,
and two of not guilty verdicts. Of the five guilty verdicts, four were sentenced to the maximum
penalty: death. Two individuals, Thomas Newton and Edward Courtney, are to be examined for
the mayhem caused this year.40
In their respective proceedings, though it is not made clear how, it is obvious Newton and
Courtney were turned informant against constituents of their shared molly culture. April 20th,
1726, Newton swore against three separate individuals, while Courtney testified against two.
Further, both Newton and Courtney admit to participating in sodomy with some of the
individuals whom they testify against, thus they must have negotiated a deal for clemency. Being
that no cases of sodomy had yet led to a death sentence, no one could have been sure what would
legally happen to a sodomite testifying against another. This may have been the precedent which
created the commonality in Old Bailey cases wherein sodomites would testify against each other,
but the prosecuting individual was free of legal pursuance. We might infer that this onesidedness, favoring the whistleblower, was a symptom of London’s fervent desperation for
simply acting out the performance of catching sodomites, as opposed to achieving a purer justice.
38
OBP, Searched for all offences of sodomy from 1674 to 1800.
For the readers convenience, I will refer the Old Bailey cases of sodomy between 1726 and 1730 as the “Four
Years”
40
OBP, Searched for all cases of sodomy in 1726.
39
This notion is strengthened by the fact that all the cases Newton instigated were decided with
flippancy and haste. In 1721, George Duffus, a rapist by modern standards, required the Old
Bailey’s only special verdict sentencing on sodomy to conclude his guilt. Five years later, such
as in the case of Gabriel Lawrence, one of the prisoners of Newton’s depositions, a jury only
needed to hear short testimonies against an alleged homosexual sodomite to condemn him to
death. 41 Newton spoke of Lawrence’s relationship with Margaret Clap’s molly house. And,
though the detail was barely relevant, he ensured to mention that “She usually had 30 or 40 of
such Persons there every Night, but more especially on a Sunday.”42 This statement was
primarily an attempt to condemn Margaret Clap. Clap’s involvement in Lawrence’s potential
guilt was only to the extent that she provisioned a molly house. How many others attended this
house was irrelevant to the examination of Lawrence. Including these details points to the idea
that some force lusted for maximally harming the molly community. This kicked off the
homosexual-hunt of 1726. According to all previous Old Bailey records, this sort of homosexual
pursuit was unprecedented. Additionally, his mentioning of Sunday nights being the busiest day
of the week for the molly house was likely an attempt to paint the molly culture in a particularly
bad light, as this would signal to the jurists that Lawrence was associated with a now especially
unchristian culture.
Another of Newton’s cases on this date displays judicial frivolity and illuminated the
anxious London mind toward homosexuality. Newton testified that Thomas Wright sold alcohol
out of his home, often in the entertainment of sodomites.43 According to Newton, Wright’s molly
house was revealed due to “a Quarrel betwixt Mark Partridge and – Harrington: For upon this
41
OBP, April 1726, Gabriel Lawrence (t17260420-64).
OBP, April 1726, Gabriel Lawrence (t17260420-64).
43
OBP, April 1726, Thomas Wright (t17260420-67).
42
Quarrel Partridge to be revenged on Herrington, had blab’d something of the Secret, and
afterwards gave a large Information of a great many others.”44 Newton was introduced to Wright
and his molly house by Partridge, where he claimed to have witnessed “dancing in obscene
Postures…Singing Baudy songs…talking leudly, and Acting a great many Indecencies.” 45 The
lot were aware of Partridge’s designs for betrayal, and, upon his arrival with Newton, “call’d him
a treacherous…Mollying Bitch, and threatened that they’d Massacre anybody that betray’d
them.”46 This statement demonstrates the dissonance between action and discourse shown by
men of the period. Whilst participating in molly culture, they simultaneously admonished one of
their own as a “mollying bitch” for his traitorous intent. This shows us the growing desire to
separate oneself from association with homosexuality, even while participating in it. Further,
there is no more context to discuss in this case. The jury required extraordinarily little to
condemn an alleged sodomite to death. The case of William Griffin, Newton’s last prisoner, was
treated even less ceremoniously than the first two. “Newton thus depos'd. The
Prisoner…Lodge[ed] for near 2 Years at Clap's House. I went up stairs, while the Prisoner was a
Bed, and there he committed the Act with me. Samuel Stevens depos'd, That he had seen the
Prisoner…at Clap's House. Guilty. Death.”47 This denotes the near entirety of the deposition that
condemned William Griffin. London was turning out purported sodomites to execution as fast as
they could be received.
George Reader was similarly sentenced to death on this same day, due to the statements
of Edward Courtney.48 But of all the individuals prosecuted by Newton and Courtney in April of
44
OBP, April 1726, Thomas Wright (t17260420-67).
OBP, April 1726, Thomas Wright (t17260420-67).
46
OBP, April 1726, Thomas Wright (t17260420-67).
47
OBP, April 1726, William Griffin (t17260420-65).
48
OBP, April 1726, George Redear , alias Regar (t17260420-66).
45
1726, one escaped with a not guilty verdict. Courtney testified that George Whytle kept a molly
house, and that Whytle introduced him to “several Husbands”.49 He also admitted to having
sodomitical relations with Whytle in exchange for money. Whytle objected to the credibility of
Courtney’s statements, pointing out that Courtney had been jailed three times. Courtney
explained each of his arrests and stated that his third was for “raising a Disturbance about a
Mollying Cull”.50 One day, Courtney is complaining to authorities about effeminate men so
much that he is detained for it. The next, he is attempting to indict Whytle for the act of sodomy,
some of which Courtney himself admitted to participating in himself. Cognitive dissonance
developed as a theme toward the grappling with homosexuality.
In the Four Years, 1726-1730, half of the cases occurred in 1726. The other half occurred
in the last three years, at a rate of 2.67 cases per year.51 Precipitated by the Cases of Transition
from 1715-1721, this squarely marks 1726 as the year in which London imploded with
homosexual anxieties. Consequently, we might consider the last three of the Four Years a
cooling off period. After 1730, London would not witness such egregious rates of sodomitical
condemnation until 1834, more than a century later.52 Though these three years showcase the
decline in sodomitical indictment, they dually represent that London permanently affixed an
attitude of hate and admonishment toward homosexuality when dealing with it legally. Of the
sixteen cases in the Four Years, several of the prisoners found guilty were, in truth, only culpable
of assault with sodomitical intent, or simply sodomitical intent without assault.53 The depositions
made against them admitted as much. But, in their growing disdain for homosexuality, juries
49
OBP, April 1726, George Whytle (t17260420-68).
OBP, April 1726, George Whytle (t17260420-68).
51
OBP, Searched all cases of sodomy between 1727 and 1730.
52
OBP, Searched all cases of sodomy between 1731 and 1913.
53
For one such example, see OBP, December 1726, trial of James Williams (t17261207-60).
50
nonetheless chose to find the prisoners guilty of actual sodomy. Moreover, only two cases in all
the sixteen might be thought of as rape by modern standards. One of them being statutory in
nature as one of the participants was consenting, but only seventeen years of age.54 The
remainder would be thought of as consensual cases of sex. In totality, this symbolizes the most
glaring difference between the Old Bailey’s original instances of sodomy and those of the Cases
of Transition and the Four Years. Sodomy was, for cultural intent and purpose, no longer
considered to simply mean any non-procreative sex. Each time society grappled with sodomy in
this period, it did so with an aim to punish homosexuality. Typically, it was consensual
homosexuality at that.
The last case of the Four Years depicts the now established intricacies of London’s new
concern for homosexuality. William Hollywell and William Huggins were found having sex in
“the upper part of the Cathedral of St. Paul's.”55 In his defense, “Huggins call'd a great many of
his Neighbours, who gave him the Character of an industrious Man…a loving Husband to his
Wife, a tender Father to his Children…a religious Man that kept to his Church… and [the court]
should more readily have credited his Familiarity with Women.”56 These contentions signify the
culmination of how the general Londoner realized they must now speak against homosexuality if
struggling against it. Huggins’ witnesses describe him as an “industrious Man”. That a person
would not partake in homosexuality because of their work ethic seems to be a signal that London
was grasping at straws for the effort of disavowing homosexuality. Connection of the two
characteristics is a false equivalency. Conversely, idleness in general was equated with
disreputable people. For example, in 1732, William Curtis, “a Boy about the Age of 20 Years”,
54
OBP, July 1726, Patrick Malcolme (t17260711-55) and August 1730, Gilbert Laurence (t17300828-24).
OBP, December 1730, William Hollywell & William Huggins (t17301204-22).
56
OBP, December 1730, William Hollywell & William Huggins (t17301204-22).
55
accused John Ashford of sodomy.57 However, a character witness stated that Curtis was “a very
idle Boy and used to hide himself in Holes about the House, to keep out of the way of his Work.”
It is more reasonable to draw on the general disreputability of a person based on idleness. In the
case of Ashford and Curtis, the prisoner was even found not guilty for the character of Curtis’
industriousness having been rebuked. But, this line of thinking likely led to individuals
connecting false dots. Regarding sodomites, they would reason that if an idle person were
typically bad, then an industrious person must be good. Therefore, an industrious person would
not commit sodomy. While the flaw in this thinking is obvious, its existence as an argument
highlights that people were simply looking for any way to condemn sodomites, logical or
otherwise. If we replace this argument with the claim that Huggins was “a tender Father to his
Children”, we find the same results. Surely, a homosexual male is capable of loving his children.
There was no reason for Londoners to believe otherwise, except for their preoccupation with
degrading the status of homosexuality. Further, Huggins’ witnesses proclaimed that he was a
devout Christian. As previously discussed, Christian views on sodomy rarely concerned
themselves with homosexual sodomy before the dichotomization of male and female. We must
then recognize that Londoners were not really reprimanding homosexuals because of their
Christian values. Rather, the fear of reputational degradation drove London to call on religion as
an authority for homosexual reproach. Finally, like masters who purchased the services of
prostitutes to bolster the reputation of their apprentices, Huggins’ witnesses implored the court to
acknowledge his “Familiarity with women.” On the surface, this is simply an attempt to reinforce
the perception of his heterosexuality. However, the statement was made in conjunction with the
testament that he was “a loving Husband to his Wife”. Of course, adultery was, at a minimum,
57
OBP, September 1732, John Ashford, (t17320906-68).
frowned upon by the era’s value system. But Londoner’s were recognizing the new positionality
of homosexuality in the status quo. In the fight for Huggins life, this character witness thought it
better to frame Huggins as a heterosexual adulterer than someone who was faithful to his wife,
but possibly a sodomite. Hereto, we see the tail of human-anxiety wagging the dog of religiosity.
London began the eighteenth century with virtually no legal interest in homosexuality.
But, as the intellectuality of the seventeenth century caught up with the culture of the eighteenth,
Londoners came to understand that male and female anatomies did not exist on a vertical
hierarchy, as they had once thought. Their discourse on gender showed they began to recognize
the distinction between female and male. Though this mass recognition could have increased the
positionality of women, patriarchal tendencies demanded that womanhood somehow be
reoriented inferiorly to men. One means of achieving this was through manipulation of emerging
Enlightenment principals. The movement’s beliefs around social contracts, and the value of
women in them, broke the hierarchy that men and women had occupied together. Women were
no longer believed to be loosely substandard men. They were deemed distinctly inferior. The
gender dichotomization led to English male fear of association with the lesser sex, requiring
them to prove their masculinity by disassociating themselves with femininity. The molly
subculture was a threat to this societal movement. As gender dichotomization grew into the
eighteenth century, we can see London adjusting its legal enforcement and, by that extension, its
religious rhetoric, to push the agenda. To oppose feminine association, sodomy, in the eyes of
the public, suddenly had far more to do with homosexuality than ever before. The Old Bailey’s
Cases of Transition demonstrate London’s fumbling with the new objective. But, by the Four
Years, it was fully primed to contemptuously eviscerate any molly threat that surfaced. While
these points are adjacently discussed by many historians, there does not seem to be much in the
way of examining the trends that I’ve explored here. These may represent a significant turning
point in Western society’s historical relationship with and conception of male homosexuality. I
believe the transition of which kinds of sodomy eighteenth century London cared about, and
when, provides valuable insight in examining why the West has condemned homosexuality.
Likewise, more assessment on this topic could illuminate the concept that humans have,
historically, shaped their religion to meet the unspoken demands of their societal desires.