Exploring the Lives of Victorian England's Prostitutes

“As dangerous as if she stood on the corner of the street exploding gunpowder.” This was the view of ‘Miles’, a correspondent in the Bedfordshire Mercury , writing about the dangerousness of prostitutes in 1874. They were considered a scourge by the Victorians; a menace to society and a threat to the moral and physical wellbeing of a nation. Carrying disease, committing crime, corrupting others; prostitutes were the most feared ‘social evil’. These women were the focus of controlling and invasiv