The "Other" Gibraltar
Molly remembers Gibraltar as a sunny and romantic place of wonder which is in stark contrast to its sordid reputation in the United Kingdom of the time. Whether warranted or not, polite society viewed "Gib" as a Sodom on the Straits, a smugglers' den, and crawling with disorderly, drunken soldiers and sailors. Gibraltar was regarded as the British Empire's "Nighttown" of the Mediterranean.
Throughout the world, border towns, port cities, and garrison towns always seemed unsavory to the middle classes. Gibraltar was all three and due to its small size, its unfavorable characteristics were readily perceived by moneyed visitors from the British Empire and the United States. Nowhere in town were you more than a few blocks from the busy civil and naval docks. In 1870, the year of Molly Bloom's birth, 4,195 merchant ships (1.5 million tons) entered Gibraltar; in 1880, 4,585 (3.2 million tons). In addition to merchant vessels, Gibraltar received ships of the Royal Navy and of the Mediterranean naval powers. Sailors on shore leave, and the establishments that catered to them, were numerous and unavoidable.
Gibraltar was more a fortress accommodating a town, than a town accommodating a military garrison. In the late-nineteenth century, the British Army kept about 5,000 British soldiers in Gibraltar, typically on tours of one to three years. As the resident civil population was only about 18,000, well over half of all military-aged men on the streets were in uniform. While the army tried to provide its young, unmarried soldiers with "wholesome" entertainment, the town's merchants provided the troops what they most sought: alcohol and women. The Gibraltar women shunned the enlisted soldiers but there was no shortage of prostitutes from Spain. Prostitution was legal in the British colony, though tightly regulated to limit the spread of venereal disease among soldiers. Spanish prostitutes could readily obtain temporary residency and remain in Gibraltar so long as they complied with the local medical inspection requirement.
Smuggling
"Smugglers Coming Out of Gibraltar"
John Frederick Lewis Gaucin, 1833
John Frederick Lewis Gaucin, 1833
Spanish women hiding tobacco before returning to Spain.
The Graphic, August 2, 1879
The Graphic, August 2, 1879
An 1879 feature article in The Times. The article is in a 280kb pdf file on this website and will open in a new browser window.
The above link is to an essay on the website The People of Gibraltar. The webpage will open in a new browser window.
The report is in an 82kb pdf file on this website and will open in a new browser window.
Memorandum by John Adye, Governor and Commander-in-Chief, Gibraltar, on smuggling. This document is in a 634kb pdf file on this website and will open in a new browser window.
Prostitution
Postcard of Serruya's Lane, c. 1905
The above link is to an essay on the website of the Gibraltar-born author, M.G. Sanchez. The webpage will open in a new browser window.
Alien Prostitutes
Commentary on the Aliens Act of 1873 and Gibraltar. From "Our Gibraltar Letter," Western Daily Mercury, December 20, 1883.
"Even alien prostitutes are better considered than honest aliens for their residence in Gibraltar; and the inefficacy of the law, for its intended object, is further proved by the fact that these alien prostitutes often induce British soldiers to marry them, without regimental leave, and are consequently left behind, on the departure of the regiment, to continue in their former depraved habits and bad life, with the privilege of living in Gibraltar without requiring permits, as wives of British subjects."
The supposition that alien women, and especially Spanish prostitutes, married British soldiers to obtain British citizenship is likely a myth. Of 56 marriages of British soldiers from 1868 through 1872 recorded in the Gibraltar Government Archives, only five wives did not have British names and were not in the census of Gibraltar as permanent residents. Of the five, two were Spanish, two were Italian, and one was Portuguese. Apparently, thirty-nine of the wives were resident in the UK and came to Gibraltar to marry their fiancees. Of the remaining ten wives, all were Gibraltarians, seven with British surnames. Of course, the Gibraltar registration office would not have records of marriages that took place in Spain. Note that Molly Bloom was conceived in Gibraltar in December 1869 and born in "the straits of Gibraltar" September 8, 1870.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) Ithaca 17: 1983, 2275-76.
The Ordinance to Regulate Marriages in Gibraltar, Ord. No.1 of 1861, came into operation on February 21, 1862. It required that clergymen of registered houses of worship notify the Registrar of Gibraltar of all marriages they solemnized. The ordinance also mandated that the Registrar maintain records of all such marriages as well as those he effectuated through license (civil marriage). Registration of all marriages was not mandated by law until enactment of the Marriage Amendment Ordinance, Ord. No. 7 of 1902. Accordingly, many Gibraltar marriages effectuated prior to 1862, and a few between 1861 and 1902, were not recorded by the colonial authorities.
n/ Lawrence Sawchuk and W. Pitaluga, "Marriage in Gibraltar, 1862-1920," Website of the Gibraltar National Archives. Click on the link and the home page for the Gibraltar Marriage Register will open in a new browser window.
Two brief articles on iniquity in Gibraltar; the first from 1883, the second from 1888. The articles, and the cover of the magazine's June, 1885 issue, are in a 256kb pdf file on this website and will open in a new browser window.
The Sentinel was a monthly "social purity" magazine established and edited by Alfred Stace Dyer. Dyer was a noted social reformer who led campaigns against the British opium trade and legalized prostitution regulated through the "Contagious Diseases Act." He gained some fame in 1880 through his book The European Slave Trade in English Girls: A Narrative of Facts (London: Dyer Bros., 1880). He was a leader of the Anglo-Oriental Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade and the Working Men's National League for the Abolition of the State Regulation of Vice. Dyer was a Quaker and unlike nearly all prominent social and moral reformers, was of a working class family.
n/ Paul McHugh, Prostitution and Victorian Social Reform (Abington, UK: Routledge, 2013).
Howell, Philip. "Sexuality, Sovereignty and Space: Law, Government and the Geography of Prostitution in Colonial Gibraltar." Social History 29, no. 4 (2004): 444-64. This article considers the British colonial regulation of prostitution in Gibraltar through the operation of a permit system that managed the influx of labourers from the Spanish mainland.
The above link is to the article in the JSTOR database. If you do not have institutional access to JSTOR you can get free personal access which allows you to read six articles per month.
Soldiers and Sailors
The above link is to an essay on the website of the Gibraltar-born author, M.G. Sanchez. The webpage will open in a new browser window.
Riotous Sailors
Press agency report as it appeared in the Manchester Evening News, January 7, 1884.
"An Exchange Company's telegram, dated Gibraltar, Monday, states: -- The conduct of the sailors of the fleet on shore yesterday was so disorderly that it may almost be described as riotous. Many of them obtained leave and when their time expired refused to go on board their vessels. Pickets were sent out to arrest them, but the sailors ascended the rock and threw stones at their pursuers."
Low Drinking Shops Abound
Reprint of a note in The Quiver (London) as it appeared in Shields Daily Gazette, March 7, 1881.
"The Quiver (Messrs Cassell, Petter, and Galpin, Ludgate Hill) referring to the want of a Sailor's Rest for Gibraltar says that the cosmopolitan population of Gibraltar renders it necessary that something should be done. There is a Sailors' Home, but it is insufficient in accommodation. A house has lately been taken with a view to its being fitted as a coffee tavern. By making this attractive it is hoped that sailors and soldiers also, will go there instead of to the low drinking shops with which Gibraltar abounds."
The Quiver: An Illustrated Magazine for Sunday and General Reading was founded in 1861 for "the advancement of religion in the homes of the people" and to bring about "intellectual, moral and spiritual improvement."
n/ Simon Cooke, The Victorian Web. Page will open in a new browser window.
Defending the Rock
A response to the many English newspaper articles critical of Gibraltar's government, merchants, and residents, mostly with respect to the smuggling issue. The letter is in a 93kb pdf file on this website that will appear in a new browser window.
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