5
Notorious Defenders
Prostitutes Using the Law

While walking down Broadway, Catherine Wilson, who said she had a good memory for faces, recognized a man she had met five or six months earlier in a prostitution establishment in Orange Street. The man had stolen her watch, beaded bag, handkerchief, pocket book, and ivory rule. Wilson approached the man, made a citizen's arrest, and escorted him to the police station. At the station, Wilson filed a charge of theft, and the man was tried, convicted, and sent to prison for six months.^[1] Although Wilson's assertiveness may have been notable, her confidence as a citizen, working with legal authorities, was not unusual for a nineteenth-century prostitute. Because they worked their trade outside the law, prostitutes were always vulnerable to arrest and to abuse and harassment from officials, patrons, rowdies, and the public. Many of them suffered repeated legal indignities, difficulties they accepted as part of the profession, but many, like Wilson, also found ways to deal with the legal system and even to work the system effectively to their own advantage.

Prostitutes and Law Enforcers

The biggest factor in determining the impact of laws on the prostitute was her relationship with law enforcers, especially with the

police officers on the street, who represented law-enforcement authority at the level with which the prostitute had the most day-to-day contact. In most cases it was the local police who determined whether a prostitute was to be recognized as such, was breaking the law and should be arrested, or was inoffensive and could operate free of legal interference.

New York was not a well-policed city in the nineteenth century, and twentieth-century notions of police professionalism are distant from the police organization that prostitutes of the time encountered in New York City. For the first few decades of the century, New Yorkers were still close enough to the period of British rule to be suspicious of any form of "military" authority or control in their communities, so they rejected the idea of a well-organized permanent police force. Citizens preferred to depend on police supervision that was casual and sporadic and that was supplied by fellow members of the local community. The result was an inefficient but very personalized form of law enforcement, where many decisions involving conflicts between prescribed law and local customs and communal attitudes were left to the discretion of the neighborhood police. Police discretion defined who was deviant and how deviants should be controlled, and this discretion involved discrimination in the form of selective law enforcement. Thus, nineteenth-century New Yorkers' desire for a limited formal institutional police power resulted in an unchecked informal discretionary police power.^[2]

Although by 1830 New York's population and urban problems had increased to the point that many New Yorkers felt that the social controls of a stable society had broken down in many areas of the city, police organization remained much as it had been in the late eighteenth century. Officials such as the mayor, high constable, constables, marshals, and night watch all bore some responsibility for the police protection of the community, as did members of the Common Council and police justices. The mayor was the chief police officer, taking charge at fires, riots, and other breaches of the peace. Constables were elected from each ward annually. It was not always easy to find people who were willing to undertake the arduous duties of the constable's job, but any citizen who refused to accept his election as constable was fined. Occasionally, someone could be found who was eager to serve because of the fees that could be earned or the power conferred by the office. Marshals were appointed by the mayor and held office at his pleasure. Both constables and marshals had the common law duties and powers

of peace or police officers, but they did not wear uniforms or carry identifying badges or emblems. They did not receive regular salaries but were compensated by fees for services performed according to a schedule established by the state legislature. Critics of this form of job compensation argued that police officers devoted their time to what was likely to earn the largest fees, not to what was most important, that they made unnecessary arrests of the poor and powerless to collect fees, and that honest officers often earned very little money under the system.^[3]

Night watchmen, who patrolled the city at night, did not have police powers and could arrest free from reprisal only if a crime were committed before their eyes or if they were acting under the direction of a police officer. By 1830 there were 512 watchmen in New York, who were paid on a per diem basis; shifts were arranged so that watchmen could also hold daytime jobs, with the result that only 128 of them, one-fourth of the force, were on the streets at any one time. The pay for watchmen ranged from 75 cents to 87-1/2 cents per night. Watchmen owed their appointment and tenure in office to the mayor, aldermen, and assistant aldermen, who competed over the years for power in controlling this valuable patronage. The watch was an ancient institution, as its long history (and the age of its members) attested, but it did not have much prestige since many thought it inadequate and its members incompetent. Watchmen wore leather helmets while on duty and were thus derisively known as leatherheads. If a watchman's helmet was taken from his head twice while asleep on duty, he was to be dismissed. Citizens often joked, "While the city sleeps, the watchmen do too," a jibe borne out by statistics. Men chosen for the watch were often of a low caliber, people who had few other means of earning a living.^[4]

Between 1830 and 1845, a marked upsurge in crime, vice, and disorder plus the model of the recently restructured more "professional" London police force spurred efforts to provide a similar police organization for New York City. The number of complaints entered at the police courts in 1835 was 10,168, more than five times the number that had been recorded three decades before. All citizens worried about the growth in violent crimes, and moralists complained about the great increase in the crimes of prostitution, gambling, and intoxication. In 1835 there were almost 3,000 licensed drinking places in New York City, a ratio of one for every fifty persons in the city over the age of fifteen. Riots also greatly increased in the 1830s; there were so many in

1834 alone that it was long remembered in New York City history as the year of riots. At riots in both 1834 and 1835, local law enforcement officials were unable to suppress rioters, a failure that led the mayor to call in the militia. These outbreaks dramatically highlighted the weakness of the city police force.^[5]

In the decade and a half after 1830 citizens also worried about the potential for corruption by police. Police appointments were regarded as patronage plums, and thus any changes in the party in power meant an influx of inexperienced men. Policemen were considered entrepreneurs more than public servants, in a system with many openings for bribery and not many rewards for diligence. Reliance on fees rather than salaries was an evil that had grown over the years; in cases involving stolen property, for example, officers were not overly concerned about apprehending offenders, since recovering the property for rewards was far more lucrative. Some New Yorkers believed that police officers made deals with criminals in which the thieves turned over stolen property in exchange for being set free. The competitiveness of the fee system also discouraged cooperation among police officers in the apprehension of offenders. A policeman received 50 cents for each unlawful citizen committed to jail, a seemingly small sum but one that was equal to two-thirds of a watchman's nightly pay.^[6]

Between 1830 and 1845 there were a number of formal proposals for reforming the police, but political parties' competition for control of the police as patronage prevented innumerable plans from being adopted. Finally, a reorganization and reform of the New York City police was accomplished in May 1845 by a bill passed in the state legislature and endorsed by the Common Council. Two of the major reforms were the abolishment of most of the existing police offices, with all police functions to be performed by a new "Day and Night Police," and the elimination of the fee payment system by the establishment of set salaries. Although the new plan provided for a better organized and unified police structure, the force retained its "political" orientation because policemen of all ranks were appointed by elected officials. The reform established the basic structure of the New York police for the rest of the century, though some changes were made over the years. In 1857 the city police force was put under the auspices of the state legislature, remaining in the state's control until home rule was once again established in 1870.^[7]

New York City's personalized and localized form of law enforcement gave the prostitute the opportunity to establish a working relationship with local law enforcers and reduced the likelihood of a large, citywide vice structure that might victimize the prostitute. As vagrancy and disorderly persons cases make clear, the police arrested and jailed prostitutes under the law, but their toughest enforcement seemed directed more at the poor and less "established" streetwalkers than at prostitutes living in neighborhood brothels. Distressed citizens charged that prostitution was allowed to exist because police received monetary payoffs from brothel operators. In the spring of 1844, when pressure was strong for a police reform, the Tribune ran an expose by a writer called "L" on the corruption of the police. The article claimed that thieves, harlots, and other depredators paid off public officials to avoid prosecution.^[8] It is likely that some prostitutes were permitted to work in a neighborhood because of payoffs or bribes to police, but, other than public complaints about suspected bribes, there is no evidence that an extensive system of prostitution payoffs existed in the early and middle part of the century. Theoretically, if a policeman collected a bribe for leaving a prostitute alone in the years before police reform, he would then have few other opportunities to collect scheduled fees for legal proceedings against that prostitute. It is more likely that individual prostitutes paid to be kept out of jail after being arrested so that an officer who arrested a prostitute might get a bribe for dropping the charges. If there were a time when brothels paid for protection, it was probably after 1845 when police salaries replaced the fee system—even though salaries were supposed to eliminate police corruption which many believed was caused by the fee system.

Historians have often mentioned payoff practices in the antebellum period but have not clearly documented them. Some have cited as evidence for payoffs the legal system of fees and fines that existed before the police department was restructured. Aside from misconstruing the fee system, however, sufficient documentation has not been presented and examples typically are cited from the post-Civil War era. One contemporary with firsthand knowledge, former police chief George Walling, wrote in the 1880s that police blackmailed poor prostitutes, and he argued that a policy of segregating prostitutes in specified sections of the city would help prevent this practice. Walling did not state if his claims of blackmail applied to the earlier period as well as the 1870s and

1880s, nor did he state how widespread the practice was.^[9] Available evidence suggests that the systematic and organized control of commercialized sex through payoffs was not characteristic of New York City until the last quarter of the nineteenth century.^[10]

Most sources indicate that prostitutes and prostitution houses were allowed to operate in local neighborhoods because law officers did not perceive them to be "criminal" or a major problem in the community. The women managing and living in these houses were treated as neighborhood citizens operating local businesses, unless their establishments became too disorderly.^[11] In 1849 Samuel Prime noted that "nice" houses were protected by the police and even were allowed to exist "next door to police stations," a reference to the brothel of Kate Hastings at SO Leonard Street, next door to the fifth ward station house.^[12] Thus, prostitutes associated with police officials as members of a local neighborhood, and they established a working relationship with law enforcers because their professions interfaced in several ways. Prostitutes were a source of official fees for legal actions taken on their behalf, such as arresting rowdy guests or serving processes, and prostitutes also gave police payments or "tips" for other types of services performed, such as recovering stolen property or helping in various private matters. Whereas prostitutes might have resented a payoff system as harassment, they could regard fees and tips for services as positive rewards for assisting them. Furthermore, prostitutes often furnished information to officials about investigations or other police business, and in some cases the association of prostitutes and police even reached a "friendship" level.^[13]

The working relationship between prostitutes and law enforcement officials was brought to the public's attention during the Jewett murder trial in 1836. Officer Dennis Brink, who had arrested the suspect the morning after the murder, testified in court about the nature of his relationship with Rosina Townsend, the madam for whom Jewett had worked. Brink pointed out that he had known Townsend for three years, had been in her brothel about six times, but had not been there as a client or as a participant in a card game. He had served processes against Townsend's boarders and against her servants on different occasions, and he had received the regular fees for these services. One of the processes he served had been against a boarder for assault and battery. Brink also had been summoned on several occasions when there were disturbances in the house, but the rioters had always dispersed before he arrived. He

stated he had never paid Townsend money, but she "may" have paid him for legal fees or costs or for serving processes for her. Brink and several other officers had been paid $5 each for helping with Townsend's household sale a month before, but he denied that he had received two vases free from Townsend at the sale. Defense counsel Ogden Hoffman quizzed Brink on whether he had ever received money from Townsend for speaking on her behalf to the district attorney, or if he had ever gone to the district attorney to intercede on Townsend's behalf in regard to an indictment pending against her. When Brink said he could not remember, Hoffman asked him to name the district attorney at the time of the case in question. Brink answered that it had been Hoffman.

Hoffman then questioned Brink's involvement with other prostitutes. Brink acknowledged that on several occasions he had received money from Mrs. Berry for services rendered in suppressing troubles at her brothel, and he estimated the payments to have been approximately $1 each time. He also acknowledged receiving money from a gentleman for settling a case that was pending in the Court of General Sessions against two prostitutes who had torn the clothing of a third prostitute.^[14]

Although Brink appears to have had frequent involvement with prostitutes, his actions were not always on their behalf. In several cases brought before the Court of General Sessions, Brink had been the officer on duty who brought charges against a house of prostitution, and on one occasion Brink brought charges of assault and battery against a prostitute, Margaret Ryerson, for "violently seizing hold of him and tearing his shirt while in the execution of his duty" at her disorderly house.^[15]

Police often testified alongside prostitutes in court trials, especially in cases of divorce, since adultery was the major grounds for divorce. A policeman usually was asked to verify that a female witness was a prostitute because of his knowledge of her or her house, and this testimony almost always indicated that the police had had amicable relationships with the prostitute. In the 1852 divorce trial of Edwin and Catherine Forrest, eleven active or former policemen were called to testify about Caroline Ingersoll, who had operated several assignation or prostitution boarding houses in the city. Policeman Lorenzo Savage testified he had been to Ingersoll's house before with two other policemen, and he said that he "did not stay but they did." Officer Jacob Carlock noted that he knew Ingersoll because he lived up the street as a neighbor, and he gave descriptions of the types of men and women

who entered and left her residence. Another officer, Augustus Goodrich, said he had only been to Ingersoll's once as a policeman, but since he was a cabinetmaker by trade, he had done a few carpentry jobs for her there.^[16]

In the case of Mary Fowler, who was charged with operating a disorderly house, one ward captain and four other policemen testified indirectly on Fowler's behalf. All of the officers were acquainted with her and admitted to seeing men and women going in and out of her house as late as 3 A.M ., but none of them "knew" if it was a disorderly house, and none had ever "seen anything improper there." In summarizing the case, the presiding judge pointed out the obvious by noting that disorderly houses "exist in all parts of the city, . . . even the most respectable neighborhoods, and are indirectly countenanced by the police."^[17]

Evidence of the close association of legal officials and prostitutes in the day-to-day investigations of the police is found in the diary of Robert Taylor, a police justice for eight years who had earlier served as a captain of the watch. In the early 1840s, Taylor had played an active role in pushing for police reform, and after the adoption of the reorganization plan in 1845 he had prepared the manual for the new force.^[18] In his advice to police, Taylor, advocating an active, investigative force over a responsive one, wrote: "The prevention of crime being the most important object in view, your exertions must be constantly used to that end."^[19]

The year and a half of entries in Taylor's diary indicate that he viewed himself as an investigator as well as a judge, actively pursuing wrongdoers and seeking their punishment. The diary catalogues his dealings with thieves, gamblers, drunks, liquor dealers, and prostitutes. The prostitutes with whom he worked, however, were regarded not as law violators but rather as neighborhood resources for his investigations. Nor did Taylor consider himself corrupt in any way for not interfering with the prostitution operations. He mentioned having seen a daybook and register that "gave proof that corruption exists to an alarming extent with many officials connected with the administration of criminal law in the city," but he obviously did not regard his own relations with prostitutes in this category.

Taylor recorded over fifty routine visits to brothels. His references include names of twenty-five different prostitutes, six of whom are

mentioned from three to six times each. Taylor always took one or more companions on his brothel visits—as co-investigators, as voyeurs, or possibly as witnesses to protect his reputation.^[20] Taylor went to the brothels seeking information on cases involving divorce, death, abortion, counterfeiting, or theft, but he also noted that on one occasion he took Justice Ketchum for a tour because Ketchum had never visited a brothel before. After seeing what went on in eleven different brothels, Ketchum apparently was fascinated enough to return with Taylor on another evening that included visits to nine brothels.

In most cases the prostitutes appear to have been very cooperative in helping Taylor or in giving him information. Taylor made return visits to those houses where the women were most cooperative, such as the brothel of Adeline Miller on Church Street. In one instance, however, Miller refused to help get information for Taylor because he was investigating her son, Nelson, who had taken a shawl from his own wife. Apparently, Miller felt comfortable enough with her relationship with Taylor to refuse to help him instead of claiming she had no knowledge of the affair. When Miller would not help, Taylor persuaded another woman in the house to assist in locating the shawl, and she later notified Taylor where it had been pawned.

While Taylor was at church one day, a woman called at his home, a visitor he assumed to be prostitute Fanny White, who had promised the night before to get some information for him. That White would make a Sunday morning visit to his house did not appear to surprise or embarrass Taylor.^[21]

Establishing a working relationship with a law officer was obviously to the advantage of a prostitute: it allowed her to operate freely in a neighborhood and gave her a contact on the police force in case customers, boarders, or rowdies caused problems in her brothel. Adeline Furman, alias Adeline Miller, summoned the watch to her Elm Street brothel because four men were being disorderly and refused to leave. Officer Harvey forcibly evicted them and ordered them to "be peaceable and go away." The men still lingered outside the house, threatened to prosecute Harvey, and told him it was "a damned shame a watchman should receive pay for protecting whore houses." Harvey then arrested and brought charges against the four men.^[22]

Even if a police officer or watchman acted against a prostitute's interests and arrested her, the New York City legal and court system

provided her with ways to avoid further legal restraints. Police justices, or magistrates, presided over police court, the first level of administration of the criminal justice system. Before 1848 justices were appointed to office, and after that date they were elected, thus involving them even more in the partisan politics of the city. Few, if any, of the police justices had legal training, and they conducted their courts with little regard for the niceties of legal procedure.

Aldermen and assistant aldermen were elected representatives from each ward to the city council, or Common Council, and they, with the mayor, had the power to make appointments to the police force. Aldermen also possessed magistrates' powers, and many used this power to hold court in the station houses. Thus, a policeman might arrest a prostitute, and an alderman or magistrate could release the prisoner without any sort of hearing. An 1853 law modified this practice by no longer allowing aldermen to bail or discharge persons committed by other magistrates, but aldermen retained the right of releasing a prisoner before a magistrate had committed her or him, and they could also release a prisoner between the time of arrest and an appearance before a magistrate. Although the concurrent jurisdiction of the legal system lowered the morale of court officials, since they could countermand each other's authority, it offered prostitutes alternatives for escaping the heavy hand of the law—alternatives they apparently used to their advantage.^[23]

The Advocate of Moral Reform frequently voiced complaints about the close relationships between prostitutes and officials. The paper reported that an attractive prostitute from ward five, mother of two children, had sneered at the reformers' threat that the law would root out her vice, and she informed them that "men of the first distinction in the city are the ones who pour from $50 to $400 a week into her treasury." The prostitute told reformers that a judge had offered his name and money if she ever needed it. The reformers further confirmed their suspicions of collusion between prostitutes and officials when two prostitutes and two men were seen walking from the noted brothel of Patience Berger to the home of a judge not far away. In the period before restrictions were put on aldermen's judicial powers, the Police Gazette reported an incident in which a sixth ward alderman came with two friends to the station house to order the release of two prostitutes. Because he was drunk, the police locked him up, a response to his

disorderly behavior as well as a possible indication of their resentment of the alderman's power to countermand their orders. The press also reported the case of Mary Berry's husband, Francis, who was charged with robbing a man in their Duane Street brothel. Berry offered to return one-third of the "booty" knowing, according to the Advocate , that the law usually required the return of much less. The judge refused the offer, but Berry's bail was immediately provided by an ex-alderman.^[24]

Samuel Prime also noted the tolerance of legal officials for prostitutes and their close association with the women in neighborhoods: "Hundreds of [disorderly] houses close by the houses of our magistrates spread their allurements before the eyes of our youth and tempt them into the vortex of hell, and the shield of law protects the portal, though all that enter, enter to be damned."^[25] At times, however, the close association or neighborhood proximity of prostitutes and officials could cause strain. One of the houses owned by Adeline Miller and managed by a Mrs. Brown backed up to the house of Alderman Erben. As disturbances at the brothel became more frequent, the Erbens became more annoyed because, whenever watchmen were called to Brown's house, the riotous parties "effected their escape by taking the liberty of scaling the Alderman's fence, rushing through his hall, and making their exit at his front door." Finally after one of these late-night "unannounced visits," the Sun reported that Erben "had the inmates of the house all removed to the watch house," in the hope of breaking up the "nest of prostitution and iniquity, which he has so long tolerated directly under his own magisterial nose."^[26]

The result of New York City's localized and personalized law enforcement was that it was selective, supporting both discretion and discrimination on the part of officials. Prostitutes understood this and hoped that either a lack of true concern or leniency by officials would allow them to escape harassment, arrest, or punishment. Sometimes prostitutes found that policemen's actions crossed the boundary between law enforcement and abuse. Elizabeth Dairey, sent to the Tombs for stealing, reported she had been kicked by an officer. Others noted incidents of sexual harassment and abuse. Emeline Frisby, a black woman who worked in a "house of polluted reputation" in Reed Street, was arrested and put in prison for taking $164 from her "sister." The Sun reported that officers had "compelled" Frisby to strip and submit to a "considerable search." Mary Moore, from a brothel in Broome Street,

filed charges against watchman John Ostrander for entering her room and attacking her while she was asleep. He was tried but discharged by the jury. Another prostitute from the late 1860s reported she had been taken to an oyster house by an officer who then raped her and threatened to send her to prison if she told.^[27] Though some policemen may have believed that a woman in the "unlawful sex trade" was fair game for whatever treatment they meted out, their abuse also may have reflected a disdain toward those prostitutes and other women who were poor and at the bottom of the ethnic hierarchy.

The police were not completely insensitive to prostitutes in the lowest echelons of the trade, however. Many "down and out" prostitutes who felt they could no longer support themselves in prostitution turned to policemen for shelter, food, and medical assistance. There are a number of cases where prostitutes came to police asking to be sent to the penitentiary because they had been turned out of their brothels, had nowhere to go, or were sick and needed medical help. One twenty-three-year-old woman, who said she had been in the profession since she was a child, was committed to prison after having been out of the penitentiary only three days. When given a six-month sentence, she expressed her gratitude and said she would gladly take another six months at the end of her term. In 1850 the Herald reported the death of seventy-year-old "English Nance," who had been mentioned in the press for decades and who, at a much earlier age, was said to have had the extraordinary strength to be able to "beat off half a dozen officers attempting to arrest her." After reaching middle age, or for the last thirty years, the Herald noted that she had been a constant visitor in prison, "averaging more than half her time there."^[28] "Jail as home" was not an unusual choice for these women. There were few public agencies at the time, other than the police, who would have assisted these women in any meaningful way because, on the whole, public assistance was sparingly supplied to anyone in need, prostitute or not. Furthermore, while some might interpret their seeking out law enforcers and imprisoners as a perverse form of psychological dependency, it is also possible that previous interaction with police had established that they could respond to the necessities and limited options of unfortunate prostitutes as well as, if not better than, anyone else in the community. Both familiarity with the police station and personal interaction with legal

officials may have made the police the community agency with which many prostitutes interacted most comfortably.

In spite of some examples of police discrimination and abuse, New York's law enforcement system based on officers' personal discretion enabled prostitutes and other law violators to manipulate the system to their benefit. In a letter to Governor Fish in November 1849, New York City Judge J. W. Edmonds complained that "police magistrates and aldermen discharge at pleasure even after conviction anyone with influence enough to procure discharge."^[29] This influence occurred in many forms. Usually it was helpful if a prostitute came from one of the "better" brothels. Emma Place, alias Allen, was arrested for robbing a man of $40 while he was at Jenny Sweet's well-known brothel on Church Street, but the justice at her arraignment dismissed the case after she claimed that the complainant was drunk when the alleged robbery occurred. Prostitutes also resorted to the use of monetary rewards to create influence. An example of such a case involved a prostitute who was arrested and sent to jail for assaulting a gentleman while he was with his family at the theater. According to the Tribune , the woman was freed after only a few days' confinement because she distributed $25 among the police officers.^[30] The Herald reported influence of a different kind in a case involving two third ward prostitutes who were arrested for soliciting. One, Kitty Bracket, was described as very ugly, while the other, Emma Howard, was said to be very attractive and well built. Howard's good looks elicited much comment among policemen at the stationhouse but did not prevent the captain from locking her up in the cell next to Bracket. During the night Howard requested a drink of water and was said to be safely in her cell, but by morning she had managed to escape while friend Kitty was sent on to Blackwell's Island. The Herald commented that those "who knew more of human nature and the power of a pretty woman" were not astonished by the miraculous escape.^[31]

Kate Ridgley was another woman who understood that the power of a pretty woman and friendly relations could be factors in a court case. Ridgley, "a dashing looking woman," managed a house at 78 Duane called the "palace of mirrors," which was said to have sixty superbly furnished rooms. Ridgley filed a complaint against two "sporting men" who visited her house and "alarmed her boarders" by threatening to

damage her furniture. She took her case before the mayor to have a decision rendered, bringing along with her six "very fine looking young witnesses" who were "decked out in the tip of the fashion with silks, satin and jewelry." These witnesses "were seated near the mayor, to be called upon in order to substantiate the accusations." The defendants shrewdly hired a well-known political figure to protest their innocence, and even though the mayor found the two men guilty, he demanded only that they each post $100 bail to keep the peace. Ridgley seemed satisfied with the decision, and she and her boarders, "after chatting a little while with some of their old friends, left the office for the quiet of home."^[32]

If a prostitute failed to be shown leniency by police, aldermen, or justices, she had one final recourse if her case went to trial: the jury. In describing prostitution and disorderly house cases in the 1850s, Chief of Police George Walling wrote that "as a general rule, juries have something almost amounting to an aversion to convict in such cases, and especially is this so when the jury is made up largely of elderly men; they seem to sympathize, strangely enough, with the elegantly accoutred and apparently repentant Delilah, who sometimes sheds 'crocodile' tears, or else looks as prim and demure as a Puritan maiden fresh from the Mayflower."^[33]

Given the informal and personal nature of New York City's law enforcement in the mid-nineteenth century, it is understandable that prostitutes would view law enforcement officials as more important than the law itself in the functioning of their daily lives. Officials decided whether the prostitute faced restrictions or freedom, punishment or accommodation, censure or camaraderie. The discretion allowed legal officials in the execution of their duties could mean a prostitute would be sent to the penitentiary for six months with little or no regard for legal due process or her individual rights, or it might mean she could operate her business in a neighborhood with little interference because she used working relationships, sympathy, personal and sexual favors, or monetary rewards to accomplish this end. Prostitutes understood that their well-being often depended on tenuous and unequal relationships with law enforcement officials. Nevertheless, many nineteenth-century prostitutes effectively avoided the punishments of the legal system and openly and smoothly practiced their profession by a tactful manipulation of the personalism of the system.

Prostitutes As Legal Citizens

No aspect of a prostitute's life indicated more clearly her integration into the mainstream of New York City life and her confidence in that position than did her participation as a citizen in the municipal and judicial processes of the city. Prostitutes accepted the fact that they had to work around the legal strictures of their society, but they also believed they were entitled to certain rights and privileges as members of the community. Prostitutes expected the municipal government to defend their interests and protect their persons and property. When they, their possessions, or their brothels were threatened, prostitutes called the watch, pressed charges, and gave court testimony against their aggressors. In defending their interests, prostitutes were not afraid of being highly visible or of taking public action against another party because they viewed themselves as a part of the public citizenry, not as legal deviants who must function outside the established system.

Besides bringing their own suits against individuals in the courts, prostitutes also were called upon to participate in legal hearings or public inquiries. Sometimes prostitutes were required to give information at inquests into the death of a friend, coworker, or patron, and at other times they were subpoenaed to testify as witnesses in divorce hearings. Although a husband's association with a prostitute proved he had violated a legally endorsed trust and must suffer the consequences, no questions were raised nor prosecutions made over the prostitute's participation in an activity that was supposedly prohibited by law.

Finally, just as serving as a public witness at an inquest or trial was a civic obligation assumed by prostitutes, so too was the payment of taxes on their real and personal property. Prostitutes were assessed on their assets like other citizens, and like others, they readily challenged their tax assessments when they believed they were too high.

A year in the life of Kate Hastings suggests the variety of ways a prostitute might interact with the court system and public officials. A native of New Hampshire, Hastings began her New York career in prostitution in 1845 when she went to work in Sarah Tuttle's Leonard Street brothel next door to the fifth ward station house. This brothel was familiar not only to the neighboring law enforcers but also to Justice

Robert Taylor, who in his diary mentions visiting it several times. Hastings took over management of Tuttle's brothel in 1848 and purchased the property from Tuttle two years later. Following the purchase of the brothel, Hastings went before the tax assessor to have her personal property holdings "sworn off" the tax roll, since she apparently had used her personal assets in purchasing the real estate property.^[34] Hastings's appeal before the tax assessor was at least the fifth time over the period of a year that she made an appearance before some legal tribunal, including the police court, the criminal courts of Special Sessions and General Sessions, and the Superior Court.

Like other brothel managers, Hastings periodically had to contend with rowdy guests in her establishment. On one occasion she filed charges in police court against William Dowell for malicious mischief, and another time she gave testimony in the Court of General Sessions against James Berdell for assault and battery. Berdell had gotten into an argument with several of the women in Hastings's brothel and had raised such a disturbance that police were summoned. The officials immediately recognized Berdell as a fugitive from justice who was wanted for violently assaulting a police officer a year before.^[35]

Hastings also made an appearance before the Superior Court of Connecticut in the divorce trial of John C. Holland, president of the Norwich and Worcester Railroad Company. Holland's wife, Frances, had subpoenaed Hastings and two other New York City prostitutes to verify her husband's infidelity. Hastings was a cooperative witness and gave a brief account of her years in prostitution, including a description of her involvement with "Marquis," the name by which all three prostitutes knew Holland. Not only did she describe Holland's intimacies with several of the fifteen women in the brothel, but she also stated: "He has never been in bed with me [but] he has had carnal knowledge of me in my parlor adjoining my bedroom."^[36]

Hastings's confidence that publicity or notoriety would not jeopardize her freedom to practice her profession was even more evident in a case in which Hastings aggressively defended her "name and reputation" both on the streets and in the courtroom in response to an unflattering article in a local newspaper.

Several of New York City's mid-nineteenth-century newspaper editors were controversial figures. After the 1830s there was an increase in the number of inexpensive New York dailies, the penny press, whose

common fare was topics that would have been considered improper or indecent to discuss in print a decade earlier. Many of the stories encouraged a popular taste for vicarious vice and crime, while others appear both to have offended sensibilities and wounded reputations. Editors such as James W. Webb of the Courier and Enquirer , James G. Bennett of the Herald , George Wilkes of the Police Gazette , Moses Y. Beach of the Sun , and E. Z. C. Judson of Ned Buntline's Own not only squabbled with each other as editors of competing papers but also became embroiled in a number of controversies with members of the reading public.^[37] Both editors and citizens were brought to physical blows over the anger and animosities created by news articles. In light of this, editor J. G. Bennett's biographer has stated that nineteenth-century "editorial impact could almost be measured by the number of welts and bruises a newspaper proprietor displayed. Assaulting an editor, generally with a whip, was rarely out of season on the streets of New York."^[38]

In April 1849, E. Z. C. Judson, editor of Ned Buntline's Own , printed an article in his paper mentioning Kate Hastings. The first half of the small article called "Description of Gamblers" portrayed a local figure, Samuel A. Suydam, as a very unattractive person. The last half of the column said that

if . . . any of my readers feel particularly anxious to see this notorious blackleg, his den is at No. 14 Barclay-Street, and his chere amie is the infamous east-off mistress of a deceased gambler, known as gallows Kate Hastings, the keeper of a low house of prostitution in Leonard-Street. Sam dances attendance to this strumpet when called on.^[39]

According to a letter from Hastings printed in the Herald , Hastings learned about the article the day after its publication while she was shopping in a store on Ann Street. Hastings stated that the article was "derogatory to my own character and the character of my house. . .. I immediately said I would cowhide Ned Buntline the first time I caught him in a public street." Just as Hastings declared this to her acquaintances, Judson passed the store, and Hastings followed and caught him by the arm. She told him she would cowhide him for the insult the next time she met him, and she would wait on Broadway until the opportunity arose. Five days later, after waiting an hour on the corner near Judson's office, Hastings found her opportunity. As Judson walked down

the street with friends, she gave him two blows on the head. Hastings said she "didn't stop to see if he was much hurt and didn't care."^[40]

The assault attracted much attention and comment both in the press and from New York citizens. J. G. Bennett appeared to take special delight in reporting an embellished version of the story in the Herald . The paper said it was alleged Judson had drawn a pistol and threatened the life of his fair assailant. Infuriated by the reporting of the affair, Judson wrote the paper pointing out that he had not drawn a pistol nor had a word been said. He stated he felt the Herald's reporting was so particularly malignant that he had directed his lawyer "to enter a suit for libel against the paper's proprietor unless he gives a full and immediate retraction."^[41]

Judson filed charges of assault and battery against Hastings, and her case went before a grand jury. The grand jury could not find a bill against her, so the case was "laid over." Hastings waived her right to a trial by jury and accepted a bench trial in the Court of Special Sessions. The press gave a detailed description of Hastings's appearance before the court:

She had on a splendid fawn-colored silk dress, and wore a rich broche shawl, with a pearl colored straw hat. She had about her person a profusion of jewelry, charms, watch, bracelets, buckles, pencil head, watch-key, and other like articles of adornment. She came in with a smart business-like air, and seemed to court dispatch.^[42]

According to the Herald , the trial attracted a large group of spectators who were so eager to view Hastings they "stood to see her, put on eyeglasses, and ran to the balcony."^[43]

Hastings's court deposition defended her actions on the basis of the derogatory attack that had been made on her by Judson in his paper. She stated that Judson had for a considerable period published similar gross attacks upon her which had been calculated to arouse her anger, and thus they had succeeded in causing her to "chastise" him. Even though the grand jury did not find a bill against her, Hastings said she wished to save the county the expense of a jury trial so had waived that right. She stated she readily accepted guilt for inflicting the chastisement upon Judson but believed that his "scurrilous attack" on her left him fully meriting the severe punishment she had meted out. Hastings reinforced charges that her adversary had a venomous nature and an unsavory

character by submitting as evidence two letters that had been sent to her the day following the confrontation on Broadway. One was signed by Judson and said:

You are an infernal dirty bitch and if you ever attempt to do to me a similar act you may consider yourself shot. Take warning by this you dirty whore. My paper is mine and I am able to be responsible for any articles contained therein.
E. Z. C. Judson^[44]

The second letter, which also appeared to be in Judson's handwriting, was signed, "One Who Knows Something." It justified the actions of Judson and accused Hastings of being a destroyer of youthful morals and lives, a "damd [sic ] whore . . . [who is] fucked every night by sporting men." The letter ended with the warning: "Woe be to you cursed whore. Look out!"^[45]

The judges accepted Hastings's plea of guilty, said they trusted she would not attack the man again, and imposed a fine of 6 cents. The Herald reported that when her sentence was pronounced, "Kate very deliberately opened an elegant purse she held in her hand, and was about to pay the sixpence down at once, but her counsel interposed saying to her that the amount was merely nominal, and that she might leave it to him to arrange." According to the press, when the trial ended voices were heard all around expressing approbation at the decision of the court, and as Hastings left the room she audibly remarked that if Judson did not leave her alone in the future he would not be able to come to court the next time.^[46]

In spite of the animosities expressed for each other, Judson and Hastings appear to have eventually reached a truce in their relationship. A police officer testified to seeing Judson and some companions leaving Hastings's brothel only a month and a half after the trial for her assault on him.^[47]

Many prostitutes were just as active as Hastings in their roles as citizens of the community—or in their interactions with municipal agencies, such as tax assessors. A review of tax records in wards five and eight in eight different years during the 1840s and 1850s reveals twenty-four instances of known prostitutes appealing their assessments. Some prostitutes, such as Eliza Pratt, Adeline Miller, Sarah Tuttle, Fanny White, and Ann Thomas challenged their appraisals on more than one occasion. The fact that prostitutes took advantage of the appeals process

[Full Size]

13.
Letter from Editor Judson to Prostitute Kate Hastings. 
This letter, written by an angry E. Z. C. Judson after being horsewhipped 
by Hastings, was submitted as evidence at the court hearing on the incident. 
(NYDA Indictments, People v. Hastings, 17 April 1849, Municipal Archives, 
Department of Records and Information Services, City of New York)

indicates that they were not afraid of challenging municipal officials and were not concerned about keeping a low profile for fear that public attention might jeopardize their ability to work in the community.^[48]

Court records and newspapers also indicate that prostitutes repeatedly were called upon to serve as witnesses at public trials or hearings, especially to supply testimony verifying infidelity in divorce proceedings. When the parties involved were prominent, such as John Holland, the trials became news events, and the prostitutes became well known to the community. Six months after Judson's altercation with Hastings, his wife sued for divorce, and Fanny White and the occupants of her house testified to repeated instances of adultery on Judson's part. Testimony of prostitutes also was used in the 1852 divorce trial of the famous actor Edwin Forrest. Caroline Ingersoll, manager of assignation and prostitution boarding houses, gave guarded but important testimony that was crucial in bringing about a decision favorable to Mrs. Forrest.^[49]

Prostitutes also testified at inquests or trials involving the deaths of prostitutes or their patrons and at investigative hearings into suspected crimes, such as the fire that destroyed the National Theatre and Julia Brown's brothel next door. In the case of the fire, officials were investigating both a suspected arson and the death of a young prostitute. In the 1836 Jewett murder trial, ten prostitutes testified about events at the brothel and gave information concerning the parties involved. In the 1843 murder of Charles Corlis, five prostitutes were called to give information about circumstances surrounding the death. In the 1870 murder of Benjamin Nathan, Clara Dale, a prostitute from Irene McGready's brothel, was a key witness because she provided the alibi for the prosecution's major suspect, Nathan's son.^[50]

Prostitutes frequently appeared as plaintiffs in court cases. Some of the complaints filed in court by prostitutes were against their employees or servants, most often in cases involving the theft of clothing, items of adornment, or money. Servants appear to have been named as culprits far more often than were prostitute coworkers, and courts seem to have been tougher about, and less forgiving of, a charge of theft than a charge of practicing prostitution. Two servants in the house of Antoinette Goldstreng stole $97.40 from a stocking where Goldstreng kept the weekly rental fees. Even though police officers recovered part of the money, the two servants were sent to prison for two years. Eliza Fisher's servant Mary Ann Furman also was sent to prison for stealing two hocks,

two shirts, two lace collars, and a velvet hat. Fisher made another complaint in court a couple of years later, when a second servant was arrested for stealing four petticoats, two dresses, a veil, a shawl, and $9 cash. Abby Meyers's servant Amelia Thompson was jailed for twenty days for stealing material worth a mere $1.50, and another servant of Meyers was arrested and committed for taking a writing desk and silver valued at $200. Prostitute Matilda Edmonds, a resident in Isabella Stewart's brothel, was arrested and sent to prison for stealing a gold watch, gold pencil, silk dress, hat, and other articles valued at $100.^[51]

Theft also was an issue between prostitutes and their clients. Clients often claimed they had been robbed while in a brothel, but prostitutes also brought charges against customers who used their entry into the establishment as an easy opportunity to take unguarded valuables. Prostitute Jane Smith screamed for the watch when she realized a roll of bills had been taken from her pocket while a patron was with her in her room. The man was immediately arrested and taken to the police. Rachel Porter complained to police that a man had taken a safety chain worth $15 from her neck while they were together in her brothel. The customer denied the charges, and the necklace was not found, but Porter said he had given it to another man. Law officials believed Porter's story over that of the customer, and he was committed to jail. The newspaper reporter covering the story commented that the customer's "appearance warranted the expectation of better things from him."^[52]

Some prostitutes may have used charges of theft as a means of getting assistance in removing an unwanted customer from a brothel. Abby Meyers called officers to arrest a patron she claimed had robbed her while in her house. Meyers did not appear at the police station the next morning to press charges, so the newspaper assumed Meyers had not been robbed at all.^[53]

Prostitutes appeared in court as plaintiffs most often when pressing charges against patrons and other males who created disturbances in their brothels. Sometimes clients got drunk or rowdy and refused to leave, so the watch was called to assist with their eviction. A guest at 24 Anthony who became angry and would not leave when ordered out at 1:30 A.M . got into a scuffle with one of the women in the house. The watch was summoned, and he was put in jail. Mary Jewell refused to let a lawyer into her brothel after midnight, so he kicked in the door. She called the watch and pressed charges in court.

Often customers were destructive of a prostitute's property, and in most cases prostitutes immediately prosecuted the assaulters. Two so-called "Texas patriots" who raised a ruckus in Catherine Cochran's brothel by bragging about their war exploits were thrown out by the other male customers. The two men returned and started smashing glasses and assaulting the women and were sent to jail. Mary Wall admitted five customers who had arrived at her brothel in a hack. Once seated in the parlor, they requested drinks, and then one proceeded to use a fire shovel to destroy decanters and almost all the other glassware on the sideboard. Wall took them to court for their assault.^[54]

Much of the property destruction and physical violence that occurred in brothels, especially in the 1830s and early 1840s, was the result of groups of rowdy males who roamed the streets and took great pleasure in wanton attacks upon prostitution houses. Whether these attacks were the result of excessive alcohol, male resentment over the independence of working and sexually active women, or entertainment for men who saw violence as an assertion of their rising social and political power in an increasingly egalitarian society, the victims of the attacks often tended to be those persons perceived to be "oppressed, unpopular, or unprotected."^[55] Prostitutes were viewed as vulnerable because they were women and possibly because they operated as "illegals" in the community, but ruffians were often surprised at the persistence and force of both the legal and physical responses of these women to their attacks.

George Gale and some of his friends spent two weeks in the spring of 1831 harassing several brothels, including those of Phoebe Doty and Elizabeth Baker. Both Dory and Baker were attacked three times each during this period. At Baker's brothel, the men threw stones at the house, breaking and destroying windows, and then demolished her stoop and forced themselves inside, where they were "crass and offensive." At Doty's house, Gale and Enoch Carter kicked furniture, took lamps down, spilled oil, and threatened to knock Doty to the floor. Angered rather than intimidated, the women filed charges against the men.^[56]

Bullies did not single out prostitutes alone for their vicious rampages. In late April of 1835, the house of Elizabeth Jeffreys at 63 Church was forcibly entered by John Chichester, John Boyd, and several other members of their notorious gang. The men assaulted Jeffreys, moved on to the home of Abel Welles and repeated the same violence, and then attacked three men in a neighborhood store. The next week, the gang

went to the brothel of Jane Ann Jackson and threw brickbats and stones against the door and windows, breaking the window shutters and sash. They then entered the brothel, assaulted Jackson with a large gilt ball, and threatened to set fire to her house. From Jackson's they went to Eliza Ludlow's brothel and forced her to serve them brandy. Afterward, Chichester and friends threw the glasses into the fire, burned a rug, broke a bench by hurling it at a prostitute, and threatened to toss a woman out the window. After leaving the brothel, the bullies assaulted three more men in the street and broke several street lamps. The prostitutes, joined by the other neighbors who had been attacked, pressed charges against the Chichester gang, and the men were convicted.^[57]

Prostitutes made especially easy targets for the bullies. Brothels were managed by women and were open at very late hours. Also, prostitutes angered some men by denying them entry to their brothels, by refusing to let them act as they wished when admitted, or by refusing sexual service to some. Violence was a response to rejection and frustration, but it was also a form of sport. As the activities of the Chichester gang illustrate, however, many neighborhood citizens besides prostitutes suffered from the increased street violence of the period, indicating that attacks on prostitutes were because they were vulnerable citizens rather than unacceptable social outcasts. Certainly, they felt secure enough as members of the community to prosecute the bullies instead of being cowed by their aggressiveness.^[58]

Prostitutes pressed criminal charges against rowdy males to get them incarcerated, but they also pursued damages in court for the property the men destroyed. A gang of six men broke into the vacated brothel of Adeline Miller at 44 Orange Street, destroying about $100 worth of furniture. From Orange Street they went to Miller's house at 133 Reed and in spite of her resistance, broke into the window, threw bottles of liquor at Miller and then began destroying her most valuable property, demolishing $400 worth of oil paintings, glassware, mirrors and furnishings. They asked for money, and as she was giving it to them they grabbed her by the throat and struck her on the head with an iron bar. From Miller's the men went to the house of Jane Weston (alias Jenny Graham), where they drank and demolished a basket of champagne before asking for money. Both women swore out complaints against the men, and they were jailed. They also sought remuneration for damages.

Five months after the attack on the brothels, the men were ordered by the court to make restitution of $700 and fees before they were released from jail.^[59]

Court prosecutions were not the only way prostitutes responded to assaults, intimidation, and the loss of property. Many prostitutes responded to physical force by defending themselves with aggressive physical actions. On Christmas day in 1847 John Briggs and some friends came to the brothel of Phoebe Dory at 166 Church Street. Briggs and his cronies became very rowdy, bullied the inmates of the brothel, and began to conduct themselves in a "beastly and indecent manner." When the men refused to leave, one of the women in the brothel, Moll Stephens, put a gun to Briggs's head and pulled the trigger. Fortunately for Briggs, the bullet chamber that was shot was the only one of the six that was empty. Briggs grabbed the gun and ran out of the brothel. The next day Doty filed charges against Briggs for assault and battery, but he countered with the same charges against Stephens. The judge put both parties on bail, but the Police Gazette pointed out that, when a black boy had done the same thing with a pistol to a black prostitute a few years before, he had been sent to state prison for nine and a half years.^[60]

Another instance of self-defense occurred in a Duane Street brothel when one of the patrons became jealous of the attention being shown another customer by an attractive prostitute named Maria. Later the customer took Maria to her room and threatened her with a dagger. Although Maria was short, she was very muscular and, when the jealous customer threatened her, she jumped up, seized his arm, snatched the dagger, threw him on the floor, put her knee on his chest, called him names, slapped his face, and then threw him down the stairs. Prostitute Mary Gamble, when attacked with a sword and stabbed in the nose, scratched her assailant's face so badly that she was certain he would show the marks for weeks. When three men kicked open the door of Susan Shannon's brothel, she cut one with a sword. Jane Williams also acted to protect herself when twelve men tried to forcibly enter her brothel. She confronted the men with a revolver, but one man hit her, took the gun from her, and ran away. Williams then pursued justice by filing charges in criminal court.^[61]

Sometimes prostitutes responded physically to attacks or injuries that were non-physical in nature. Kate Hastings horsewhipped Judson for

insulting her, and Amelia Norman stabbed Henry Ballard for abandoning her after making her pregnant. Ginderella Marshall, madam of a Leonard Street brothel, horsewhipped and struck on the head a guest who would not pay after enjoying himself in her house. Mary Stewart confronted a man in her brothel with a gun and threatened to blow his brains out. The man had come to persuade his younger brother, who was living with Stewart, to leave the prostitute and go home. Another prostitute assaulted and attempted to stab a man on behalf of her paramour. The man had given testimony against her lover, charging him with stealing a watch.^[62]

The self-assurance prostitutes showed concerning their rights as community citizens is especially evident in a few cases one would have thought would be almost impossible for a prostitute to win. Because rape was generally regarded as a sexual act instead of a violent assault, any woman had difficulty proving her case. If challenged, a woman charging rape usually had to establish that she was chaste, which obviously was a difficult burden of proof for a prostitute.^[63] Nevertheless, some prostitutes did file charges of rape and attempted rape, and their attackers were convicted. Even if justice officials thought of the act as assault and battery, the prostitute was better off than in cases where the rape was believed to be what she had bargained for as a prostitute.

One case of rape involved a gang of men led by Thomas Hyer. The men entered the brothel of Ellen Holly and gang-raped one of her boarders, Ellen Bellmire. Hyer and his friends were convicted of the assault but were out of jail by the end of a year. Eliza Logue's house was forcibly entered by five men who destroyed some furnishings, strangled Logue, and then "threw her across the foot of a bed and endeavored by force and violence to have connection with her." Only the arrival of the watch prevented the rape from occurring, but charges were brought against the men, and they were convicted.^[64] Prostitute Hannah Fuller also pressed charges for attempted rape. Fuller was seated in the window of her bedroom at 4 A.M . one summer morning when William Ford passed by and saw her. Ford climbed over the gate and broke into the house. After kicking in Fuller's door, Ford removed his boots and pants and carried her to bed and attempted to "ravish and . . . carnally know her." Mary Ann Grovenor came to help Fuller but left when Ford threatened to split open her head. Only through the intervention of the watch was the rape prevented.

Fuller pressed charges against Ford but later withdrew her complaint, saying she "believed he was under an excitement at the time" and was an "old friend and has been for a long time back and still is." She requested that no further action be taken against him because she now believed they were both at fault. "Had I known the consequences to befall him I would never have made the complaint." The court then prosecuted Ford for assault and battery on the watchman.^[65]

A second type of case where a prostitute might not expect to receive a sympathetic hearing involved harassment when streetwalking. By the 1850s, because of the large influx of poor immigrants to New York and the great increase in street traffic, authorities became very strict in policing city thoroughfares if the public complained that prostitutes were being a nuisance. As the 1855 case of Matilda Wade showed, any woman on the streets at night had difficulty proving she was not a streetwalker or vagrant. Streetwalkers in the two preceding decades also had been considered a public harassment as well as a symbol of eroding public morality, but several cases illustrate that these women believed they should be guaranteed and usually received—personal protection even while plying their trade on public thoroughfares.

Prostitute Mary Smith of Leonard Street filed charges against William Nosworthy for assaulting her as she was walking home from the Park Theater. Nosworthy seized her and "raised her clothes so to expose her nakedness to passers by." Nosworthy was fully prosecuted. Another prostitute who was promenading on Broadway was approached and kissed by a drunken man. She objected to his sexual advances and prosecuted him but dropped the charges after he apologized. Prostitute Julia Meadows also was strolling on Broadway at night when a young man approached her from behind and threw oil of vitriol on her clothes, burning both her silk dress and her visette. Meadows screamed for the police, who pursued and caught the man; she filed charges, and he was committed. Prostitute Jane Williams, while on her evening stroll, picked up hack driver Jim Waters and was taking him to her brothel when they passed another man who touched Williams's shoulder. Williams left Waters for the new escort, and Waters seized her by the arm and objected. After Williams hit Waters in the face, he turned her over to the watch, charging her with assault and battery. Williams told the judge she hit him in order to get away, and the judge ruled against Waters, dismissing the case on grounds of self-defense.^[66]

Although there are many examples that demonstrate how prostitutes enjoyed the rights and privileges of community citizenship, there are also instances that illustrate that the prostitute was always vulnerable in public disputes because of the illegal status and stigma of her profession. Even though prostitutes frequently used the legal and judicial system for their own interests, there was the possibility their credibility would be challenged because of their way of life. In the case of a theft or other conflict, it was the prostitute's word against the client's, and the reports of these cases indicate that the lack of an "irreproachable character" sometimes worked against prostitutes. In the well-publicized Jewett murder trial in 1836, for example, the major thrust of the defense counsel's argument was that the testimony of prostitutes could not be received in a court of justice, even in a trial for murder. According to the defense counsel, "the connection between chastity and veracity is so vital that the loss of the former is the instant destruction of the latter."^[67] The judge in the case concurred with the defense, and in his charge to the jury warned that jurors must

consider well the character of the persons brought forward as witnesses. Testimony principally is drawn from ... persons of very bad repute ... [and] their testimony is not to be credited unless corroborated by testimony drawn from more credible sources. In the judgment of the law you are not entitled to conviction upon it; but if it be corroborated and strengthened by other credible testimony then give to it all the credibility which it is in justice entitled.^[68]

Since one young man contradicted the testimony of the prostitutes at the trial, the suspected murderer was found not guilty. Most of the editorial opinion was against the decision of the court. The Sun noted that the defense counsel's argument was based on a "specious and dangerous principle" on the basis of which crimes need only be committed in the presence of prostitutes for the murderers to walk away free. The paper also pointed out that the counsel himself had won many convictions in the past based on "testimony of the same character."^[69]The Advocate of Moral Reform voiced similar sentiments, adding that it saw

no reason why the testimony of Mrs. Townsend and her inmates is not worth as much as that of the young men, who by their own confession are in the habit of visiting her house constantly ... thus reducing themselves to her level.^[70]

There were a number of sources in the period that reinforced the notion that "prostitutes are known to be notorious liars." The Advocate of Moral Reform ran an article in 1841, "The Habit of Lying Among Prostitutes," which was taken from William Tait's study, Prostitution in Edinburgh .^[71] In the February 1840 trial of a group of men who were charged with assaulting Susan Shannon at her brothel, the jury was unable to reach a verdict because one juror stated that he "did not consider a prostitute a human being, and could in no event find a verdict from her testimony." Two weeks after the Shannon trial, however, Justice Wyman found two men guilty of assault and battery on Julia Brown and her prostitutes, even though the defendants claimed the prostitutes had lied. After hearing the verdict the men expressed indignation that the testimony of the prostitutes had been valued over theirs.^[72]

Although prostitutes' credibility in testimony continued to be challenged periodically throughout the middle decades of the nineteenth century, judicial experience confirmed that a prostitute's veracity could be accepted with the same care as that of any other citizen. In the disorderly house trial of Mary Fowler, nine years after the Shannon and Brown cases, Judge C. P. Daley declared that "bad and vicious habits do not necessarily imply a want of veracity, for it is a matter of familiar experience in the courts of justice, that persons otherwise of the most degraded character, not unfrequently manifest a strict regard for truth."^[73] A prostitute's testimony would continue to be accepted or rejected based on the plausibility of the evidence given—or the attitudes of the legal officials in charge.

Thus, whether challenging laws that discriminated against them or working with law officials, courts, and municipal agencies to further their own interests, prostitutes of the mid-nineteenth century demonstrated that, in spite of the existence of anti-prostitution laws, they and their profession were very much a part of the social fabric of New York City life. The ambivalence shown by both ordinary citizens and officials toward prostitution underscored this position in the community. Anti-prostitution laws were kept on the statute books in an effort to satisfy a public need to feel that morality was being preserved and that the unrespectable and poor classes would be kept in control when necessary, but the actual casual and discretionary enforcement of the laws illustrates that many citizens did not find the existence of prostitutes in their neighborhoods so offensive. Prostitutes did not, however, achieve the

status of coworkers and fellow citizens in the urban community merely because New Yorkers showed a tolerance or lack of concern about them. Prostitutes actively worked to create a positive customary and legal environment for themselves in ways that helped integrate them into New York City life. In theory, they were faced with laws vastly indiscriminate and procedurally unrestrained, but in practice, the more successful prostitutes particularly were able to use their money and their working legal knowledge and connections to make vigorous use of the law to protect themselves.