Alfred Kinsey - Accused of Being a "Fifth Columnist" and Weakening American Morals

Alfred Kinsey, 1955. Public Domain

Reformer, Alfred Kinsey, stated that homosexuality was not a medical condition, yet gay men were still thrown into prison or labelled schizophrenic.

Alfred Kinsey, (1894-1956) was born in Hoboken, New Jersey. In 1920, he was awarded a Ph.D. from Harvard University, and went on to teach zoology at Indiana University. In 1942, he founded The Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University.

Kinsey's Book - A Challenge to Freudian Beliefs

His enquiries into human sexuality led him to publish Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948). According to Encyclopaedia Britannica, "These reports, based on 18,500 personal interviews, received extraordinary publicity for their conclusions about contemporary sexual mores and behaviour." They certainly challenged Freudian beliefs that homosexuality was due to psychiatric disturbance.

For Kinsey, all individuals fitted on a continuum of sexual preferences - and might, during their lifetime, shift from one part of the scale to another. Men in category 1 had no interested in homosexual outlets, while category 6 men preferred nothing else. Men often moved between the categories during their lives. According to author, Andrew Wykholm, the book became a bestseller, while provoking controversy and dissent.

I Have a Right to my Life

Meantime, in spite of the Kinsey Report, homosexuality was still regarded as a medical condition or a disease that could, perhaps, be medically treated. A young man brought up on two indecency charges, reported in The Argus on 3 January 1952, was offered choices between becoming a voluntary patient at a mental hospital or being jailed. He had already been in custody for three weeks pending medical reports. It was claimed he needed treatment for schizophrenia. He told the magistrate that he had a right to a decent life and was sent to prison for two months. "I've got my life to live," he said.

"He never hid his sexuality. He was honest to himself in every respect," said the report.

Kinsey - Accused of Weakening American Morals

Some time later, in 1953, Kinsey's Sexual Behaviour in the Human Female appeared, and caused outrage when he said that lesbians were better at giving partners a climax than males. He also claimed that women who had premarital sex experienced more orgasms after marriage.

Andrew Wikholm adds that some congressmen suspected Alfred Kinsey of being a "fifth columnist" working to erode America's morals and weaken her against the communists.

Alfred Kinsey's research grant was withdrawn after his unpopular claims were published in Sexual Behaviour in the Human Female.

Sources:

·      Kinsey, A. Sexual Behaviour in the Human Male (1948)

·      Kinsey, A. Sexual Behaviour in the Human Female (1953)

·      Wikholm, A. Social Constructionist History Link, Last Accessed 14 February 2012.

·      Staff Reporter, "Man Held on Indecency Charges," The Argus 3 January, 1952.

·      Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (1994-2011) For more information visitBritannica.com

Murder in Cold Blood - A Belgian Widow Accuses England

Wandsworth Prison, Wikimedia Commons

The strange account of a felon who became the victim and centre of an intense anti-capital punishment campaign masterminded by a wealthy Belgian widow.

Leonard Brigstock was obsessed with a passion for the macabre, manifesting in horrible, blood-filled dreams that drove him crazy. Brigstock had joined the Navy at seventeen years old, and at thirty-three, on Saturday 19 January 1935, he brutally slit the throat of Chief Petty Officer Hubert Sidney Deggan, aged thirty-six. What was particularly unsavoury about this murder was that it took place while the victim was sleeping on the gunnery training ship, HMS Marshal Soult, which was then berthed in Chatham Dockyard.


Previously, Brigstock had been in the King William public house drinking and playing darts. He left at 2.15 to return to his home in Nelson Road. Then, although he was on leave, he decided to return to the ship, where he waited till Deggan had gone for a nap in the mess room.


It was a vicious attack. The head of the CPO was almost severed from his body. Afterwards, Brigstock, coolly, went to a shipmate to report what he'd done. It was almost as though he was proud of himself. "I have cut the CPO's throat," he said, handing the man the dripping razor.


Later, it emerged that the mad stoker's motive was revenge. He had been reported for three disciplinary offences by the murdered man. Apart from these issues, his record was good and he was described as "conscientious." The offences involved negligence, such as absence and drinking tea at the wrong time and place, and were said to be of a "very serious nature."


Mitigating Circumstances - Insanity and the Devil's Mate


So why did Brigstock attract the concern of the wealthy widow, Mrs. Violet Van der Elst?
The stoker had experienced a traumatic life, suffering from the death of his first wife. Insanity ran in his family, as his grandfather died in a lunatic asylum and his niece was in a mental home. His childhood was disturbed by his father's violent attacks on the family. Brigstock, too, was often violent and once tried to cut his brother's wrist with a knife.


Some of Brigstock's dreams involved his dead wife. He saw her on the side of the ship trying to get away from an enormous figure - this was the Devil's mate. When he tried to save her he was choked and beaten by the evil, black figure.


A month later at the Kent Assizes, Brigstock denied malicious and wilful murder, pleading insanity. His plea was rejected and the jury found the ship's stoker guilty. Donning his black cap, the judge pronounced the death sentence and a subsequent appeal was unsuccessful. Brigstock's last hope was a reprieve which never happened. He was tried at Maidstone on 19 February 1935 by Judge Lord Chief Justice Lord Hewart and sentenced to hang on Tuesday 2 April 1935 at Wandsworth in London.


Mrs. Van der Elst Causes a Riot 


On the day of the execution at Wandsworth, there was almost a riot outside the prison. Brigstock's case had been taken up by the widow of a Belgian shaving-cream magnate, Mrs. Violet Van der Elst. The wealthy widow waged an anti-capital punishment campaign from her Kensington home, having organised a petition totalling 65,000 signatures in favour of a reprieve. She maintained Brigstock was insane; therefore he should not hang.


Mrs. Van der Elst was unsuccessful and Brigstock was executed despite the widow's protests that an innocent man was to be hanged. There was a fairground atmosphere on the day of the execution. Planes zoomed overhead trailing banners STOP THE DEATH SENTENCE, while women prayed and men trundled around with sandwich boards saying STOP CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. Excited crowds milled outside the prison gates reading leaflets against capital punishment. Someone shouted, "England is about to commit another murder in cold blood."


The hangman was Robert Baxter assisted by Robert Watson, who ensured that the trap dropped beneath Leonard Brigstock at 9.00am that April morning. His death was reported as being instantaneous. At least, in some respects, society was beginning to become more enlightened about punishment and compassion since the darker days of Georgian and Victorian Britain.


Sources:

• Adapted from Medway Murder & Crime, Janet Cameron, Tempus Publishing, 2008.
• On the Gallows, Violet Van de Elst, Doge Press, 1937
• http://www.medwaymemories.co.uk/murder_on_the_warship.htm

 

Poltergeist of the Butcher's Daughter in the Marlborough Hotel

Artist's Conception of a Poltergeist, 1911
Public Domain

Ghostly activity at the Marlborough Hotel in Brighton, is claimed to be so intense that it received a visit from the Paranormal Society. One of the visitors, a psychic, said she could see the apparition of a woman in a black dress and wearing jet-black beads. This was thought to be the ghost of Lucy Packham, according to a report in the Argus dated Monday 30 October 2000, which described the brutal murder of a young woman by her husband in a fit of rage.

I cannot guarantee that the ghostly apparition tale is true, although the story of Lucy Packham has a firm, historical basis.

Thomas Packham, the publican at the Marlborough Hotel, was a thug and was violent to his wife and children. On 2 March 1900, a Dr. Ross was called to the Marlborough Hotel to find Lucy Packham dead. Lucy, the daughter of a butcher, had married Packham in 1888 and the couple had three children. The cause of death was found to be serious bruising to the head and body, and, as confirmed by the post mortem, cerebral haemorrhage.

Thomas Packham was charged with murder, and witnesses gave evidence of his brutality and verbal abuse towards his wife, for example, he had once even hit her with a heavy stewpot. It was reported how he had flung her into a seven-foot-deep grave-like pit before he ended her life. The jury was composed entirely of men and, after Thomas Packham reported how "dirty and idle" his dead wife was, he was found guilty of manslaughter instead of murder. He received four years' imprisonment and reportedly served only three, a paltry punishment for his crime.

Lucy's Poltergeist Prefers Female Company

Lucy was just thirty-two (or thirty-six in some reports) and it is no wonder if the poor woman still cannot rest. Many customers claim to have felt Lucy's presence, and witnessed the activity of the poltergeist she has left behind her. The manager, Sue Kerslake, detailed these activities as playing around with lights and switching off the gas on the beer taps.

It's said that the poltergeist of Lucy also sweeps bottles off a shelf behind the bar and twirls lampshades. The landlady often has a strong feeling of being watched. "I've never seen her properly," she said, "just fleeting glimpses when I've been on my own. When I thought about it, as she was beaten to death by her husband, she probably didn't like men too much. She's more comfortable with female company. It's not scary because she isn't nasty and she's been here a lot longer than me anyway."

Sue always warns new members of staff about the haunting and, although no one has yet declined employment, most are too terrified to enter the cellar. One employee, Paula, of St. James's Street, didn't believe in ghosts until she began working at the Marlborough Hotel in 1998. "I've known Sue for a long time," she said, "and she's not the sort of person to make things up. Sometimes you do feel there's someone in the bar with you, even if you can't see anyone else in there."

Originally, the Marlborough Hotel was a coach house. It was renamed the Marlborough Hotel and Theatre in 1850 and was once owned by someone called Henry Witch, who died in 1906.