1870 - 1879

1870​        Joseph and His Friend by Bayard Taylor.  The novel’s dedication was not published in 

                                Britain.  It included the words that it was dedicated to those: “who believe in the truth

                                and tenderness of man’s love for man, as of man’s love for woman.”  The novel is a 

                                fictionalized account of the love affair between the poets Fitzgreene Halleck & Joseph

                                Rodman Drake.  Note chapters 9 & 10. It was set in a new world “where men might 

                                love each other without fear of conventional society.”

            Mademoiselle Giraud, ma femme by Adolphe Belot is about an angry frigid lesbian. 

            Simeon Solomon exhibits his painting The Sleepers and the One That Watcheth. Now the 

                        painting clearly looks homoerotic, but was accepted at the time.

            William Cory, previous master of Oscar Browning, is forced to resign from Eton after a 

                        same-sex scandal.  

            Arthur Rimbaud visited Paris, where he is believed to have had sex with soldiers.

            Henry Morton Stanley visited Turkey, where he was closely linked to a youth called his 

                        “half-brother.”  Some have argued that this was a homosexual relationship.

            28 April Ernest Boulton [Lady Stella Clinton] (23) & Frederick Park [Miss Fanny] (22) in 

                        full female attire attend a performance at the Strand Theatre.  They had been watched 

                        since the previous year, and they were arrested.  

​           Carl Westphal publishes an article on “contrary sexual feeling.”

            20 June.  The Times prints a letter from Lord Arthur Clinton claiming he was innocent and he 

                        was only guilty of keeping up the theatrical pretence of “Stella” (Ernest Boulton) 

                        posing as Lady Clinton.  However, he had committed suicide after the letter was sent.  

            29 June.  An anonymous article ‘Inverted Relations’ in the Pall Mall Gazette discusses male 

                        and female “inverts”.

            29 July. The New York Times prints a letter in defence of John Fiske who had written some 

                        passionate letters to “Stella”, which were read out at her trial in London.  

            A French dictionary defines pédéraste with the comment: “There are many pederasts among

                        the Greeks & Italians.”

            Edmund Gosse (21) writes to a schoolfriend a letter which seems to be full of love.

1871​        May. Boulton & Park endure a sensational 6-day trial, at which they are found not guilty of 

                                sodomy.  The prosecution failed to prove that they did anything more than dress in 

                                women’s clothing for fun, so they were acquitted.  The verdict was greeted with loud

                                cheers.  Simeon Solomon attended the trial.  

            October.  Robert Buchanan in The Contemporary Review refers to Swinburne as an “intellec-

                        tual hermaphrodite” in an attack on the ‘Fleshly School of Poetry’. 

            Democratic Vistas by Walt Whitman.  He posits an erotic fraternity.

            Simeon Solomon paints Walter Pater.

            La Curée by Zola has a homosexual character, Maxime, but he is drawn in a negative light.

            Desperate Remedies by Thomas Hardy contains scenes of sexual passion between women.

            A Vision of Love Revealed in Sleep, a poem by Simeon Solomon is appreciated by J.A. 

                        Symonds for having a touch of medieval, classical and oriental qualities.

            Aleksey Sofronov stands in for his brother to act as Tchaikovsky’s servant, and serves him 

                        for the remainder of his life.  

            New laws were enacted against sodomy in the German Empire.  However, there are very few

                       prosecutions. 

            Franz E… was incarcerated in an asylum for propositioning a watchman.  

            Auguste-Ambroise Tardieu considers bachelor & unmarried widows under 30 should be 

                        taxed to try and increase the population.  “The bachelor is not only a sterile being, but

                        is also a bad example, and even more an agent of corruption.”

            Legrand de Saulle, French psychiatrist, suggests a new category of persecution complex 

                        should be introduced: “Fear of being considered a sodomite.”

            The unification of Germany meant that homosexual acts were criminalised. 

1872​        Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine meet and have a passionate affair for 18 months.  They co-

                                 write a sonnet to “The Arsehole.”

           William Johnson Cory is forced to resign as an Eton schoolmaster, probably because he was

                        too affectionate towards some of his pupils. He adds Cory to his surname. 

            William Hamo Thorneycroft sends a bronze statue of a gladiator as a gift to Cecil Boyle, to 

                        whom he was attracted.

            Tchaikovsky (32) tours Nice, Genoa, Venice & Vienna with Vladimir Shilovsky (19), his 

                         favourite pupil.

            Mary Benson married to future Archbishop of Canterbury, falls in love with Ellen Hall, while 

                        recuperating in Germany.  

            Samuel Butler begins work on The Way of all Flesh, but it won’t be published in his lifetime.  

            A study of prostitution in Château-Gontier discovered young men consumed lesbian 

                        pornography.

            The Birth of Tragedy out of the Spirit of Music by Friedrich Nietzsche – stresses the import-

                        ance of the irrational aspects in mythology and the mysteries of Dionysos.

            Harsh Prussian anti-homosexual laws are extended to the unified Germany.  

1873​        Walter Pater’s Studies in the History of the Renaissance, includes an essay on Johann 

                                Winckelmann.  The first essay details a French medieval romance between 2 men.

            ‘In a Transport’ by Charles Warren Stoddard published in South-Sea Idyls [sic] becomes 

                        more apparently homosexual the nearer the ship approaches Tahiti.

            April-August.  Arthur Rimbaud writes Une saison en enfer, dramatising aspects of his affair

                        with Verlaine.  [A Season in Hell].  

            Verlaine shoots his lover Rimbaud in the wrist and is sentenced to the maximum punishment 

                        of two years hard labour.  Verlaine’s sexuality, although irrelevant in the case, seems

                        to have influenced the jury.  His genitals had been examined thoroughly by 2 Belgian

                       doctors.

            Whitman has a stroke, so Peter Doyle comes to live near him to nurse him.

            Edward Fitzgerald tries to make “Posh” Fletcher give up alcohol for health reasons, which 

                       causes a rift between them.  

            J.A. Symonds writes A Problem in Greek Ethics, but it remains unpublished for a decade. 

            My Kalulu, Prince, King and Slave by Henry Morton Stanley – an intimate friendship is 

                        enjoyed between an African chief, Kalulu, and a Zanzibari ‘Arab’ prince.  

            Hugh Lynar dies and the former Attorney General for South Africa William Porter returns to

                       Ireland.

            11 February.  Simeon Solomon (33) was arrested for indecent exposure and committing a 

                        sexual act in a public lavatory with George Roberts (60), stableman.  He received an 

                        18-month suspended sentence, whilst Solomon was fined.  

​            November.  Eduard Zak commits suicide, was he seduced by Tchaikovsky?

            ​Tchaikovsky meets Alexei Sofronov, who becomes his valet & lover.  

​            The young E.F. Benson, son of the future Archbishop of Canterbury, is besotted with a 

                                Lincoln chorister.

            About Prostitution in General, and in Particular in Relation to Rio de Janeiro: Prevention of 

                       Syphilis by Francisco de Macedo.  One chapter is on male homosexuality.  

1873-6​        The Romance of Lust, or Early Experiences features the sexual education of Charlie Roberts.  

1874​        Sketches in Italy and Greece by J.A. Symonds.  The essay ‘Parma’ discusses Corregio.  

            Romances sans paroles by Paul Verlaine – includes sensual experiences with Rimbaud.

            Walter Pater is turned down for a long-promised proctorship after Benjamin Jowett discovers 

                        a romance between him and William Hardinge (19).  Hardinge already had a 

                        reputation as the ‘Balliol Bugger.’

            Diaphaneite by Walter Pater.  It was modelled on Pater’s closest friend, Charles Shadwell, a 

                        beautiful youth.  

            South Sea Islands, short stories by Charles Warren Stoddard – homoerotic tales.

            Pierre Loti (24), French writer, splits up with long-term companion Joseph Bernard.  

            Simeon Solomon is arrested in Paris on an indecency charge with a youth (19).  

            ​Edward Carpenter writes a letter of appreciation to Walt Whitman.  He also ‘defrocks’

                                 himself after being ordained 5 years earlier.

            ​The Larousse Encyclopedia article on ‘Oragsme’ admits that orgasms can be experienced by 

                                artificial means [ie in same-sex couples], but notes “many diseases come from 

                                unnatural pleasures.”

            A French slang dictionary lists more than 40 insulting terms for a male homosexual.  

1875​        Fridolins heimliche Ehe (Fridolin’s Mystical Marriage) by Adolf von Wilbrandt.  A man’s 

                                non-erotic fulfilment occurs when a former male student moves in with him.  

            ​Roderick Hudson by Henry James.  A novel of sublimated male desire.  

            ​Oscar Browning is dismissed from Eton, allegedly after taking 16-year-old George Curzon 

                                on a continental holiday.

            ​Ambrose St. John dies.  John Henry Newman suffers a deep bereavement.

            ​Mary Benson, married to future Archbishop of Canterbury, meets ‘Tan’ Mylne, an older

                               woman and slowly warms to her. 

            Edmund Gosse (30), shortly before his marriage, meets William Hamo Thorneycroft (29), a

                         handsome young sculptor, who becomes the love of his life.  

1876​    Studies of Greek Poets by J.A. Symonds includes a final chapter which depicts homo-

                                  sexuality as an essential part of Greek social life.

            Symonds attempts to ascertain Edmund Gosse’s sexual preferences, but is rebuffed.

            ​Edward Carpenter writes to Whitman a letter, which includes the phrase: “you have so 

                                  infused yourself that it is daily more and more possible for men to walk hand in hand

                                  over the whole earth”.  

            Modest Tchaikovsky (26) lives with his deaf and dumb lover, Hermanovich Konradi (12), for 

                         the following 17 years.  

            Tchaikovsky wrote to his brother Modest saying: “our inclinations are for both of us the 

                         greatest and most insurmountable obstacle to our happiness, and we must fight our

                         nature with all our strength.”

            28 September Tchaikovsky wrote to Modest: “Do you really think that I am not oppressed by

                         this awareness that they pity and forgive me, when in fact I am guilty of nothing…In 

                         a word, I should like …to shut the mouths of various contemptible creatures.” 

Petr Tchaikovsky

            In Oxford Oscar Wilde meets Lord Ronald Gower for the first time.  Gower is believed to be

                         the model for Lord Henry Wootten in The Portrait of Dorian Gray.  

            ​Clarel, an epic poem by Herman Melville.  Vine is a portrait of Nathaniel Hawthorne, and the 

                                  poem has a homoerotic theme.  

            Charles-Eugène Le Bègue de Germiny (35) and Edmond-Pierre Chouard (18), a working-

                         class youth are arrested at a Parisian urinal.  

            Oscar Browning leaves Eton after a scandal & retreats to King’s College, Cambridge.  

            The Larousse encyclopedia perpetuates the fallacy that lesbians had an enlarged clitoris.  

            George du Maurier’s Intellectual Epicures has a modern man of sensibility surrounded by

                         blue china, Japanese fans & medieval snuff boxes.  The orient was racialised as 

                         effete.  

            13 December.  In a letter Thomas Alrich states he received a letter from Bayard Taylor “so 

                        full of affection and unaffectedness that I am ashamed to love him with only all of my

                        heart.”

1877​        Second edition of Walter Pater’s The Renaissance includes ‘Two Early French Stories’, which

                                 deals with a medieval French story of a male same-sex relationship. 

​            Edward Carpenter visits Walt Whitman and later claims that they shared a bed in Camden.

        ​Renaissance in Italy by John Addington Symonds. A section in Vol 3 concentrates on the 

                                celebration of the male nude in the form of Saint Sebastian.  

​       Walter Pater’s Studies in the History of the Renaissance is republished omitting the conclusion

                                because it was thought to encourage inappropriate behaviour in young men.  

​        Rhaetica is published privately.  Includes the poem ‘What Might Have Been.’

        ​The New Republic by W.H. Mallock is a satire on effete Oxford Hellenists and aestheticism.

        ​Wilhelm von Gloeden moves to Naples and Capri.  In Taomina he specialises in photographing 

                                young local males in artistic or nude poses.

        ​A.E. Housman falls in unrequited love with Moses Jackson, and they share lodgings on-and-off

                                for 5 years.    

​         April.  A clerk, James Smith, 37 and George Wright, telegraph boy, were indicted for an

                               unnatural offence.  Smith was sentenced to penal servitude for life for buggery, and 

                               Wright for 10 years.  Smith was kept in prison for 20 years.

                  Lord Ronald Gower meets Harry Smith, the previous acquaintance of Lord Henry Somerset,

                                and they may have become lovers.  

        A Warwickshire ‘sodomite’ found having sex with a fowl, was freed, because a fowl isn’t an 

                        animal.

        Walter meets ‘Richard Jackson’, a rich would-be-poet.  They have a sentimental friendship.

        Martin Kok (27), Danish author, and Joachim Reinhard (19) are involved in the first publicised 

                Danish homosexual scandal.  Reinhard although insisting he was innocent flees to 

                        America.  

1877-8​    Hans von Marées paints Die Lebensalter – a homoerotic painting of 3 male nudes & a partially

                                 obscured female nude.  

1878​    Thomas Hardy’s The Return of the Native is published, which contains the character Christian

                                 Cantle, who seems to belong to a third sex.  

        Tales of Ancient Greece, No.1, Eudiades and a Cretan Idyll by J.A. Symonds is published.

        Anna Karenina by Tolstoi.  Vol 2, Chapter 7 includes a sketch of the relations between 2

                         homosexual officers.  

        ‘The Meeting of David and Jonathan’ a poem by J.A. Symonds.  He probably also wrote the

                         poem ‘The Sleeper’ about Christian Buol this year.

        Composer Saint-Saëns leaves his wife while on holiday.  He is thought to have been more

                         attracted to men.

        Paul Verlaine meets & falls in love with Lucien Létinois, and they settle on a farm.  

        5 May.  Mark Pattison notes in his journal of a tea with Walter Pater, which also included Oscar

                         Browning.  Both Browning and Pater are said to have had effeminate acolytes.

        Ethel Smyth, composer, meets and has a passionate friendship with aristocrat Lisl von

                         Herzogenberg, which lasts 7 years.

        Lady Isabel Somers-Cocks discovers Lord Henry Somerset’s, her husband’s, love affair with a

                         commoner, Harry Smith (17).  Somerset is forced to flee to Monaco, then Florence. 

        Walt Whitman (59) meets Harry Stafford (18), who works at the New Republic.  They share a

                         bed.  Whitman & Stafford enjoy a tempestuous affair.  

        Charles Wynn-Carrington married Cecilia Baring, but Swanson, a Scotland Yard detective,

                         notes him as a “sod”.  

        In the wake of the Lord Henry Somerset scandal Harry Smith leaves a regretful note of parting

                         to Lord Ronald Gower, as he is parcelled of to Australia.  Gower takes ship in order

                         to follow him.  Gower arrives in Australia but Harry Smith was actually in New

                         Zealand.

        Samuel Butler becomes close friends with Henry Festing Jones.  He asks him to give up his 

                        profession as a solicitor and become his personal literary assistant & travelling comp-

                        anion.  They live in separate establishments, but see each other daily.  

c.1878​    Billy McGlory’s ‘Amory Hall’ is set up in a large New York dance hall.  Beautiful young men

                                 with squeaky voices and rouged cheeks indulged in “disgusting badinage.”

        Katherine Bradley & niece Edith Cooper begin living together as lesbians.  Later, they publish

                         joint enterprises under the name ‘Michael Field’.  

1879​    Carl Pontus Wikner, Swedish philosopher, writes ‘Psychological Confessions’, but doesn’t

                                 publish them.  He gives instructions that they be published after the deaths of his

                                 children.  They were published in 1971!

        Sodom in Union Square, or revelations of the Doings in 14th Street by ‘an ex-Police Captain.

        Gerard Manley Hopkins preaches at Leigh, Lancashire on the physical attributes of Jesus,

                         which have a highly homoerotic flavour.

        Friedrich Nietzsche leaves Basel university on a small pension.  He will live with Jewish friend 

                         Paul Ree in Switzerland & Italy.  

        Hints of Lord Ronald Gower’s homosexual liaisons are published in Man of the World.  The

                         Prince of Wales sends Lord Ronald Gower a letter accusing him of being “a member 

                         of an association for unnatural practices.”  Gower sends an angry reply.  

                         Gower travels to Paris with the artist Frank Miles, believed to be an early lover of 

                         Oscar Wilde.  

        Simeon Solomon starts selling letters from Algernon Swinburne, which the poet found “a thing

                         unmentionable.”

        April. Gower confides in his diary his interest in Raoul Perrin, a young American soldier he had

                         persuaded to desert from the army.  However, his interest waned and Perrin later 

                         committed suicide.  

        June.  Edmund Gosse, Hamo Thorneycroft, Hamo’s father, and 2 other men cruise up the

                         Thames, indulging in naked bathing parties.  Gosse & Hamo enjoy a symbolic union. 

                         Thorneycroft specialised in nude male statues. 

        Summer.  Mary Benson married to future Archbishop of Canterbury, meets and is infatuated

                         with Charlotte Basset, wife of a disabled rich landowner in Cornwall.   

        Arthur Rimbaud falls in love with Lucien Létinois (19), mainly because he looked similar to

                         Paul Verlaine.

        ‘The Bugler’s First Communion’ by Gerard Manley Hopkins – eroticises a robust young man.  

        Lord Henry Somerset’s wife leaves him when he becomes infatuated with a boy (17).  He

                        withdraws to Italy and she is ostracised for making public the reason she left him.  

        Tchaikovsky visited a male prostitute in Paris. 

        Nincompoopiana by George du Maurier shows a group of effeminate, drooping, aesthetic men

                         watched over by a bust of Antinous.  

        September.  A male patient, Edward de Lacy Evans, in a Melbourne Lunatic Asylum was found 

                          to be female during a routine wash.  

Bibliography

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Aldrich, Robert, Gay Life Stories, London: Thames & Hudson, 2023.

Aldrich, Robert & Garry Wotherspoon (eds.), Who’s Who in Gay & Lesbian History: From Antiquity to World War II: London,

                    Routledge, 2001.

Bray, Alan, The Friend, University of Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2003.

Griffin, Gabriele, (ed.), Who’s Who in Lesbian & Gay Writing, Routledge: London, 2002. 

Norton, Rictor, My Dear Boy: Gay Love Letters through the Centuries, San Francisco: Leyland Publications: 1998.

Rowse, A.L., Homosexuals in History, London: Wiedenfeld & Nicholson, 1977.

Spencer, Colin, Homosexuality, a History, London: Fourth Estate, 1995.

Woods, Gregory, Homosexuality in Literature, London: Yale University Press, 1998.