  Betting has so long been associated with men that it is probable there are still many people who have never considered the evil in its relation to women. The attention of those, however, who have given some thought to the problem of betting and gambling has been increasingly turned to this phase of the question, and it is now certain that among women the practice is spreading with alarming rapidity. As in the case of men, the habit is not confined to any one class of society but has affected all, so that at the one end of the social scale costly jewellery is sold to cover bridge debts and at the other blankets are pawned to put money on a horse. If we turn to the evidence given before the Lords Commission we find numerous side references to the practice. Here, for instance, is some evidence given by Chief Constable Peacock of Manchester:— Q. One of these slips (i.e. bookmakers’ slips) you have given me is from a lady? A. Yes. Q. And it appears that she had 8s. on in one day? A. Yes. Q. In what position in life would she be? A. She is only a working man’s wife. Q. She puts in this slip with 8s., meaning that she has invested that money on horses in one day? A. Yes. Again, Mr. Horace Smith, a well-known London magistrate, in his evidence refers to the practice of bookmakers taking bets from women and children, and also to the effect betting has on the honesty of women, giving instances to prove his assertions. Asked if he thought that women as well as men bet more than they used to, he replied that he had no doubt they did, and that he had even had women bookmakers before him. Mr. Spruce, a Leeds commission agent, also admitted the fact of the woman bookmaker. This last statement may come as a surprise to many readers, but we are able to give circumstantial proof of its truth in the following circular:— Gentlemen in quest of reliable racing intelligence are invited to communicate with Miss ——. Only those who are prepared to pay well need apply, as Miss —— is not one of those who give away Tips. During the latter part of 1903 Flat Racing Season Miss —— decided to commence business as a racing adviser, and she at once met with conspicuous success, her selections including—Grey Tick, Cesarewitch; Burses, 2nd Cambridgeshire; Switch Cap, Manchester November Handicap. Miss —— invites all sportsmen in quest of genuine racing intelligence to join her list of regular wire subscribers. Satisfaction guaranteed to all regular subscribers. Those sportsmen who send for her wires can rely on winning money. Her terms are, she believes, higher than those of the ordinary Turf correspondent, but clients will be fully satisfied that her wires are worth every penny charged. Those sportsmen who require wires every day are requested to apply elsewhere, as Miss —— cannot promise to send out more than two or three selections every week. The source of her intelligence cannot be divulged, but it may be mentioned that no other racing adviser is in the same position as Miss —— to obtain such genuine information. This lady charges 10s. for a single wire and £5 for twenty. Mr. Luke Sharp, the Official Receiver for Birmingham, Worcester, and West Bromwich, replying to the Bishop of Hereford, drew attention to perhaps the most deplorable phase of betting among women. This consists in the collection of bets by agents calling on women for other weekly payments. Here is what Mr. Sharp said:— I had a conversation with one of my friends who is very much interested in these matters with regard to some cases in Worcestershire, and I wanted to get the particulars, as I did not like to make a statement unless I could prove it, and I will now read you his letter if your Lordship desire it. He says: “I do not mention this in any way to incriminate the man who I understand is carrying on a system of gambling, much as I condemn such and consider it should be stopped. I simply brought the matter before you to show how among the many ways gambling is brought to the houses of the working classes. It is done by agents who, while collecting the weekly payments on some Along with this evidence we must also take that of Mr. Robert Knight, General Secretary of the Boilermakers’ Society, and a magistrate of Newcastle, who says:— Betting generally is largely on the increase; especially is this noticeable amongst young men and women. Between the hours of 11.55 and 3.15 a bookmaker was recently seen to take 236 bets from men, women, and children in South Shields.... Unrestrained by Act of Parliament, the bookmakers go from door to door in the streets occupied by the working classes for the purpose of inducing women to bet.... When the workmen are at their work these bookmakers go round and visit the parts where they live, get hold of the wives of the workmen when the husband is at work, and get them to bet. Very often it does not end in betting with spare money: a woman very often takes the things of the house and pawns them to get the money to bet with. There is still another reference to this practice in Mr. Knight’s evidence, which we give in full:— Q. With regard to the house-to-house betting, would you include that in the prohibition (i.e. of street betting)? A. I would. I think it has become a terrible evil—one of the worst I know of. Q. Do these bookmakers solicit the women or whoever opens the door to them? A. Yes; they go from house to house, and they get the women, in the absence of their husbands, to bet, and I have known in some cases where the money has been so short that the mother has gone and taken some things out of the house and pawned them in order to get money to bet with. Q. Have you known of bad cases of women betting with their husbands’ money, for example? A. Yes. Q. Do you know many cases of that kind? A. Very many. In some cases the husband is not himself given to betting, but on account of the visit of the bookmaker to the house during the husband’s absence at work the wife has given way to betting; and then by-and-bye the husband has got to know that this has taken place, and I need not tell you the result: it is extremely sad. It will be agreed that this form of betting is particularly mean and despicable, even if it be true to some extent that women when they gamble are specially addicted to it. Indeed Mr. Tannett-Walker, who is connected with a large engineering works near Leeds, gave it as his opinion, in his evidence before the Commission, that they were “worse gamblers than men,” and he went on to say:— I think it is more serious, because, generally speaking, the working man only bets with his pocket-money, as he calls it in the working districts, and I think the woman very often risks the money the husband gives her for household purposes; I think she is much more reckless and excitable under loss than a man, and therefore much more likely to go to the full extreme of all the money she has in her pocket. The present writer has had the privilege of receiving a large mass of evidence from clergymen, the police, prison chaplains, officers of the S.P.C.C., police court missionaries, district nurses, and others, bearing on the prevalence of the habit, and it may be valuable to supplement with outside testimony what has already been quoted from the Select Commission on Betting and Gambling. The Vicar of Jarrow-on-Tyne writes:— My impression is that it is on the increase, but it is not easy to tell. For the most part, it takes the form of lotteries or sweepstakes, women putting in their sixpences, etc., and winning a possible £20 or so. Now and then a woman may be seen openly betting in the streets, but usually it is done quietly. I have been told that women act as agents for the bookmakers. Now and then a woman will come to her Communion whom I suspect of betting, but, as a rule, I think they feel it on their conscience more than people of the upper classes do. The police court missionary at Newcastle-on-Tyne says:— I have had considerable experience of evangelistic work in slum parishes in Newcastle, and it is my opinion, from careful observation, that there is a very great amount of betting and gambling among women. I have known women sell the shoes and stockings from off their children’s feet to get coppers to put on their favourite horse. From a pit village the vicar’s wife writes:— The women are so terribly tempted by the men who come round to their doors. But possibly the following story, related by a navvy, may serve better than numerous examples to exhibit the real inwardness of the betting habit when it attacks the home through the housewife:— I have my health and strength [he said], and I have always plenty of work; the job I’m on now will last another six months. It’s true I have seven children, but I make no trouble of working for their support. We used to go to church when we was first married, my wife and I; we lived at Southampton then, and we both thought a deal of Canon Wilberforce. It was him that tied the knot. Since we came North I have not gone to any church: wife was taken up with the children. But I always washed myself, and put on my Sunday suit when Sunday came round; sometimes I’d take the kids for a bit of a walk into the country, and sometimes I’d take a stroll round with a few of my mates. Anyways I held up my head straight and thought I was as good as any—my meaning is that I thought I had the right to look any one in the face, for I believed till a week ago that I did not owe any one a penny piece. It was Saturday even, and up comes to me a bailiff chap, but I did not know then that he was a bailiff; he shoves a paper into my hand, and I reads on it “Judgment Summons. Personally served on the Defendant,” and there below I sees my name written in. I said, “Take it away, I never have aught to do with such things.” I had to take it in, and I found it was an order for £1: 2: 3, that should have been paid long before to a firm called a “Clothing Company,” trading from a town twenty miles away. Not half a dozen words did I say to any one that day, just sits dumb and dazed over the fire; not a wink did I sleep, but by Sunday morn breakfast was over I’d my plans made. I gets a bit of lead pencil from one of the lads, turns By tea-time that Sunday I’d got that paper about covered with figures, and reckoned up it come to £70. There were two doctors’ bills, four coal-cart men, there were three lots of goods from the “Clothing Company,” and four from the “Furnishing Company,” and both these I were told firms of peddling fellows whom I had never seen, because they are such curs they never show their face at a door when the master’s in, and when they have sold their goods (all on the weekly payment system) to silly women, they go off home by train, so as the husbands can’t follow them home and give them the horsewhipping they deserve. I found a deal of things that Lord’s Day. I went up to look at the children’s beds and saw the blankets was gone off them, I looks in the drawers and found them empty where they should have been full of children’s clothing and bedding. I understood that day why the two eldest girls were so long getting themselves places; they had naught but what they stood up in. Folks might say I should have looked into things a bit sooner, but I were one that always said, “If the man earned the money and turned it over to the wife, it were the wife’s place to lay it out to advantage.” We had not been living in that house above a twelvemonth, but it all come about since we’d moved in. I could see nothing wrong with the street when we took the house; it looked quiet enough. It had not been built so long; the house was clean and airy, How was I to know, when nobody telled me, that the women in this was all a-cheating their husbands, and was just one a bigger gambler than another. As near as I can make out their practices was like this. They’d all back horses with the money they should have kept in a safe place against rent day, and them that lost would wait while Monday when the packman come round, and they’d take a suit of clothes or a pair of blankets on the weekly payment system. Straight away they would carry them to the pawn-shop, so their husbands having never set eyes on the stuff would never miss it out of the house. I suppose they’d think they’d done a clever thing when they had raised the money for the rent and a bit over besides to back another horse. Sometimes the Day of Judgment would seem to have come to one or another when county court summonses would come to their house, but so long as their husbands did not see the papers, they’d put off the day of reckoning a bit longer. My wife says they’d run round to one another’s houses and say, “I’m in a deal of trouble, will you oblige me to-day by taking a pair of blankets off the Clothing Company and pledge them for me, and I’ll pay you back when I can? And if you get into trouble some day, I’ll help you out if you’ll just oblige me this once.” My wife knew nothing about such ways afore we came to live in this street, but she were a quick learner, and got into it like a lad gets into his new sums when he gets put up a standard at school. It’s none so very hard when it’s put plain—horses, packman, pawn-shop, and a county court; and then over again, more horses, more packmen, more pawn-shops, and more county court. Sorry to trouble you with such a long yarn, but I Faced with a similar question, what would the reader do? Circumstances like these indicate only too clearly why it is that there is a social problem. The heart of all happiness and integrity in life resides in the home, and when anything comes between the mutual understanding and confidence that alone makes home life possible, we may be sure that evils undreamt of before will find an entrance into the home. The insidious nature of the evil is best illustrated from the fact that almost every week the newspapers record the downfall of some individual whom the public had thought above suspicion. Similar instances occur in the humbler walks of life. The present writer knows of instances in which cottages sometimes lent for religious services were also on occasion used as betting centres. Here is an extract from the letter of a reliable correspondent:— A bookmaker made one woman in a street his friend. She would receive the money for him, and gradually entice many to join. In my own district there the most respectable looking home was used in this way. The owner, a widow woman, was perfectly clean and Another feature which calls for comment is the fact that girls are either encouraged by their employers, or by their fellow-servants, to indulge in betting. Deaconess Clarkson of Durham mentions the case of a girl, sent to service from a “Friendless Girls’ Home,” failing to repay her monthly instalment for her outfit. On being asked the reason, the girl maintained that her mistress had persuaded her to put it on a horse. This other instance would be ludicrous if it were not pathetic. The first night a young girl spent in service she was asked by the butler to give half-a-crown for the sweep. She asked why she should pay the sweep! but in order to avoid giving offence gave him the money. The parlour-maid “lifted” the sweep, amounting to 37s. 6d., when the girl understood what the butler had meant. We saw from the evidence of Mr. Luke Sharp that this evil was not confined to the North, and it might be well to draw attention to a reference to similar practices elsewhere. Writing in the Nineteenth Century recently, a writer said:— A typical Lancashire woman of the lower class told me that trade was very bad in her district, mostly because the women bet a shilling on nearly every race, and they take th’ bread out of th’ children’s mouths to It might be interesting to give the actual figures for one instance in which a cottage in a working-class district in York was carefully watched for some fourteen hours, spread over five days. Those entering to make bets were as follows:—
It will readily be seen that a very significant proportion of those entering the cottage were women, boys, or girls. So far we have dealt almost entirely with the prevalence of the practice among working women, and that for obvious reasons. In other classes of society there is, of course, as much betting on horses as among working women, and for larger amounts. In other ways, too, there is very much to be deplored. Dean Lefroy, speaking in Norwich Cathedral in June of 1904, created quite a sensation by a strong denunciation of bridge gambling. The condemnation elicited some facts, all proving the prevalence of the evil. No more mean or despicable an outrage of the ordinary canons of hospitality can be conceived, than that so well illustrated in an extract from a recent address by Ian Maclaren:— I want [he said] from this place to offer my protest against bridge parties, which are gathered together simply and solely not for playing a game but for winning money by gambling. Conceive of one case, and I only mention one. A young married lady is asked to go and stay in a country house by a lady older than herself, and an old friend of the family. Her husband cannot go with her, but she goes down to spend the week-end. Bridge is played, and, although she knows a little about it, she excuses herself as not being a sufficiently good player. It is pointed out that every one must play, and that no doubt she will do well enough. She has a suspicion that not only money is risked on the game, but that it is risked to a considerable amount. She is assured that it is nothing. At the close of the evening she discovers that she has lost £35. Of course far greater sums than that are lost, but that is a great deal for a young married lady, the wife of a professional man, to lose. She has not the money to pay. She goes home, and very properly tells her husband the whole story. He sends a cheque to the hostess, and he states distinctly in the letter that a woman who would ask a woman younger than herself, and specially under her charge, to play at bridge under such circumstances was doing nothing more or less than keeping a gambling-house.... I ask you whether you would like your wife to be involved in this vortex of gambling, and if you are prepared to face not the financial but the moral consequences?... I hope this appeal will lead you to consider the position, and take a firm stand against an insidious because a very fascinating and fashionable evil. The incident referred to is no uncommon experience, and reveals feelings alien to the fine spirit of hospitality so common to British life, and incidentally exhibits the blighting effect of the greed of money upon the life of society. The gaming-house proper is a more sordid consideration, which is only mentioned to show that its existence has not been forgotten. More often than not it is managed by a woman, and the police raids reveal over and over again that such houses are the very sink of crime and vice. From what has been written it will be seen that the evil has spread very insidiously into all ranks of society. The working woman gambles with the wage of her husband, the society woman with her dress allowance or her husband’s income, the spinster with stocks and shares through her lawyer, and the honestly intentioned though ill-advised charitable lady with raffle tickets at church bazaars. By refusing to participate in those lotteries women have one very obvious way of discountenancing an immoral method of raising money. Remedial measures for the evil are suggested in another article in this book, but we would draw attention to one other remedy which would scotch the evil among women, viz. a resuscitation of the ideals of home life. “The home,” said the late Mr. Moody, “was founded before the Church, and you in Britain stand more in need of homes than you do of churches.” The failure of home is the failure of the parents to realise its duties and its |
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