Background Info
Some more Information about the places, times and people featured in my novels
The Courtesan and the Mutineer
Polly Turner is born in Black Swan Alley, off of Borough High Street in Southwark in 1768.
She lives with her mother and three elder brothers in a room above the Black Swan Inn, a delapidated and run down coaching inn that was built in the late 1500's and is now falling down.
She is forced by her mother to marry the man who has raped her, and she goes to live with him in the equally squalid Angel Alley, until he leaves her.
Tricked into prostitution, she goes to live in a stew in Rochester Yard, situated off of New Rents, in the shadow of St Saviour's Church (now Southwark Cathedral).
After managing to escape from the stew, Polly leaves with the stew bully -or doorman- Jerimiah Styles, and he starts to pimp her in Covent Garden. She eventually extracts herself from Styles and becomes the lover of Jack Harris, the authour of 'Harris's List of Covent Garden Ladies', the guide book of prostitutes living in and around Covent Garden. Harris retires to the countryside to marry his long term mistress, and Polly is kept by the wealthy and flamboyant Irishman James 'Jimmy' Fitzgerald.
Roque's 1740 map of London. Polly Grows up in Black Swan Alley situated off Borough High Street, and later moves to Angel Alley with her first husbnad.
Their relationship is volatile, and she leaves him for the young and rich Bisham Andrews with whom she falls madly in love. Andrews announces to his family that he is marrying Polly -by this time her husband is dead- so they do all they can to sabotage their relationship, and they send him away on his Grand Tour.
A broken hearted and pregnant Polly aborts the child and nearly dies. She is rescued from near death by Fitzgerald, and after her recovery she meets Lord Claremont and goes to live with him in St James's Street.
Lord Claremont leaves her for her friend and fellow courtesan, Kitty Murphey and introduces her to the volative and mentally unstable Lord Wyndham. Claremont has a change of heart and takes Polly back, and while him and Wyndham are bickering, she goes to live with the young Duke of Buckland.
His family come and claim him after he spends vast amounts of money on Polly, and he becomes ill.
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All seems to be going well, until the enigmatic and troubled master's mate, Mr Fitzroy Jefferson stages a mutiny, and puts Captain Bright and those not involved in the mutany in a boat, and sets them adrift. Polly and her children are kept on the ship, and she is dragged around the South Seas with the mutineers of the Plenty until they finally settle on the uninhabited island of St Patrick's.
The mutineers are captured after three years on St Patrick's and taken back to England for trial, and in the ship is Mr Sackville, who has spent his whole life looking for Polly, now they are reunited.
Covent Garden depicted in the 1780's. The centre of the Georgian flesh-trade, it was teeming with brothels, banios, and stews.
Polly goes back to Lord Wyndham but is imprisoned by him as he becomes more mentally unbalanced. She is rescued again by Fitzgerald, with the help of John Stevens, a friend and caricaturist. They hide out in Clerkenwell and Polly meets the Jamaican sailor Alex Lindo. After a brief affair they marry, and Polly is allowed on his ship, first to the West Indies, then to Polynesia.
Polly starts an affair with the first officer Mr Sackville, her husband dies of a fever, and the captain finds out about her affair with Sackville.
He puts the pregnant Polly ashore on the island of Otaheila where she is well looked after by the natives. She stays there for two years with her two children until she is rescued by Captain Bright, commander of the HMS Plenty.
The Royal Naval Dockyard at Deptford. Polly lives briefly in Deptford while she awaits her second husband, Alex to return from sea.
Polly later lives in New Rents where she is lured into working as a prostitute in one of the many Southwark stews.
Three prostitutes in St James's Park depicted in 1782.
Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens. A popular haunt for Georgian high-society. Polly spends many evenings here at the height of her fame as a courtesan.
Royal Navy ship docked at Tahiti. Polly finds herself on the South Sea island of Otaheila.