Beautiful Forever – The Life of Madame Rachel

Everyday women are inundated with advertisements promising to remove fine lines, miracle creams to make skin youthful and dewy, to turn back the hands of time.  We all know that there is no miracle cure for aging, but we continue to buy, and to seek out new beauty treatments like Botox, chemical peels and fillers.  But none of this is new; women (and men) have been seeking the fountain of youth since the dawn of time.  However, in the 19^th century, with the advent of daily newspapers and the increase in literacy, a new way was found to reach the masses, advertising.  And no one did it better than Madame Rachel, a con artist who operated a prominent beauty salon, from which she personally guaranteed her clients who used her fabulous preparations, everlasting youth.  Among the money items for sale were magnetic rock water that was allegedly from the Sahara desert and water from the River Jordan in Israel.  For almost ten years, Madame Rachel had Victorian women fooled.  But it wasn’t just beauty treatments that Madame Rachel was offering her clients.  

At the time of her first trial for fraud in 1868, Madame Rachel’s case exposed not only the thinly veiled anti-Semitism that was rampant in Victorian London, but also their fears of independent women running successful businesses.  She threatened everything that the Victorians held dear about the role of women, who were supposed to be chaste, unpainted angels who needed protection.  Whores, actresses and loose women wore make-up and cared about their appearances, not the average Victorian housewife, or so they thought.  Her trial exposed women’s dirty, little secret, that they were willing to pay a high price in their pursuit of beauty.

In the 19^th century, cosmetics were a lucrative growth business; companies such as Rimmel were founded. But the industry was still in its infancy, and products were crude, and colors were limited.  Make-up consisted of rouge and powder, red salve for the lips and kohl for the eyes but any respectable woman who used more than face powder was given disapproving looks. Queen Victoria, in particular, was appalled at the idea of women using cosmetics. Female beauty was only supposed to be achieved by washing with soap and water, and exposure to fresh air, but not too much dancing as it gave an undignified flush to the cheeks. There was such a general hostility to make-up that most women concocted their cosmetics at home using homemade recipes with ingredients such as arsenic.  Only those with money could afford face washes and creams offered by proprietors such as Madame Rachel.

Madame Rachel claimed to be a woman of social standing who was distantly related to the great French tragedienne Rachel Felix.  In reality, she was born Sarah Rachel Russell sometime between 1806 and 1814. She grew up poor and illiterate in the East End of London, but what she lacked in formal education, she more than made up with street smarts.  According to biographers, Rachel was married to an assistant chemist in Manchester, and then later in 1844 to a man named Jacob Moses who deserted her.  She later moved in with a man named Philip Levinson (also known as Levy or Leverson), whose name she subsequently took.  Leverson was the father of six of her children.  Initially Rachel had a fried fish and potatoes stall in the slums of Clement St. Danes, supplementing her income as a dealer in second hand clothes, before she hit on a more lucrative line of work, selling cosmetics.  

She came armed with a sob story guaranteed to win sales, claiming that she’d been ill with a fever and her beautiful locks were shorn.  A medical man told her that he would give her a lotion which would make not only make her hair grow back, but even more beautiful and luxurious than before.  The product worked and Madame was launched into the beauty business.  With the help of her oldest daughter also named Rachel, she wrote a pamphlet called Beautiful for Ever, which laid out her philosophy of beauty.  The pamphlet was only 24 pages and could only be purchased exclusively at Madame Rachel’s.

Although she may not have had a formal education, she was a natural when it came to marketing her products and her business.  Madame Rachel advertised her exotic sounding wares in publications like The Times of London, the Court Journal and Debrett’s peerage, places where her target audience, wealthy women, would see them and become intrigued.  Next she secured premises in Bond Street (No. 47A) for her shop.  She claimed to not only be a ‘purveyor to Her Majesty the Queen,” but also Empress Eugenie, one of the most admired beauties of the era.  She also jacked up the prices, proving that even in the Victorian age; people believed that if something was incredibly expensive, it must be good.  To make it even more alluring, Madame Rachel advertised that nowhere else could women obtain the products that she offered.   Everyone loves exclusivity.  She also claimed she and her daughters were much older than they were as proof of efficacy of her products.  If Madame Rachel were alive today, she would probably be the CEO of a global advertising firm.

Women would arrive at her door heavily veiled so that no one would recognize them.  Once inside, Madame made sure that they were surrounded by luxury.   The premises were decorated with Middle Eastern opulence, the scent of sandalwood and incense in the air, their every need attended to by young women in flowing robes.  And at the center of it all was Madame Rachel, dressed all in black, like a spider luring its prey.  For her more discreet patrons, Madame Rachel also made house calls. The season which stretched from about the beginning of February until mid-July was her busiest time. According to her most recent biographer Helen Rappaport, Madame Rachel raked in thousands of pounds on a weekly basis, which eventually bought her a box at Covent Garden, a fine carriage and a pair of horses. Madame Rachel didn’t just spend her money on herself; she used the money to send her younger daughters and sons to school in Paris so that they could obtain the education that she never had.  Her eldest son David was attending medical school in London.

Madame Rachel offered an array of treatments all with suitably luxurious and exotic names.  Items such as Rejuvenating Jordan water which sold for 10 to 20 guineas a bottle (about £1,000 today), Circassian Golden Hair Wash, Magnetic Rock Dew for Removing Wrinkles, Royal Arabian Face Cream, and Honey of Mount Hymetus wash, along with perfumes, oils and spices that she imported at great expense from Armenia, Circassia and Madagascar.  But her most sought after treatment was what she called ‘enameling.’  Anyone who has seen portraits of Queen Elizabeth I probably have a good idea of what the treatment entailed.  Her customers craved a white, porcelain complexion not just on the face but also the bosom and shoulders.   The price for this treatment was a mere 20 guineas.  The treatment was actually quite simple.  Madame would use various lotions to remove facial hair, followed by an alkaline toilet wash to cleanse the skin, and then she would fill in the lines and depressions on the face with a thick white paste.  A little powder to set the paste and a touch of blush completed the process.

But beauty treatments weren’t all that Madame Rachel offered.  She also had a neat little sideline going as a so-called marriage broker, as well as procurer.  Lonely widows and spinsters would come to Madame Rachel for treatments, and then once she had ‘beautified’ them, she offered them a chance at personal happiness but it was all lies. Like con artists since the dawn of time, Madame Rachel exploited the weaknesses of women to make a profit.  She would also encourage her clients to take an Arabian bath and then men would pay money to spy on them through a peep hole.

But her most profitable sideline was in blackmail.  Madame’s treatments cost a fortune, and many of her upper class clients were in debt up to their eyeballs.  Until the Married Women’s Property Act in 1882, a married woman had no money of her own unless she had a forward thinking Papa who made sure that his little darling had an allowance or pin money as part of her dowry.  Most women were not that lucky. They were basically spending their husbands’ money without his permission. Madame Rachel would extend them credit and then once they owed her thousands of pounds, she would try to collect. Since the women were too afraid to tell their husbands the truth, Madame would offer to take their jewels as collateral.  Madame would then take the jewels to a pawn shop and keep the money for herself.  Women were too afraid to take Madame to court because it meant being exposed to ridicule and social humiliation.

In 1868, one of her former clients was finally brave enough to sue Madame for fraud and malpractice.  While Madame was eventually convicted, her client’s reputation was ruined.  The client’s name was Mary Tucker Borradaile, a widow of an Army colonel who had been stationed in India.  She had met Madame Rachel in 1864, and continued to patronize her shop for several years.  As an inducement for Mrs. Borradaile to continue her treatments, Madame Rachel told her that an aristocrat named Lord Ranelagh (Thomas Heron Jones, 7^th Viscount Ranelagh) was in love with her.  Mrs. Borradaile corresponded with Lord Ranelagh solely through Madame Rachel, continuing to give her money for treatments, until in the end she’d even signed over her widow’s pension.  Of course, Lord Ranelagh, a notorious rake and scoundrel, denied that he had ever met Mrs. Borradaile or set foot in Madame Rachel’s shop.

The newspapers and tabloids had a field day with the story.  They printed vicious anti-Semitic cartoons; the case seemed to confirm people’s suspicions about Jews, that they were avaricious and foreign, preying on the good citizens of Britain.  There was so much coverage of the case, with so many slanderous stories, that it would have been impossible for Madame Rachel to receive a fair trial. The case went through two trials before Madame Rachel was convicted.  By the end, the judge clearly believed that she was guilty and made no bones of his opinion in front of the jury.  Madame Rachel nee Sarah Rachel Leverson was sentenced to five years penal servitude, of which she served three years.  Unrepentant, she went back into the beauty business.  Ten years after her first conviction, she was once again convicted of fraud and sentenced to prison where she died in 1880. During her second trial, several of her products were analyzed and found to contain nothing more than water, fullers earth, pearl ash, starch and hydrochloric acid.

Sources:

Margaret Nicholas, The World's Wickedest Women, Octopus Books Limited, London, 1984
Helen Rappaport, Beautiful for Ever: Madame Rachel of Bond Street – Cosmetician, Con-Artist and Blackmailer. Ebrington: Long Barn Books 2010.
The Extraordinary Life and Trial of Madame Rachel at the Central Criminal Court, Old Bailey

Skittles - The Last Victorian Courtesan

Recently a friend and I were talking about Jesse James and his affair with the stripper Skittles.  The lovely and talented Hope Tarr thought we were talking about another Skittles, Catherine Walters, the last Victorian courtesan. I had totally forgotten about Skittles, probably because she was less flamboyant than some of the other Victorian courtesans. Skittles wasn't necessarily interested in being famous, unlike Cora Pearl, who seemed to court notoriety.

Imagine if there were trading cards for courtesans! I imagine that the one for Skittles would look this.

Name: CatherineWalters

Nickname: Skittles or Skitsie to her intimates.

Born: June 13, 1839 in Liverpool at No. 1 Henderson Street, in a drab and dirty street near the docks.

Died: 1920

Parents: Edward Walters, a custom employee, and Mary Ann Fowler

Siblings: 3^rd of 5 children. 

Religion: Baptized a Catholic

Appearance: Small and slender, with grey-blue eyes and chestnut hair. 
She dressed inexpensively at first but with great taste, wearing clothing that was modest and subdued. Her riding habit was cut to so perfectly to the contours of her body that there was speculation that she wore nothing underneath it. If Cora Pearl were Versace and Vivienne Westwood, than Catherine would be more Chanel and Givenchy.

Traits: Exceptional beauty, practical nature, and riding skills, acquired while working in a livery stable. She was also effervescent, outspoken, direct and bawdy. Her naturalness was one of her chief attributes as a courtesan, she remained affectionate and sympathetic. “She had the most capacious heart I know and must be the only whore in history to retain her heart intact,” wrote journalist Henry Labouchere.  Never once did she seek to revenge herself on her lovers after the affair was over. There would be no autobiography detailing her lovers such as the ones penned by Cora Pearl or Harriette Wilson.

One of her most unusual traits was her ability to bind her lovers to her not only for the night or a for a few months but for life. One of her biographers, Henry Blyth, wrote that she possessed the quality of being loved. She also never attempted to bankrupt her lovers as did Cora Pearl and some of the other grandes horizontales of the 19^th century.

Occupation: Courtesan

Lovers:  Marquess of Hartington, Prince of Wales, Achille Fould, Lord Fitzwilliams, Wilfred Scawen-Blunt, Aubrey DeVere Beauclerk

Background: Not much is known about Catherine’s early life in Liverpool, what her childhood might have been, where or how long she might have been educated. Her father was heavy drinker, so whatever money he made probably was spent on drink. One of her lovers, Wilfred Scawen-Blunt wrote in his diaries that Catherine’s mother died when she was four and that she had been sent to a convent school from which she had run away. Nor where she first learned to ride, one of the great passions of her life. One story is that she worked for a time as a bare-back rider in a traveling circus. Perhaps she saw one as a child and fell in love with the horses and wanted to ride. The most credible story is that she had access to the local stables and that she taught herself to ride by helping out in the stables and by exercising the horses.

For Catherine, riding was her entry into a better world than the one she came from. While other courtesans traded on their beauty, Catherine could outride and outhunt most men. Catherine appears not to have had the Victorian female aversion to sex, which boded well for her future profession. She was selective, choosing her lovers more because she enjoyed their company than for what they could do for her. She became the mistress of George, Lord Fitzwilliam at the age of 16. He set her up in London, when the relationship ended, he made her a generous settlement of £ 300 a year and a lump sum payment of £ 2,000. By this time she was known as ‘Skittles’ probably a reference to the fact that when she was young she worked setting up skittles in a local bowling alley, the Black Jack Tavern near the docks.

At the age of 19, she became the mistress of Spencer Compton Cavendish, Lord Hartington nicknamed ‘Harty-Tarty.’ He was the eldest son of one of the premiere Dukes in the kingdom, the 7^th Duke of Devonshire. A shy and immature young man of 26 when they met, he was to become a major figure in Liberal politics and was considered by many as Gladstone‘s natural successor. By 1859, when she was 20, she was installed in a lovely little house in Mayfair, horses with a life settlement of an annual sum of £ 500 which the family continued to pay even after Hartington‘s death in 1908. Her relationship with Hartington lasted about four years and seems to have been greatly affectionate on both sides. The greatest passion that she and Hartington shared, and the only one they were able to indulge in publicly together, was hunting. While her lover occupied himself with his duties in Parliament, Catherine had lessons with a governess.

Catherine is also said to have worked as one of the celebrated ‘horse-breakers’ who paraded in Hyde Park from the hours of 5 to 7, where she first attracted widespread attention. In 1861, the future poet laureate Alfred Austin wrote a poem entitled ‘The Season’ which mentioned Skittles by name. When the painting "The Shrew Tamed," by Edwin Landseer was exhibited in 1861, it was assumed that she was the model for the womanin the painting, although it was also claimed that it was a woman named Annie Gilbert. Skittles had arrived!

Her horsemanship, for which she was passionately admired for, meant that she found acceptance on the hunting field that she was denied in other social situations. Stories about her daring abound, both on and off the field. She once cleared the 18 foot water fence at the National Hunt Steeplechase, on a bet, after three other riders tried and failed. She won £ 100 for her efforts. While the men on the hunting field were accepting of her, their wives were another story. When she rode with the Quorn, the wife of the Master of the Quorn who was the Earl of Stamford, took exception to Catherine’s presence. This despite the fact that the Countess had been a gamekeeper’s daughter and possibly a circus performer. Catherine left with good grace, but she is supposed to have remarked, ‘Why does Lady Stamford give herself such airs? She’s not the Queen of our profession, I am.”

After her relationship with Hartington ended, Catherine decided to move to Paris during the 2^nd Empire of Napoleon III for a fresh start. Here she established herself as one of that select band of grandes cocottes. In Paris, rivals such as Cora Pearl, dyed their hair yellow or pink, entertained their paramours whilst lying in solid onyx bath tubs with taps of gold, and considered nakedness shameful only if one was not covered in diamonds. Catherine preferred to dress like a lady, she had a naturalness that must have seemed like a breath of fresh air in the hothouse atmosphere of Paris. “There was something special, very select and reminiscent of London and Hyde Park,” Zed wrote, When she appeared in the avenue de l’Imperatrice, driving herself with two beautiful sparkling pure-blooded horses, followed by two grooms on horseback in splendid and elegant uniform….every head turned, and all eyes were on her.”

One of her many admirers was the young diplomat and poet Wilfred Scawen Blunt (1840-1922) who was 23 when they met. Blunt fell deeply in love with her to the point of obsession. He was not her only lover which sent him into paroxysms of jealousy. The affair ended in a public scandal when the Ambassador to Paris, Lord Crowley discovered that while Blunt had been wooing his daughter Feodore to the point of being considered her ‘unofficial‘ fiancé, he’d been off sleeping with Skittles. Despite the family’s expectations, Blunt couldn’t bring himself to propose. Blunt was dismissed from his position at the embassy. After their relationship ended, Blunt never loved another woman the way that he loved Skittles. She was the inspiration for his narrative poem ‘Esther.’ When he married, he determined to marry for money, capturing the heart of Lady Anne King-Noel, the daughter of Ada, Countess of Lovelace and the granddaughter of Lord Byron. After several years, Blunt and Skittles resumed their friendship, corresponding until her death.

After the fall of the 2^nd Empire, Skittles returned to London, where she divided her time between hunting and entertaining at her Sunday afternoon tea parties, which were attended solely by men including the future Prime Minister William Gladstone. She also had a brief affair, with Bertie, the Prince of Wales. After their liaison ended, the Prince also paid her an allowance, and whenever she was ill, he sent his own doctor to attend her. Once when he thought she was dying, he sent his private secretary to collect and destroy over 300 hundred letters that he had sent her.

In 1872, Skittles moved to 15 South Street, Park Lane, which was to be her residence for the rest of her life. At a certain point in the 1880’s, she took up with Alexander Horatio Baillie. Although she called herself Mrs. Baillie for a time, they were probably never married. Her final love affair was with Gerald de Saumarez, who she had first met when he was a schoolboy of 16 and she was 40. When she died at the age of 81, she left her estate to him. In her later years, she became something of a recluse. Crippled by arthritis in her later years, she died of a cerebral hemorrhage on August 5, 1920. She’s buried in the Franciscan monastery in Sussex. Her estate was worth £2764 19s. 6d at her death.

Sources:

Henry Blyth: Skittles: the last Victorian courtesan, Rupert Hart-Davis, London, 1970

Katie Hickman: Courtesans, Harper Collins, 2003

Cyril Pearl: The girl with the Swansdown Seat, Frederick Muller Ltd. London, 1955