Prostitution : considered in its moral, social, and sanitary aspects, in London and other large cities and garrison towns: with proposals for the control and prevention of its attendant evils / by William Acton.

  • Acton, William, 1813-1875.
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Prostitution : considered in its moral, social, and sanitary aspects, in London and other large cities and garrison towns: with proposals for the control and prevention of its attendant evils / by William Acton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    I PREFACE. Twelve years have elapsed since I submitted to public considera- tion the first edition of this work. I entered upon my labours with feelings for difierent from those which induce me to resume them. Then, tlie attempt to rouse attention to a question that seemed to myself one of national impoi-tance, ajopeared almost hopeless. Now, the mind and conscience of the nation are awakened, and opinions which would have been formerly dis- missed as idle dreams, are deemed worthy of serious attention. Diu'ing the intervening period prostitution, with its atten- dant evils, has been the subject of anxious inquiry. In 1864 the Secretary of State for War, and the Board of Admiralty, ap- pointed a Committee to report on the best means of protecting the army and navy from the ravages occasioned by venereal disease, and in 1866 an Act having this end in view — now well known as the Contagious Diseases Act of 1866 — jiassed through the legislature. The results achieved by means of this Act, and the subject of prostitution generally, have also been reported on by two Select Parliamentary Committees one of the House of Lords, in 1868, the other of the House of Commons, in 1869, and the legislature has seen fit to extend the scope of the Act of 1866, by an Act of the last session (32 and S3 Vic. c. 96). The working of this Act, and the public attention called to the subject, has been attended with the liappiest results, both as regards the health of our army and navy, and the sanitary and moral improvement wrought in the unhappy women who have come within the scope of its provisions. So