Listen Now

Seamstress Doris Staples doesn't want to see Private John Waters any more... but the American soldier has other ideas. He goes to her workplace to make sure she doesn't "step out" with any other man... and carries with him a pistol.

Men were expected to seek an outlet for their sexual appetites, but any women who saw multiple partners or wanted to exit a relationship faced stigma, hostility and deadly violence.  

Further reading:

Ashton, John R; Machin, David; Osmond, Clive; Balajaran, Rasaratnam; Adam, Sheila A and Donnan, Stuart P B. ‘Trends in Induced Abortion in England and Wales’, Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, vol. 37, 1983, pp. 105 - 110.

Dryden, Steven. ‘A Short History of LGBT Rights in the UK’.

Ellwood, David. ‘The American Challenge in Uniform: The Arrival of America’s Armies in World War II and European Women’, European Journal of American Studies  vol. 7, no. 2, 2012.

Laite, Julia. Common Prostitutes and Ordinary Citizens: Commercial Sex in London, 1885 - 1960 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012). 

Monckton Smith, Jane. In Control: Dangerous Relationships and How They End in Murder. (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2022).

Vickers, Emma. Queen and Country: Same-sex desire in the British Armed Forces, 1939-45. (Manchester University Press, 2013).

Wagner, Paul. The Youngest Crew (Cheyenne, WY: Lagumo Press, 1997).

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.