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27 October 2022

The 1953 symposium at the New York Academy of Medicine

Emil Gutheil (1889-1959) was born in Czerlany close to Lviv, which was originally in Poland, but then part of Austria-Hungary and now is in the Ukraine. He was educated at the University of Vienna. He became a neuro-psychiatrist at the university Psychiatric Clinic, and was mentored by psychoanalyst Wilhelm Stekel (1868-1940), who is credited with coining the term ‘paraphilia”.

We met him previously in the early 1920s when a trans man then 34-years old, whom Gutheil refers to only as ‘Elsa B’ came to Gutheil, seeking help to gain a transvestitenschein. He subjected B to 33 sessions of psychotherapy during which he continued to refer to B as ‘she’ and as a ‘woman’.

Gutheil became director of the Active-analytic Clinic in Vienna, but emigrated with his wife to the United States in the late 1930s in anticipation of the the Anschluß Österreichs, the Nazi takeover of Austria.

In 1939 in New York he founded the Association for the Advancement of Psychotherapy and in 1947 the AAP started publishing the American Journal of Psychotherapy. Gutheil remained loyal to the ideas of his deceased mentor Wilhelm Stekel (and, working with Stekel’s widow, edited his autobiography), in particular the idea that trans conditions had an environmental cause and successful therapy would dissuade patients from the pursuit of medical options. This of course would require many sessions of psychoanalysis. Gutheil had no examples of patients successfully ‘cured’.

Harry Benjamin wrote in The Transsexual Phenomenon (p29-30 in the Warner edition; p12-3 in the PDF version):

“Following the sensational Jorgensen publicity in 1952, I was asked to write an article on the subject for the now no longer existing International Journal of Sexology. In this article, which appeared in August 1953, 1 chose the term transsexualism for this almost unknown syndrome. I did the same in a lecture (as part of a symposium) at the New York Academy of Medicine, before the Association for the Advancement of Psychotherapy in December, 1953, discussing male transsexualism” [i.e. trans women] “only. … In the years following the Hamburger et al. publication in the A.M.A. Journal and my own in the American Journal of Psychotherapy in 1954 (constituting the lecture of the previous year) there were hardly any references to transsexualism, in the American medical literature. ”

The symposium had been suggested by Gutheil and was held 18 December 1953. Benjamin read his paper, "Transsexualism and transvestism as psychosomatic and somatopsychic syndromes", and Gutheil and two others responded from their respective experiences and standpoints. This was the second time that Benjamin used the term ‘transsexual’.

All four papers were published in Gutheil’s American Journal of Psychotherapy, 8,2, 1954 without any editorial comment, but with “Transsexualism and Transvestism” added to each title.



  • Harry Benjamin. “Transsexualism and Transvestism as Psycho-Somatic and Somato-Psychic Syndromes”.

This is twelve years before Benjamin's The Transsexual Phenomenon.  It shows how his ideas were developing.   Some but not all of what he says here will be retained in the later book.

Benjamin reviewed the various terms proposed by his predecessors. Then he writes:

“Naturally not every act of ‘cross-dressing’ is transvestitic. Only if it occurs in an atmosphere of emotional pressure, sometimes to the point of compulsion and is accompanied by a more or less distinct sexual satisfaction can the term be applied . Otherwise it would be simple masquerading of a non-affective nature .”

[Editorial comment: this is in line with Hirschfeld’s Die Transvestiten but not his later works such as Sexualpathologie, 1919. ]

“While the male transvestite, enacts the role of a woman, the transsexualist wants to be one and function as one, wishing to assume as many of her characteristics as possible, physical, mental and sexual.”

“Transsexualism as well as transvestism are decidedly more frequent among men than women, like most other sexual deviations. Due to the more permissive fashions in women, female transvestism is less conspicuous, but naturally can involve for the individual the same frustrations and often tragic situations as in men.”

[Editorial comment: In 1953 the evidence did point to this conclusion. However the relative proportions are quite different in the 21st century - as also they were in Weimar Germany.]

“The transsexualist is always a transvestite but not vice-versa. In fact, most transvestites would be horrified at the idea of being operated.”

Sexuality:

[Transsexuals] “consider the fact that they are attracted to men natural because they feel as women and consider themselves of the female sex. … Transvestites on the other hand are in the majority heterosexual, although their principal sexual outlet seems to be auto-erotic.”

[Editorial comment: This is retained in The Transsexual Phenomenon of 12 years later when Benjamin assigns Kinsey scale numbers to each of his types. The Transvestites are Kinsey 0-2; The True Transsexuals are Kinsey 4-6. The erasure of gay transvestites is in this early paper. Benjamin had been introduced to Virginia Prince by Louise Lawrence a few years earlier. Certainly he accepted some of her ideas. Hirschfeld had also erased gay transvestites in his 1910 work Die Transvestiten, but reversed this in Sexualpathologie, 1919 - the former but not the latter in the bibliography at the end of the paper.]

On etiology, Benjamin writes:

“The effeminate male may look and behave as he does on a purely psychosomatic or psychological basis (imitating his mother, for instance) but he may also be the product of a somato-psychic mechanism originating in his chromosomes. It is often impossible to distinguish between the two.

Havelock Ellis has this to say in regard to etiology : "Early environmental influences assist but can scarcely originate Eonism. The normal child soon reacts powerfully against them. 'We must in the end seek a deeper organic foundation for Eonism.' "

Benjamin proposed three types:

  1. The principally psychogenic transvestite. “He is miserable when dressed as a man and immediately comfortable and relaxed in the clothes of a female. He has become an expert in cosmetic make-up, yet is occasionally in social or legal difficulties. He assumes a female first name and wants to be referred to as 'she.' … In fighting his peculiarity he sometimes over-emphazises masculinity and becomes known as a ‘tough guy.’ ”

  2. The intermediate type. “ .. he inclines at times toward transsexualism, but is at other times content with merely dressing and acting as a woman. He wavers between homo- and heterosexual desires usually according to chance meetings.”

  3. The somatopsychic transsexualist. “Feminine appearance and orientation is often striking in these people but masculine features are compatible with full transsexualism. The conviction of these endocrine males that they are really females with faulty sex organs is profound and passionate.”

Benjamin retained this 3-part typology in his The Transsexual Phenomenon of 12 years later where his six Types were still sorted into three Groups:

Type 2 here became Group 2 and thus Type IV on Benjamin’s scale, 'Nonsurgical Transsexual, Kinsey 1-4'. Just what this is became confused: sometimes a Virginia Prince ‘transgenderist’ ( a term which would also include Sylvia Rivera); sometimes a true transsexual who chose or had to put up with being non-op; but also a waverer such as Benjamin’s one example, Peter/Irene, a rather well-known musician from Oregon, married for twenty-five years, who apparently never did transition.

He comments on psychotherapy.

“All therapy, in cases of transsexualism—to the best of my knowledge—has proved useless as far as any cure is concerned. I know of no case where even intensive and prolonged psychoanalysis had any success. If we are dealing with a constitutional deviation, we can hardly expect to influence it .”
And then again 2 pages later: 
“In my opinion, psychotherapy for the purpose of curing the condition is a waste of time . A basic conflict would be too firmly anchored in the constitution. All that the psychiatrist can possibly do is to relax tension, to develop and reinforce realistic thinking, and to supply guidance. That, of course, is not a cure.”



 

  • Emil Gutheil. “The Psychologic Background of Transsexualism and Transvestism”.

Gutheil accepts Benjamin’s proposed use of the term ‘transsexual’.

Like Benjamin he refers to Hirschfeld’s Die Transvestiten, but not his later Sexualpathologie, 1919, and includes the former but not the latter in the bibliography at the end of his paper. He does not erase gay transvestites in the way that Benjamin does, but in the very different way of insisting that all transvestism is a type of homosexuality, even though this is unknown to and denied by the patients themselves. He cites one of Hirschfeld’s patients: “I never felt attracted to men. However, dressed as a woman, I liked to flirt and joke with them. I felt flattered to be mistaken for a woman.” A behaviour that Virginia Prince also admitted in her sessions with Robert Stoller.

He rejects Benjamin’s etiology:

“The neurosis of the transvestite is frequently considered as a sequel of the existing "biologic error. " Since the biologic component cannot be established satisfactorily , such a concept must be accepted only as a hypothesis. However, closer psychiatric exploration of the transvestite reveals to all who are familiar with the methods of psychiatric investigation that the patient's neurosis is due to specific pathogenic factors, most of which are accessible to scientific inquiry . The most important finding of the psychiatric investigation is that the patient's desire to be a woman is a symptom of this neurosis and is imbedded in a setting of other neurotic mechanisms of contributing value.”

He continues:

“In my opinion, transvestism is the result of six psychopathologic factors. They are : (1) latent (or manifest) homosexuality with an unresolved castration complex; (2 ) the sadomasochistic component ; (3 ) the narcissistic component; (4 ) the scoptophilic; (5 ) the exhibitionistic , and (6) the fetishistic component. In every case all six tributaries are represented in varying degrees. In some cases, the homosexual component is conscious and manifest; in others the fetishistic, or sadomasochistic features predominate.”

He concludes:

“What about psychotherapy? Hasn't psychotherapy been unsuccessful in so many of these cases! My answer is—that as far as the evaluation of the pathogenesis of transsexualism is concerned, it does not matter. Poor therapeutic results do not necessarily prove that the etiologic concept is wrong. If our therapy does not succeed, we must investigate the causes of our failure, learn from our mistakes and improve our approach. In most of the unsuccessful cases the patients' uncooperative attitude may be considered as the main source of failure . … I think, however, that to do justice to the transvestites we must also educate the patients themselves. We must show them how, while fantasying a future physical metamorphosis, they are, in reality, harking back to their neurotic past, to their infantile fears and pleasures, and point out to them how futile it is to try solving one's sexual problems—in effigy.”



  • Danica Deutsch. “A Case of Transvestism”.

Deutsch from the Alfred Adler Consultation Center in New York presented a single case study which was regarded as a ‘cure’.

A patient is referred to as “O.R.” and is a man in his early 30s, married four years who had dabbled as a child and after marriage in cross-dressing. He had tried a psychiatrist, but stopped because of the cost. He went to the Center. They interviewed O.R. and then his wife, who then worked on his lack of self-confidence and even shared cross-dressing with him. Deutsch, of the Center, concludes:

“This case represents a classical example of the Adlerian concept of 'masculine protest.' Interesting is also that the patient compensated for his organ inferiority (bad eyesight) by scoptophilia and fetishism.

The favorable outcome after such a short period of treatment can be attributed to the positive aspects of the client's personality. According to Benjamin's categories, this case can be classified as a 'simple male heterosexual psychogenic transvestite.' Though he was self-centered, he was not so completely discouraged as to deviate into manifest homosexuality. His fantasies were always of heterosexual character; though in feminine clothing, he assumed the role of the male.

Moreover, the cooperation of his wife cannot be overlooked. She refrained from everything that might feed his neurosis, his feeling of inferiority and incompetence; she avoided overindulgence, or a critical or domineering attitude . She rather helped him to apply his newly gained insight to obtain a positive relationship based on equality.”



  • Robert Veit Sherwin. “The Legal Problem In Transvestism”.

This is the first consideration of the legality or otherwise of transvesting and or having genital surgery in the US.

“… in the strict sense of the word, there are no laws concerning either transvestism or the various medical aspects concerned with sex transformation. But this fact in no way prevents or nullifies the popular conception that everything connected with this subject is illegal in this country. … Legislators are seldom willing to tackle problems involving sex head-on. The result is that law enforcers are therefore forced to utilize whatever laws they have at their disposal, and whether these laws actually fit the problem often seems of little consequence.”

He then discussed the mis-application of the Disorderly Conduct and the Mayhem laws.

[Editorial comment: Sherwin did not discuss the many cities in the US starting with Columbus, Ohio in 1848 that passed municipal laws against cross-dressing.]



See also the 1967 symposium at the New York Academy of Sciences.


  • Emil Gutheil. “XVI. Analyse eines Falles von Transvestitismus,” in Wilhelm Stekel. Der Fetischismus, vol. 7, Störungen des Trieb- und Affektlebens. Urban & Schwarzenberg, 1923: 534-570. Translated by S Parker: “Analysis of a Case of Transvestism” in Sexual Aberrations: The Phenomena of Fetishism in Relation to Sex. John Lane The Bodley Head Ltd, 1930: 281-318.

  • Harry Benjamin. The Transsexual Phenomenon. Warner Books reprint Edition 1977: 29-30.

  • Werner H Engel, Frederic Wertham, Paul H Hoch, William Wolf, Lewis R Wolberg & Hilda Stekel. “In Memoriam: Emil A Gutheil, M.D., 1899-1959”. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 13,4, 1959. Online.

  • Linda Heidenreich. “A Historical Perspective of Christine Jorgensen and the Development of an Identity” in Bonnie Bullough, Vern Bullough & James Elias (eds). Gender Blending. Prometheus Books, 1997: 274-5,

  • Joanne Meyerowitz. How Sex Changed: A History of Transsexuality in the United States. Harvard University Press, 2002:105-7.

  • Rainer Herrn. Schnittmuster des Geschlechts. Transvestismus und Transsexualität in der frühen Sexualwissenschaft. Giessen, 2005: 76n6

18 October 2022

Masuda Yasumare (1908 - ?) ill-fated lover

Saijo Eriko, then 23, was a leading musumeyaku, a player of female roles in the all-female revue Shôchiku Shōjo Kageki, who had been in the 1933 short film Wakasa to netsu no shûdan geijutsu: Shôchiku shôjo kageki no ichinichi. In spring 1934 she was emerging from bathing backstage when she met with one of her fans, the upper class Masuda Yasumare. 


Masuda, raised female as Masuda Fumiko, had taken the male name Yasumare and dressed accordingly. Saijo later stressed Yasumare’s physical beauty, his straight white teeth, his Harold Lloyd spectacles and his ‘Eton crop’ hairstyle. Masuda followed her to venues in eastern and western Japan where she was performing, and visited her almost daily. In addition he wrote her frequent passionate letters. She walked out with him, even hand-in-hand. 

Masuda had taken family money and stock certificates to finance his travels. On New Year’s Day Yasumare and Eriko shared a hotel room and bed in Kyoto. She was supposed to return to Tokyo for a photo-shoot, but he used emotional blackmail to stop her going. They took the slow ferry to Beppu on the island of Kyushu which is famed for its hot springs. They had been entertaining romantic ideas about a joint suicide, but on arrival Eriko’s chronic appendicitis flared up and she was three days in hospital. On doctors’ advice they took the train back to Kyoto which is much faster than the ferryboat. 

In Kyoto Masuda threatened suicide if Eriko returned to her work. By this time a private investigator hired by Masuda’s mother (the father had left home to live with his mistress some years before) had found them and alerted the press which ran daily stories on the couple. On 23 January, after an attempted flight by train and car, they were apprehended. Masuda was sent to his mother’s home in Osaka, and Erika returned to her parents in Tokyo. 

Late at night on 27 January, Masuada, who had escaped from home again and taken a hotel room in Tokyo, phoned her. She immediately went to him, her father with her. With her father’s blessing, she stayed with Masuda, supposedly until someone from his family came. However they both took tranquilisers and sleeping pills. A journalist who insisted on interviewing Saijo realised the situation and called for medical help. They did not die.

There had been several ‘lesbian suicides’ in early 1930s Japan. This case generated particular interest given Masuda’s class status and Saijo’s celebrity as a musumeyaku. In 1932 the novelist Muramatsu Shōfu had coined the term “dansō na reijin”(female beauty in men’s clothes) and used it in a short story inspired by Kawashima Yoshiko whose transvesting in military uniform with the Imperial forces in Manchuria was well-known. The term was now applied to Masuda.

Saijo Eriko

Saijo Eriko, who had her acting and modelling career, took some initiatives. She dealt with the Masuda family through their lawyer and persuaded them that Yasumare be allowed to live independently (in Japan at that time only sons were allowed to do so). When Masuda’s estranged father came to visit Yasumare in hospital, she criticised him as an absent father. Eriko wrote an account for a women’s magazine, Fujin Kōron, shortly afterwards, presenting herself as perhaps foolish, but not as someone who considered suicide. She left the Shôchiku Shōjo Kageki, and had a couple of small parts in films in 1935 and 1936.

In 1937 Eriko married a cis man.

  • Nakano Eitarō. “Dansō no reijin to Saijō Eriko: dōseiaishi misui no ikisatsu (The cross-dressed beauty and Saijō Eriko: the circumstances of their double suicide attempt)”. Fujin Kōron, 1935, 3: 1617.
  • Saijō Eriko. “Dansō no reijin Masuda Fumiko no shi o erabu made (Up until Masuda Fumiko, the cross-dressed beauty, chose death)”. Fujin Kōron, 1935, 3: 168-78.
  • Ksbayashi lchisd. "Danso no reijin"to toa? Kageki 169, 1935:10-12.
  • Jennifer Robinson. Takarazuka: Sexual Politics and Popular Culture in Modern Japan. University of California Oress, 1998: 193-6.
  • Jennifer Robinson. “Dying to Tell: Sexuality and Suicide om Imperial Japan” in Cindy Patton & Benigo Sanchez-Eppler (eds) Queer Diasporas. Duke University Press, 2000: 38-70.
  • Leila J Rupp. Sapphistries: A Global History of Love between Woman. New York University Press, 2009: 167.
  • Jennifer Robertson. “The Politics of Androgyny in Japan: Sexuality and Subversion in the Theater and Beyond” in Anne C Herrmann & Abigail J Stewart (eds). Theorizing Feminism: Parallel Trends In The Humanities And Social Sciences. Second Edition. Taylor & Francis, 2018: 174.

IMDB(Saijo Eriko)

07 October 2022

Brigitte Bond (1944 - ) beat girl, singer, performer

At the beginning of 1964 the then 19-year-old, Brigitte Bond, was signed as a singer by Tom Littlewood of the 2i’s Coffee Bar in London’s Soho which had launched early rock stars such as Tommy Steels and Cliff Richard. Mod, defined by fashionable clothes and modern jazz, was the new thing, and Mod had begun to incorporate the Jamaican music called Ska or Bluebeat. Brigitte had gigs across London with various aspiring musicians, and put out two songs as a 45 rpm single “Blue Beat Baby’ and “Oh Yeah Baby” backed by an impromptu group named the Bluebeats.

25 February 1964, the Jamaican Ska star, Prince Buster, arrived in England. He was met at Heathrow by a crowd of fans including Brigitte who was photographed dancing with him. This photo would later become iconic. The Daily Mirror dubbed her the Queen of Bluebeat. Prince Buster performed that same night at the prestigious May Fair Hotel and Brigitte was again photographed in attendance.

In April the Flamingo Club in Soho began a weekly Blue Beat Night, and Brigitte performed at the second show. Sir John Waller, 7th Baronet of Braywick Lodge, a noted poet and gay, was not able to claim his full inheritance of £250,000 ( £4 million today adjusted for inflation) until marriage and a male heir. He had rejected many women. One day he walked past the 2i’s coffee bar and saw a poster promoting Brigitte. He already knew her manager Tom Littlewood, who was willing to introduce him to Brigitte. He proposed to her on their first date. She accepted. This did not stop her being featured in Tit-Bits magazine in early May, or attending a Mods gathering on the beach at Margate over the Whitsun Weekend. The engagement was in the press 21 May. However she would not be able to give him a baby, and the engagement was quickly called off. This resulted in press articles stating that Brigitte was trans, that were repeated internationally.


However this did not impede her career. She performed for a week at the prestigious Astor Club in Mayfair where royalty and gangsters mixed (and where the next year the gangsters, the Krays and the Richardsons, would clash and start a gang war). Brigitte transferred her management to the Arthur Lowe Agency who advertised her as “The controversial Sex Change girl with the velvet singing voice”. Other advertisements referred to her as “the Shapely French singer”. This was followed by a short African tour: Mombasa, Nairobi and Salisbury.

On return to London, Brigitte performed regularly at the Pelican Club in Soho, until it was raided for its nude dancers who broke the so-called Windmill Rule, that if nude the performer should not move. Brigitte, while not charged, was mentioned as “the worst”.

In 1965 Brigitte did a tour of South Africa and Rhodesia, and returned to headline at La Dolce Vita in Newcastle. She then did a residency In Madrid. Articles in the Spanish press mentioned her gender transition - although Spain was still ruled by Franco, this did not cause any problems.


In June 1966 US establishment preacher Billy Graham was in London for a month, and had denounced the newly fashionable mini-skirt. On 17 June he visited Soho as announced. Brigitte, who was now calling herself Brigitte St John, climbed on Graham’s car to protest his comments about miniskirts. The Sunday Mirror put her on the front page to make her point.







She moved to live in Spain. She claimed that she was in the 1967 James Bond film, Casino Royale, although she is not in the credits - however given the chaotic nature of the film with its many directors and cutting room compromises, she may well have been.

She is in the credits of three films 1967-1969: Herostratus, 1001 Nights and La muchacha del Nilo playing the role of ‘dancer’ in the first two and ‘Brigitte’ in the third.

By the late 1960s Brigitte St John was a ‘supervedette’ in Spain and elsewhere, mainly appearing in cabaret, and even appearing with Coccinelle. In 1974 she appeared at Madrid’s Gay Club, its first GLBT club as la Transición, the change away from Franco’s repression, was starting. She performed with the heterosexual transformista Paco España.

In April 1976 Brigitte was interviewed for a Spanish paper and revealed that she was married and living in Campania, Italy, and that her real name was Giovanna.

After that nothing was heard about her.




There was a revival of Ska in the late 1970s. The Birmingham band, The Beat, wanted a beat-girl logo for their first album and asked the cartoonist Hunt Emerson to create one. He took the 1964 photograph of Brigitte and Prince Buster dancing, and changed the image of Brigitte into an icon that has since then been that of the Beat Girl.


Melody Maker ran a story on the history in 1979, and included the 1964 photograph.


*not Bridget St John, the folk singer

  • Brigitte Bond and The Bluebeats. “Blue Beat Baby / Oh Yeah Baby” 45 single 1964.
  • “The King and Queen of Blue Beat meet”. Daily Mirror, 26 February 1964: 26.
  • David Hunn. “Brigitte Bond: She has a built-in licence to thrill”. Tit-Bits, 9 May 1964: 13.
  • “I’ll be Lady Waller in 4 Months says Brigitte”. The Evening Standard, 21 May 1964.
  • “Where Boys Were”. Madera Tribune, 73,20, 10 June 1964, p3. Online
  • “The Stripper who cried for shame”. Daily Mirror, November 14, 1964: 3.
  • Brigitte St John. “Sin and Mini Skirts”. Sunday Mirror,June 19, 1966 p1.
  • John Huston et al (dir). Casino Royal. With Peter Sellers, Orson Wells, Woody Allen etc and possibly Brigitte St John. US 131 mins 1967.
  • Don Levy (dir). Herostratus. With Michael Gothard as Max and Brigitte St John as dancer. UK 142 mins 1967.
  • José María Elorrieta (dir & scr). 1001 Nights. With Jeff Cooper and Brigitte St John as dancer. Spain & Italy 92 mins 1968.
  • José María Elorrieta (dir). La muchacha del Nilo. With Rory Calhoun and Brigitte St John as Brigitte. Spain 81 mins 1969.
  • Rachel Hebditch. “For Richer or Poorer .. Sir John weds a bride who could give birth to a £500,000 boy”. Daily Mirror, April 4, 1974 p9.
  • “The Story of Ska”. Melody Maker, May 19, 1979.
  • Victor Selwyn. “Obituaries: Sir John Waller Bt”. The Independent,21 February 1995. Online.
  • Tony van den Bergh. “Obituary: Sir John Waller Bt”. The Independent, 4 March 1995. Online.
  • Lloyd Bradley.Reggae: The Story of Jamaican Music. BBC Worldwide, 2002: 25.
  • “The Beat Girl - Noted Cartoonist Hunt Emerson Designs a 2-Tone Era Icon”. Marco on the Bass, December 16, 2008.
  • Der JB. “Who the f*** is Brigitte Bond?”. Over & Over(setter), 28 mai 2011. Online.
  • Heather Augustyn. Women in Jamaican Music. McFarland, 2020: 87.
  • Joanna Wallace with Heather Augustyn.Blue Beat Baby: The Untold Story of Brigitte. YouTube
  • Heather Augustyn. Rude Girls: Women in 2 Tone and One Step Beyond. Half Pint Press, 2022.

Discogs            IMDB


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Thanks in particular for Joanna Wallace’s 30 minute YouTube documentary in compiling this.

Given the popularity of Brigitte Bardot (same spelling of Brigitte) and James Bond (the 3rd film was soon to be released) in 1964, one can see how she chose her name.

Sometimes it is said that Brigitte was either Maltese or from Marseilles. Sometimes that she had done British military service as a male. National Service required two years between the ages of 17-20. However it was discontinued in 1960 when Brigitte was 15. She may have volunteered - but how to fit in two such years, and then gender transition and surgery all before arriving at the 2i’s club as age 19?

Heather Augustyn’s new book. Rude Girls, on Ska music has a section on Brigitte Bond.

Wallace says that “Blue Beat Baby” came out in March, after Prince Buster’s tour. However it is referred to in the Daily Mirror article 26/2/64.

The Flamingo Club had become well-known after a fight there in October 1962 between lovers of Christine Keeler led to revelations of her affair with John Profumo, the Minister of War, that in turn led to the defeat of the Conservative Government in 1964. For more on the Flamingo Club see Chp 11 in Rob Baker’s Beautiful Idiots and Brilliant Lunatics, 2015. Also online.

Both the Wikipedia entry and the first obituary re Waller in the Independent say nothing at all about John Waller being gay and nothing about Brigitte. Both of them skip from the 1950s to the 1970s. Waller did eventually marry in April 1974, and had a daughter. However, due to the sexist nature of aristocracy, this did not count. He died in 1995 without ever getting the full inheritance.

The single:



Brigitte's dance in the film Herostratus:



Joanna Wallace's essential 30 minute documentary