Rubies and Lemons

  Frederick Hollyer, Portrait of Simeon Solomon , c.1866. Twenty-two years before the cause celebre of Oscar Wilde’s trial, another homosexual scandal emerged in the art world. This time, the fame of the ‘culprit’ was not as great, and his ‘crime’ did not directly impinge upon the ruling class. However, the effects of his conviction and punishment were the same: destitution, ignominy and a complete crushing of his artistic career. He ended his days alternating between living rough on the streets of Whitechapel, where he occasionally eked out a living as a pavement artist, and the St Giles workhouse, when his alcoholism precluded even this small dignity. At ten past seven on the evening of February 11, 1873, two men were arrested while having sex in the men's public lavatory on St Christopher’s Place, just round the back of Oxford Street. In the London of the time…such arrests were not unusual, but this one featured a highly unusual combination of culprits. One of them was an