Betty Careless
Betty Careless or Betsy Careless (c. 1704–1739) was a notorious
Biography
She was born around 1704 in London. Nothing is known of her early life, but she was an established courtesan by the 1720s. Initially under the protection of the barrister Robert Henley (later Lord Chancellor), by 1729 when she opened her own house in Tavistock Row she was attached to Sir Charles Wyndham (later Earl of Egremont). Wyndham and Careless probably had a mutually beneficial relationship; he lived for free while his society connections ensured a higher-class clientele for Careless's house.
In Amelia, Henry Fielding recalled seeing her at a play when she was a young girl. Though, he said, "it was impossible to conceive a greater Appearance of Modesty, Innocence and Simplicity", her beauty disguised her true character. He had seen her a few days before "in bed with a Rake, at a bagnio, smoking Tobacco, drinking Punch, talking obscenity and swearing and cursing with all the Impudence and Impiety of the lowest and most abandoned Trull of a Soldier".
Some idea of her reputation can be divined from the graffiti "Prayer" attributed to her in the Bog-House Miscellany (ca. 1731): "Grant us good lusty Men, ye gracious Pow'rs!
Or else stop up those craving Things of ours!", and her inclusion in one of
By the early 1730s she had reached the peak of her professional career, and she moved to a house in the Little Piazza in Covent Garden to try her hand as a bawd.
She takes centre-stage in
By early 1735 she had given up her house in Covent Garden (
On Wednesday Evening last [April 22d]
was buried from the Parish-House of Covent-
Garden, Mrs. Careless, well known for many
Years by the Name of Betty Careless by the gay
Gentlemen of the Town, of whose Money she
had been the Occasion (as it is said) of spending
upward of fifty thousand Pounds, tho' at last
reduced to receive Alms from the Parish. Almost
a certain Consequence attending Ladies in her
unhappy Cast of Life.
References
- Burford, E. J. (1986). Wits, Wenchers and Wantons – London's Low Life: Covent Garden in the Eighteenth Century. London: Hale. p. 260. ISBN 978-0709026297.
- Linnane, Fergus (2003). London – The Wicked City: A Thousand Years of Prostitution and Vice. London: Robson Books Ltd. p. 256. ISBN 978-1861056191.