Abortions+During+WWI


 * Abortions During WWI /** "'Where's Betty?'...Lizzie Glanced around quickly. 'You know she's missed four times?'...'Tried Everything, Lizzie Said. "She was supping Dr Lawson's Cure as if it was lemonade... Well, she must've got desperate, because she stuck summat up herself to bring it on. You know them wire coat hangers? / pg. 201-202

In 1861 [|The Offenses Against the Person] Act was established. The act made it so if you were to preform an abortion on another or yourself you would receive life in prison. At this time it was common practice to try to and induce a miscarriage by blows to the abdomen, drinking mixtures high in vitamin C or other more dangerous substances, and trying to puncture the fetus with objects like a wire coat hanger. Laws creating leniency were not established until 1929. / [|Regeneration and Abortion] [|Abortion Laws] / All of this information is important to the book because it relates to characters like Sarah and Betty directly and others like Prior indirectly. With this information on what the times and laws were like, it is easier to see what would drive these woman to do what many of them were forced to do because of a social stigma. Dr Lawson's Cure as mentioned in my quote, was one of the "home-remedy" style abortions. **CAS & ELZ**