In this episode, we consider the rise and fall of an illegal 1930s LGBTQ+ club in the heart of London.
Writer Hamish Roberts imagines an LGBTQ+ man discovering a place, the Caravan Club, where he can be himself in 1934 London, when being gay is illegal.
Learn more about this story’s themes with these links:
The British Newspaper Archive has an article about the Caravan Club.
Inspired by a newspaper photograph of the Covent Garden crowds gathered in Bow Street for Caravan Club hearings, we consider what those onlookers might be thinking about the scores of LGBTQ+ people attending court that day.
Learn more about this story’s themes with these links:
Wikipedia has a copy of a photograph, printed in the Daily Mirror, of Bow Street crowded with market people during the Caravan Club Hearings.
LGBTQ+ love letters, and fragments thereof, discovered in the raid on the Caravan Club in 1934 and used against the author, Cyril Coeur de Leon during his trial at the Old Bailey.
If you like this story and want more information, here are some suggested links:
The National Archives has a podcast, and its transcript, relating to Cyril’s letter.
