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Peg Plunkett (1727–1797) was an Irish brothel keeper in Dublin who wrote her memoirs in three volumes. ==Life== Margaret Plunkett was born in the Irish county of Westmeath around 1727. She was one of eight of her mother's 22 children who survived childhood. Because of her mother's death and brother's abuse she moved to Dublin. In Dublin the teenage Plunkett became pregnant and she was kept by the child's father until the child died. This was the first of six of her children who died. At this point she lost everything and took again to being unmarried and relying on the support of men.〔 Amongst these was a Mr Leeson whom Plunkett did not marry but she did adopt his surname.〔 Plunkett never revealed the identity of this man but he is believed to have been Joseph Leeson, 2nd Earl of Milltown. Plunkett became head of her own household when she started her first brothel with a friend, Sally Hayes, in Drogheda Street in Dublin. Plunkett was successful in court against the leader of a notorious gang known as the ''Pinking Dindies'' called Robert Crosbie.〔 This group of upper-class youths and failed students carried swords with which they used to mug the unfortunate. They were known for taking the "booty" from prostitutes and brothels and they continued in this practise, despite the law, for many years.〔(Irish varieties, for the last fifty years: written from recollections ), J. D. Herbert, 1836〕 Crosbie was sent to jail for an attack on Plunkett that ended a pregnancy and caused another of her children to die; it was said that Crosbie could have faced a murder charge. The business had other addresses but finally occupied premises in Pitt Street.〔 Plunkett took her exploiters to the courts on more than one occasion and she was said to enjoy local support because her business attracted customers to other nearby businesses.〔(The rise and fall of Peg Plunkett, 18th-century courtesan and consummate memoirist ), Sarah Dunant, 2 July 2015, The New Statesman, Retrieved 8 July 2015〕 Plunkett retired after thirty years to Blackrock. She was said to have have had a secret pension from the Irish government at one point.〔(Reviews of Peg Plunkett: Memoirs of a Whore ), Stuff.co.nz, Retrieved July 2015〕 As her income reduced she began to write her memoirs. It is presumed that the motive was to profit by threatening to name her former lovers.〔 She died aged 70 in 1797〔(The rise and fall of Peg Plunkett, 18th-century courtesan and consummate memoirist ), Women's Museum of Ireland, Retrieved 8 July 2015〕 and her obituary was published in the Dublin Evening Post on 17 May.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Peg Plunkett」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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