Intimate Lives and Neighborhood Networks: An Abortion Trial in the Assizes Courts of 1870s Paris

After sixteen-year old Rebecca LaRue denounced her neighborJoséphine Cornu, for performing abortions, the Paris police and investigating magistrates accused six people of providing abortions, having an abortion, or for complicity of abortion. These included two licensed midwives, a rich banker and his married equally-rich mistress, a seamstress, and a married mother.  However, about two dozen people from the neighborhood testified during the investigation, including a professor, a merchant of religious artifacts, and numerous domestic servants, concierges, doctors, and others of the neighborhood.  This paper will explore the fun and frustrations of dealing with legal records as sources for understanding gender history and urban communities.