In the interwar Republic of Lithuania, prostitution was legal until the mid-1930s. However, sex workers’ health was strictly checked twice a week, and instead of an identity document, they were given so-called yellow passports which bore the results of the check.
The girls engaged in prostitution were not free to change their place of residence but had to inform the authorities within a day. They could not live in hotels, near schools, close to minors, or in more than one house at a time.
Brothels were formally illegal but there were no criminal penalties for keeping them. The only criminal offence was employing girls under 21.
A lot changed in 1935, however. The spread of venereal diseases pressed the need for new regulation. It was believed at the time, as is still often thought today, that prostitution and venereal disease were directly linked.
In 1935, the government passed two pieces of legislation. One provided for free but compulsory treatment for all Lithuanian citizens, the second banned brothels and pimping.
“From then on, the true face and scale of the phenomenon was revealed, with criminal cases, confessions of the accused, and witness testimonies that we are now discovering in archives,” Gintarė Žuravliovaitė, a historian and museum researcher at the Historical Research Department of the Vilna Gaon Jewish History Museum, told LRT.lt.
She has recently published a research paper on prostitution in interwar Lithuania.
How were prostitutes controlled?
Let’s first agree on the terms. Attitudes towards sex workers are changing. In my research work, I call them prostitutes because that’s what they were called back then. Today, the word is no longer used. Prostitution is now seen not as a social problem but as an economic phenomenon, a trade that can sometimes be picked voluntarily, it is not seen as something immoral.
To answer the question, people who, because of their occupation, could infect others were obliged to have regular health checks twice a month. Lists were drawn up of women, noting when they were checked, whether they were infected or not.
If an infected woman was still providing services, she was threatened with jail. Amendment to the Criminal Statute also introduced harsher penalties for spreading venereal disease. Syphilis was punishable by up to six years of hard labour. Gonorrhea would bring a lighter and shorter sentence. Having sex while infected, even if the infection does not spread, was punishable by simple imprisonment.
Another part of the control was doctors questioning the infected people to determine where they got the infection. Men would not always know how they got the disease so false accusations were possible. The police would then go to the person, whether she be a prostitute or not. If the person refused to be tested, they’d get forced treatment.
Where were the brothels set up? What was the variety?
Private homes, residences, public places. Apartments and private houses. Families took in prostitutes to live together. For example, the family of Petras and Bronė Žiupkas from Ukmergė, who had two small children, accommodated two prostitutes in a one-room flat, paying 30 litas a month for the room, utilities and food. When they found clients, the family would move to the kitchen for the night and give up the marital bed. They did it, of course, out of poverty.
Sometimes people would sublet a room to a prostitute or temporarily give it to street girls with a client. The owners would charge a 50-cent “bed fee”.
It was customary to treat clients with alcohol, sell snacks and condoms. And for an extra fee of 5–10 litas, an exhausted drunken guest could stay the night.
In one case, a gymnasium student was sentenced to hard labour for running a “business”: he would look for young girls in the streets, invite them to his rented room, let them stay, charge them a fee, and try to persuade them in various ways that “you will make good money here, you will live luxuriously”. Some of the girls were understandably naive. But soon enough, the boy was caught and punished severely.
Other sites were public: cafés, restaurants, pubs, beer halls. Or actual brothels that had fronts as restaurants or buffets. There were also real restaurants that had rooms.
Some of the girls knew places where they could find temporary shelter, warm up and wait for clients. They didn’t stay there, just met their clients.
Others worked as waitresses in pubs and also provided sex. Sometimes they would get a job first and then the owners would try to persuade them to prostitute themselves. Some accepted, others left.
For example, Agota Ragauskaitė served for two months in the Kvietkauskas’ beer hall. During interrogation, the girl revealed how the owner once offered her to a customer instead of the 2 litas he owed in change. When the guest agreed and approached the girl, she slapped him in the face and refused. For that she was beaten and thrown out of service.
Hotels hired girls as chambermaids or they had to pretend to be staying temporarily.
In establishments of this reputation, it was possible to rent a room for a few hours. Visitors were not entered in the guest book because these books could be evidence for the police.
Which hotels were best known for that?
Probably the biggest hotel in Kaunas between 1935–1940 was Lausanne. Such hotels differed from brothels in that they were profit-driven.
Elite brothels charged higher rates and were oriented towards upper-class clients – military officers, officials, the high society. They wanted “fresh meat”, new girls who were not jaded. Two of Lausanne’s doormen were in charge of finding them.
What were the prices for prostitutes’ services?
At Hotel Lausanne, the lowest rate was 10 litas. However, wealthy men would pay more, 30 or even 50. One girl said she once received 100 litas from one client. Though I am not sure if it is credible.
Younger and new girls would be more expensive.
Both prostitutes who worked on the street and those in brothels usually received a similar amount, 2–5 litas, per client. The price varied depending on the client’s perceived financial situation.
But this was very affordable even for a schoolboy?
There were even lower prices. There was always bargaining, the price depended on the client’s perceived purchasing power, his behaviour, sobriety.
Street prostitutes kept more for themselves but had to find their own clients. Brothels, meanwhile, ensured a flow of customers.
On average, women in brothels serviced between one and five men a day. However, when there was a shortage of guests, they had to go out and look for clients in the street.
According to the girls’ testimonies, an ordinary prostitute made between 2 and 20 litas a day, and even about 40 litas on the more successful nights.
How were the earnings divided?
The pimps would immediately demand their share: either a percentage or an agreed amount. Usually, they would take half the money.
But food, subsistence, utilities cost extra. So the pimps ended up collecting most or even all of the girls’ earnings, especially the youngest ones.
Most commonly, brothel owners who were themselves former prostitutes would be charged with money extortion. They were well-versed in how to succeed in the business. They would take their cut even when clients did not show up or when the girl had a day off. They would say: You left and I lost my profit because a lot of men came and there was no one to serve them.
In the brothels run by greedy owners, girls did not stay long – two or three months at most. Zofija Paulauskaitė left her brothel and went to work in the street when she realised how the girls were exploited and that the owners of the house were living entirely off what they were taking from them, without doing any work.
Which girls were the most likely to fall into prostitution?
The most at-risk group were the provincial girls. Without a solid social base, without a circle of acquaintances in the city, without a plan for where they would live and work. These were the girls that the pimps were after – lost in the markets, at the train station.
They were also generally not educated and generally unprepared for life. They did not have the skills in demand in the city, could not find a job and fell into the trap of prostitution.
For example, Ona Bakšaitytė, from a village in Gelgaudiškis, came to Kaunas in search of work as a maid. Some woman overheard this and offered to come together – she would give her a job. The real nature of the job became clear only after arriving at the apartment. But without a place to stay in Kaunas, the girl accepted, although she confessed that she was scared as she had not had any sexual relations before. She was not impressed by the new lifestyle and returned home after a week and a half.
Did educated girls fall into prostitution too?
Many prostitutes, unlike most of their older pimps, were literate. There were occasions when they lured gymnasium students or even girls who had already graduated, had jobs and professions.
Elena Šarafudinaitė, who came from a village in Alytus County, is a good example: after completing four years in a gymnasium a typing and bookkeeping course in Kaunas, she went to Šiauliai to apply for a job as a bank typist. Unfortunately, she did not get the place but she wanted to stay in Šiauliai and look for another job.
Following up on a recommendation from a girl she knew, she ended up in the house of Marijona Stupurytė-Urbšienė, where she was told to work for accommodation by servicing men visiting the house. Six months later, infected with gonorrhoea and with 40 cents in her pocket, the girl left for Alytus for treatment.
Were there any well-known prostitutes?
I know of only one case, Marijona “Manka” Kanclerytė, who became famous in Alytus, allegedly because there was little competition. According to her clients, she lived in the only brothel in Alytus and assembled a large circle of loyal customers. They were satisfied but their wives were not: it was they who lodged a complaint against the prostitute next door.
According to witnesses, Manka did not accept just anyone, only men with money. This often raised the ire of drunken men so guard was hired to keep the brothel and its only prostitute safe and lead unwanted guests out.
Eventually, she got pregnant, gave birth and was thrown out of the brothel. She left the child with her parents and returned to her trade.
From your research, what can you say more generally about the interwar Lithuanian society and its attitude towards women?
I can tell that the government took steps to protect the public from venereal disease targeting prostitutes, even though women were far less likely to be infected than men who were the main carriers of diseases. Girls were subjected to rigorous checks and treatment, while men were not and continued to spread infections.
Focus was on the collective welfare of society, not on the welfare of the individual. The marginal, “corrupted elements” were isolated from society rather than integrated and given help.
Women were seen as the bearers of morals, as homemakers. Those who spoilt this image were therefore held in particular contempt. Control was based on the penal apparatus rather than on an attempt to educate society, intimidation rather than education.
