Marital Intimacy

Peep Into Married Sex Life

We get an unfiltered view into the intimate aspects of McCallum’s relationship with his wife Henrietta. This offers a rare insight into what the sexuality of a married couple during the Edwardian period might really have been like.

We learn the social mores of the time. For example, they frequently slept in separate bedrooms, though this did not seem to impede intimacy.

Intimacy

The couple had an extremely busy sex life. McCallum’s running tally recording the number of times they “do it” is remarkable even by today’s relaxed standards.

The conflict that occurred in other areas of the relationship inevitably spilled over into the bedroom and makes for amusing reading. We witness frustrations, manipulations, and retaliations

McCallum was demanding and had certain expectations. He fumes when “she denied me my rights”.

We read when

“she did some cock teasing”

“she told me I have a damn cheek to ask for bit “

“she refused me a bit, so I refused her a nip of whiskey”

Tracks His Wife’s Periods

McCallum had a bizarre preoccupation with his wife’s menstrual periods. Every month, without fail he would record the coming and going of this event. Missed or late periods were also duly noted. The odd ritual would last for over 20 years.

He tracked the occurrence of her periods via a diary entry such as “Hetty’s monthlies started”, and a week later “Hettie’s monthlies finished”.  Later on he simply abbreviated the journal entry to just “Began” and a week later “Finished”.

Even more peculiar was that he would sometimes distinguish these events by writing them in red ink. This raises a question, though this behaviour would be considered weird by today’s standards, was there some greater social significance to the tracking of a women’s cycle in years gone by.?

Jealously

With McCallum’s prolific sex drive and the sheer number of women over the years, one can’t help wonder about a few things.

Albeit some of these women were paid for, many were not. Was McCallum a charmer, or irresistibly good-looking? Or did he simply pursue with abandon and wear women down to submission?

Also, was this normal behavior of the time or was he an extraordinary man? There are some comical entries surrounding the subject;

  • When Hetty discovers the contact details of another woman in the pocket of his pants and gives him an earful followed by the silent treatment.
  • When he innocently rescues a girl swimmer having trouble breathing but his reputation precedes him and others question his motives.
  • Jealously occurred both ways-when there is evidence of a male visitor to the house and Hetty inflames the situation by refusing to tell McCallum who it was.
  • When Hetty insinuates that the reason public parks shut down at night is because of characters like him.

Reputation

Research indicates that McCallum likely had a reputation known within certain social circles.

Various inferences in the social and gossip pages of local newspapers refer to the diarist’s flirtatious ways.