NIGHTS OF DRINKS AND BROTHELOS IN THE BUENOS AIRES OF 1810

The title is suggestive, but more interesting is learning about an unknown facet of the lives of those men who have reached our days in bronze statues or figures with grim faces. In reality, and how could it be otherwise, they dispersed and frolicked their carnal spirit in nights of fandango, verbena and bohemian talks accompanied by alcohol and rented love.

PORTEÑO COFFEE ROOM

The Café de Los Catalanes, located on the corner of the current San Martín and Perón streets, despite what its name suggests, the owners were not of that nationality, but Italians from Liguria, from a neighboring payment to Domingo Belgrano and Peri, father of General Manuel Belgrano. It was the café where the Belgrano brothers attended, but also, in the hectic days of May, those who were decidedly against continuing to be a “viceroyalty” met and hence this group would be known as the “anti-virreinals”. (Mariano Moreno, Juan José Castelli, Nicolás Rodríguez Peña and Manuel Belgrano himself, etc.).

MARCO'S COFFEE

In the Café de Marcos, located a few meters from the Cabildo, at the corner of the current Alsina and Bolivar streets, in addition to having coffee and food, it had pool tables. In it, the supporters of Fernando VII met, also called "fernandinos" in opposition to the "josefinos", Spaniards who supported the French King, brother of Bonaparte, José.

Both were elegant cafes with an official social life. It was usual and socially accepted, that late at night, of course without the presence of ladies or ladies of society, - the "others" did not appear in these rooms - a gentleman got into the car that had stopped at the door of the premises, with a few more drinks and with poor aim in the feet, of course, to "correct" her was the coachman. Normally, when the gentleman was "killed in combat", the friend paid in advance for the trip to his house, telling the coachman the destination and the precautions he should take, the latter surely knew perfectly the "dossier" of the passenger.

LA PERICHONA AND SANTIAGO DE LINIERS

At the Inn of the Three Kings, the night ended with songs, drinks at will and a game of cards.

The men with some alcohol on them, very discreetly went to the "street of sin", in the area of the current building of the Ministry of Public Works of the Nation. In the brothel that operated on said street, it was the sensation, with the "ingesitas", some prostitutes who became famous and who had arrived on the Lady Shore frigate.

The story of how these ladies came to brighten the lives of the men of this lost southern city originated when in 1797 King George III of England decreed the exile of sixty women accused of practicing prostitution in London, with the aim of purpose of "restoring the morale of the city". The order was for those persecuted women to be sent to the human dump in England, that is, Australia, land of prisoners and all despicable beings, and once there they were released to their fate.

What the king of the Blonde Albion did not imagine, what the Creole saying says "that a couple of hairs on c..., pulls more than a team of oxen", and the damsels managed to convince the crew of the ship to divert their path, which they accomplished including throwing the captain's thick-headed overboard. They first landed in Montevideo, and already informed of the "job opportunities in the area", they headed for Buenos Aires, successfully settling in the so-called Calle del Pecado, in front of a Miguel de Azcuénaga property. My friend Juan Carlos Serqueiros, has written a beautiful article, "Doña Clara, whore in London, Lady in Buenos Aires", referring to Doña Clara, one of the inlgesitas, I recommend it in the author's blog "Esa Vieja Cultura Frita" .

This promiscuity without proper hygiene brought severe consequences. The contagion of syphilis, which in those years was an incurable disease, due to the fact that antibiotics did not yet exist, since they were only applied in medicine at the time of World War II, and the treatment for it was only local, with cures of mercury permanganate.

One night could be the sentence to live with the cross of a syphilitic vice.

So it was said that, So it was said that, "one night with Venus, could condemn you to live your whole life with Mercury".

High society men had singles apartments, as was the case of Manuel Belgrano in the Monserrat neighborhood, according to a letter written in 1809 by his lover María Josefa Ezcurra to her sister Encarnación Ezcurra de Rosas, telling her that had known the "small house of Manuel", this document was found by the historian Lucía Galvez.

You see friends, not everything was just a matter of doing Patria…

Until next week.