You Have Chosen to Commit the Crime of Infanticide

You are working for a prominent London family as their maidservant when you realize that you are pregnant. Unmarried and facing the possibility of losing your job, this poses many problems for you. First of all, your society expects women to remain chaste outside of wedlock. A pregnancy when not married is a serious social disgrace. Secondly, maidservants do not keep their jobs long when pregnant. Faced with this desperate situation and knowing how difficult a job like yours comes by, you decide to conceal the pregnancy with the intention of killing the baby upon birth. The risk of being caught is worth it (4).

You deliver your baby in private, and by yourself. You are horribly appalled by what you perceive you have to do. There seems to be no other way--no solution to your problem. You try to deny the baby as a living, breathing human, and frantically try to decide how to get rid of it. Do you risk carrying the baby outside and being seen, or do you smother the baby in this dark corner of the house? You must decide quickly!