"NIGHT CLUB QUEEN"

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 62, 15 March 1933, Page 3

"NIGHT CLUB QUEEN"

3LRS. 3IEYEICK DEAD

DEFIER OF DRINK LAWS

CRAVING TO MAKE MONEY

(From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, January 24.

• Mrs. Kate Mcyriek, the woman who defied the police, broke the drink laws, and suffered imprisonment again and again, died last week. She had suffered from influenza, and her death was due to heart failure.

This pleasant-featured little woman of matronly appearance was a spectacular figure in the night life of London's West End, and during the past fourteen years it is estimated that at least £500,000 had passed through her hands in providing drinks and dancing. She first entered London's night life during the years that followed the war. The first charge against her was made in 1920, when she was fined. Several charges followed, and in 1924 she was sent to prison for the first time. Between 1924 and 1932 she went to prison five times.

Mrs. Meyrick figured prominently in the Goddard case, in which Sergeant Goddard, of the Tine Street Police Station, was charged under the Prevention of Corruption Act. Mrs. Meyrick was sentenced to fifteen months' hard labour for corruptly making a gift to Goddard. She was released from prison in January, 1930, after serving her sentence, during which time she had been seriously ill. •

It was not one club alone, but several, of which she was either the proprietress or was interested in. They were known as the "Forty Three," the "Manhattan," the "Silver Slipper," the "Cecil," and the "Folies Berges." Aa fast as one club was raided and shut down she would reopen it under another name. Fines, or even terms of imprisonment never discouraged her. Every time she came out from serving a sentence at Holloway there were special celebrations at the clubs she controlled, and everything went on merrily as before until she was again caught.

Her daughter, Dolly, was married in 1926 to Lord de Clifford, who was then 19. In 1928 her daughter, Mary, was married to the Earl of Kinnoull.