DRUG FIEND CONFESSES

Greymouth Evening Star, 28 August 1929, Page 7

DRUG FIEND CONFESSES

WARNING TO GIRLS.

Amazing confessions of a woman who, born in the slums, became one of Epstein’s models and then a figure in London’s Bohemia are revealed to tho world. « The woman, Betty May, was one of tiio circle which included Billie Cailton, who met her tragic death through Off Edgware road, Betty May discloses, was a flat kept by a woman who specialised lin dope parties. Drugs of all sorts were taken, and after one particular party lasting from 10 o’clock at night to 3 o’clock in the afternoon, tho “Tiger Woman,” as Betty May was known, saw a girl to her flat. ’ . Tho following day the girls body was fished out of the Thames neai London Bridge.

At another orgy Billie Carlton appeared. She had coma straight from the theatre, and before long was in the most sketchy of undergarments and stretched on piles of cushions “smoking

At that time Betty May had been taking about a hundred grains of cocaine a day, also injections of morphia. Ten grains of cocaine is a fatal dose to a person unaccustomed to it. “Once in a West End restaurant the waiter brought me white coffee instead of black. Immediately I concluded that the whole world was against me, that not only my friends but my favourite waiter had entered into a conspiracy to prevent my drinking black coffee. In a. frightful paroxysm of despair I drew a hatpin and was only prevented from an attempt on my own life by the prompt intervention of my right-hand neighbour.” Betty May, through indulging in drugs, also had the continua| fear that buildings under which she passed would fall in on her. Again, when on waking from an orgy she could hardly open her mouth, she was convinced she Jiad lock-jaw. “I lovo feeling free more than anything else in the world, and when one is taking drugs seriously one never does feel free. Often I lost my voice entirely. “Sometimes I felt so desperate that I used to tear all my clothes to pieces in. front of my husband, who was terrified of me when I was in one of my rages.”

Betty May’s confessions are a grave warning to young girls who dream of London and its smart set of Bohemians.