Great Sankey

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St Mary's Church
Great Sankey is a village in Cheshire, now a suburban area of Warrington.

At the begining of the 19th century, a house in the village was kept as a meeting place for a society of gay men, from various social classes and various aras of north-west England. They employed a housekeeper and met there on Monday and Friday evenings in a kind of Masonic lodge, and called each other "Brother". Many of the working men involved had met in taverns and public spaces in Warrington, Manchester and Liverpool.[1]

References

  1. Lancaster Gazette, 20 August 1806, quoted in H G Cocks, "Secrets, Crime and Diseases, 1800–1814", Chapter 4 of Matt Cook (ed) A Gay History of Britain, pp 117–8