Shame and Scandal ‘63

In this map and guide we chart the brief, intense period of the Profumo Scandal of 1963. An affair that shocked the establishment, bringing together spies, politicians, teenage 'good-time girls', slumlords and sundry inhabitabitants of London's demi-monde. Cliveden Estate, July 1961: 19-year-old model Christine Keeler is introduced to John Profumo, Secretary of State for War. The pair embark on a brief affair, however, Christine is also enjoying the attention of Yevgeny Ivanov a Soviet agent who is being monitored by MI5. The man who links this trio is osteopath Dr Stephen Ward. That would likely have been the end of the story had other elements of Keeler's life not spiralled out of control culminating in gunfire in a quiet mews in Marylebone. The press would soon join the dots between Christine Keeler, Mandy Rice-Davies, John Profumo and an ever-expanding cast of those on the fringes of a sexually liberated London underworld.