“No irregularity or obstruction can resist them”: advertising of abortion pills in the Irish press, 1890–1930

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article demonstrates the extent of advertising in the Irish press in the years before and after the foundation of the Irish Free State for the “female pills” widely understood to induce abortions. These advertisements appeared very frequently in a wide range of Irish publications for several decades prior to 1922, and the article establishes the ways in which the advertisements functioned as an open secret strategically ignored by both legal and moral authorities. The style and content of the advertisements themselves, which allowed this open secret to operate in plain sight, is explored in detail, along with the context in which the advertisements were produced, circulated and likely understood by women readers. The article concludes by examining the advertisements’ gradual and then complete disappearance from the Irish press, especially in light of the Free State legislation enacted during the 1920s.