Early Life and Marriage To Fred West
Rosemary Letts was born in Barnstaple, Devon, to William Andrew and Daisy Gwendoline Letts after a difficult pregnancy. Her mother suffered from depression and was given ECT while pregnant; some have argued that this may have caused prenatal injury to her daughter. Rosemary grew up into a moody teenager and performed poorly at school.
Rosemary's parents split up when she was a teenager. She lived with her mother before moving in with her father at the age of 16 in Bishop's Cleeve, near Cheltenham; her father was prone to violence and repeatedly sexually abused her. At around this time, she began dating West who was living at Lake House Hotel Caravan Park, Stoke Road, Bishops Cleeve. Her father disapproved of the relationship, threatening to call social services and threatening West directly. Rosemary was caring for West's daughter Anne-Marie (by his previous marriage to Rena Costello) and his stepdaughter, Charmaine (daughter of Rena Costello and another man). West and Rosemary moved in together at the Lake House Hotel Caravan Park; Charmaine briefly attended Bishops Cleeve County Primary School on Tobyfield Road. However, by 1970, Rosemary found herself pregnant by West and they moved to Midland Road, Gloucester.
Rosemary West and her husband were convicted of sexual assault in January 1973. They were fined for indecent assault of Caroline Roberts (née Owen), who escaped the couple's home after being attacked and reported them to the police. The Wests' typical pattern was to pick up girls from bus stops in and around Gloucester and imprison them in their home for several days before killing them.
She also periodically worked as a prostitute, often while her husband watched. One of the most frequent visitors to 25 Cromwell Street (51°51′42″N 2°14′36″W / 51.86167°N 2.24333°W / 51.86167; -2.24333), now demolished, was her abusive father. She was often pregnant and was the mother of eight children. Five of these were fathered by Fred West, while three were fathered by clients she met through prostitution.
It is reported that, even after the birth of her fourth child, Rosemary's father would still visit her for sex, and would then rape Fred's daughter Anne-Marie.
Read more about this topic: Rosemary West
Famous quotes containing the words early, life, marriage, fred and/or west:
“Today’s pressures on middle-class children to grow up fast begin in early childhood. Chief among them is the pressure for early intellectual attainment, deriving from a changed perception of precocity. Several decades ago precocity was looked upon with great suspicion. The child prodigy, it was thought, turned out to be a neurotic adult; thus the phrase “early ripe, early rot!””
—David Elkind (20th century)
“And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief;”
—William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878)
“In all perception of the truth there is a divine ecstasy, an inexpressible delirium of joy, as when a youth embraces his betrothed virgin. The ultimate delights of a true marriage are one with this.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“For me, it’s enough! They’ve been here long enough—maybe too long. It’s a funny thing, though. All these years Fred was too busy to have much time for the kids, now he’s the one who’s depressed because they’re leaving. He’s really having trouble letting go. He wants to gather them around and keep them right here in this house.”
—Anonymous Parent. As quoted in Women of a Certain Age, by Lillian B. Rubin, ch. 2 (1979)
“Anyone with a real taste for solitude who indulges that taste encounters the dangers of any other drug-taker. The habit grows. You become an addict.... Absorbed in the visions of solitude, human beings are only interruptions. What voice can equal the voices of solitude? What sights equal the movement of a single day’s tide of light across the floor boards of one room? What drama be as continuously absorbing as the interior one?”
—Jessamyn West (1902–1984)