Christine Keeler dead at 75 – Model at centre of Profumo affair passes away after battle with lung disease
CHRISTINE Keeler, the face of Britain’s most infamous sex scandal, has died at 75.
The model and call girl helped destroy the career of then-Secretary of State for War John Profumo, with whom she had an affair during the 1960s.
And she helped bring down Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in 1963.
She also symbolised the nation’s sexual revolution in pictures sitting naked on a chair.
Son Seymour Platt, 46, said she died on Monday at the Princess Royal University Hospital in Farnborough Common, Orpington, Kent, suffering from lung disease COPD.
Writing a tribute online, he said: “I wish to share some sad news. My mother, the grandmother to my beautiful little girl, passed away late last night. She suffered in the last few years with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease but lost the fight.
"As many of you know my mother, Christine Keeler, fought many fights in her eventful life, some fights she lost but some she won.
"She earned her place in British history but at a huge personal price.We are all very proud of who she was."
Christine worked as a topless performer in London's Soho when as a 19-year-old she met society man-about-town Stephen Ward.
He introduced her to a whirlwind party scene involving what were described as orgies attended by aristocrats and VIPs.
It was through Ward that she met 46-year-old Profumo and Soviet spy Yevgeny Ivanov in 1961. She had affairs with them both.
When the love triangle came to light two years later, fears of a Cold War security leak sparked a lurid scandal that rocked the Government and had the public transfixed for months.
It made Christine Keeler one of the most famous women in the world in 1963.
Mr Platt, who lives in Ireland, said: "There was a lot of good around Chris’s rather tragic life, because there was a family around her that loved her.
“I think what happened to her back in the day was quite damaging.”
There was a lot of good around Chris’s rather tragic life, because there was a family around her that loved her. I think what happened to her back in the day was quite damaging.
Seymour Platt
Christine Keeler was born in Uxbridge, Middlesex, in 1942 and raised in Berkshire by her mum and step-dad.
Profumo was Secretary of State for War in Harold Macmillan's Tory government when he first saw Christine climbing naked out of a swimming pool at Lord Astor's mansion.
They began an affair that lasted from a few weeks to several months, according to various accounts.
At the same time, Christine was sleeping with diplomat Yevgeny Ivanov, an intelligence officer and the Soviet Union's naval attache in London.
Some accounts claim MI5 hoped to use Keeler as a "honey trap" to persuade Ivanov to defect, and were alarmed when they found out she was also seeing Profumo.
They warned the minister off being associated with Ward's seedy circle, and he ended the affair.
It remained hidden from the public until 1963 when her disintegrating love life thrust her into the spotlight.
A jealous boyfriend, Lucky Gordon, fired bullets at Ward's front door as she hid inside, and the subsequent Old Bailey trial caused rumours to swirl in Westminster.
Profumo lied to the House of Commons, denying any impropriety with Keeler, but was later forced to quit in disgrace, followed months later by the Prime Minister.
Ward was put on trial for living off immoral earnings - accused of pimping Keeler, Mandy Rice-Davies and other girls. He killed himself on the eve of the guilty verdicts.
Keeler, who always denied she was a prostitute, was jailed for nine months for perjuring herself during Gordon's shooting trial.
The BBC is currently making a show about the Profumo affair. Filming of The Trial Of Christine Keeler is due to begin next year.
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