The following is a translation of her statement regarding her production of these illegal postcards:

“In 1914, the accused, who is not trained as a photographer, got the permission of the inspector at the bathing establishment Helgoland, to photograph at Helgoland those customers who wished to be photographed, and that she has since that time occupied herself with this. She is, as a rule, once daily at the bathing establishment.

In the beginning, it was for the customers’ own use, that they, at their own request, let themselves be photographed and the accused received her payment from them. Later, among others, Scala Book Kiosk in the Scala building, wished to sell some bathing postcards and the owner at that time, Mr. Brix asked the accused to make him some bathing pictures.

The accused therefore contacted some of her customers and got these women’s permission, in view of the remaining plates to produce and sell the pictures. In the first years [she] produced pictures partly in swimming attire and partly in under garments, but later the public’s interest grew and thus Mr. Brix’s requirement for more nude pictures and the accused therefore more recently switched to also making nude pictures, though here she as the accused sees it, didn’t take the pictures “frontally”, [but] from the side and the back. She declares that this picture taking never attempted to create pictures of [an] erotic or lewd character, but has by her own judgment tried to avoid this type of presentation.#

The women who she used in her production and can be seen in the pictures she believes to be about 10 [different subjects]. They are women from various positions, theatre women, maids and some of them more “loose living”.

As previously mentioned, the accused had sold the pictures to the Scala Book Kiosk and that she also sold to the questioned [suspect] in this report Johansen in Istedgade and finally that she sold to the kiosk at the Circus garden, whose owner is now Henry Jensen. Earlier the owner was Mr. Fischer.

The accused guesses that, of the postcards in discussion, she dealt or rather produced ca. 1200 per month. Her price is 25 [øre] each.

The accused wishes it noted that she herself had been in doubt as to what extent the concerned pictures were legally saleable or not, but people she talked with about this, business people, had still declared that there was nothing to hinder the trade in these pictures and that she for several years had seen these pictures displayed in Scala Kiosk’s windows, had also on this basis assumed the trade in the pictures was legal.”

On August 5, 1920 she was questioned by the police again. She continued,

“The previously questioned under [section] VI, Mrs. Willumsen, appears again. She acknowledges that she had, as explained, ca. 1,000 postcards, with subjects as those examples noted under 28 [evidence packet], on commission with the accused Phillipsen who sold them as he explained.

Regarding her explanation that she only photographed her customers from the side or back, not the front, she says she meant, that no genitals or pubic hair were visible and had not thought about the faces, since under no. 24 [evidence packet] there are many pictures of women whose faces are easily recognizable. She maintains that of every face which is recognizable she has in every case acquired the right to reproduce and sell the picture, from the photographed women personally. In recent years she has acquired these rights from each one in writing.

She acknowledges that she said to the accused under VII, the questioned suspect Henry Jensen, that her pictures were legal but she had said this because her pictures had been sold (and displayed) since 1916, though she must acknowledge that since then the [illegible] had grown and in response, her pictures became more daring.”

# Of course we should remember that during a police interrogation she would wish to make herself appear as innocent as possible. Yet, the photographic work does actually back up her statement. If we consider the images we know with certainty are hers, those from the women’s section of Helgoland, it is obvious that what she told the police is basically true. The images are not particularly erotic and mostly taken from the side or the back. However, she did lie a little on this point as we can easily see some of the totally nude pictures were taken straight-on frontally! This may seem trivial to us, but at the time the deciding technical factor of legality, besides an obvious attempt to “wake illicit longings” was whether or not pubic hair was visible in the photograph.