In 1885 the journalist W.T. Stead sought a girl in the East End of London for sexual purposes, found a 12 year old and bought her. Stead was arrested, tried and imprisoned. However, since his motive had been to stage a publicity stunt and not to take advantage of his purchase his sentence was a short one and he made the whole affair the sting that finally brought success to the campaign to stop child prostitution (Crossland, 1996).
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...That his kind of trade existed was almost certainly news to most of his readers. His undercover, investigative style was premonitory. With the help of the specialist, Josephine Butler, Stead carried out detailed preliminary research and undertook a sting, in much the manner favoured by modern investigative journalists. The treatment of the story increased sensationalism. Stead published it in segments over several weeks, cliff-hangers attracting customer loyalty. His story was talked of everywhere and commented upon by innumerable other papers, circulation rose and touts sold copies at two hundred times the cover price.
Investigative journalism had been invented, just as great changes were about to be demanded of journalism.
