Christine Keeler Christine Keeler Christine Margaret Keeler (22 February 1942 – 4 December 2017) was an English model and topless showgirl. Her meeting at a dance-club with society osteopath Stephen Ward drew her into fashionable circles. At the height of the Cold War, she became sexually involved with a married government minister, John Profumo, as well as with a Soviet diplomat. A shooting incident between two of her other lovers caused the press to investigate her, revealing that her affairs could be threatening national security. In the House of Commons, Profumo denied any improper conduct but later admitted that he had lied.
Profumo affair would resign shortly, Macmillan announced his intention to stay on. On the eve of the Conservative Party's annual conference in October 1963 he fell ill; his condition was less serious than he imagined, and his life was not in danger but, convinced he had cancer, he resigned abruptly. His successor as prime minister was Lord Home, who renounced his peerage and served as Sir Alec Douglas-Home. In the October 1964 general election the Conservative Party was narrowly defeated, and Wilson became prime minister. A later commentator opined that the Profumo affair had destroyed the old, aristocratic Conservative party: "It wouldn't